I’ve started going down a bit of a rabbit hole with understanding more about fat loss and dieting in general. I came across the Renaissance Periodization channel on YouTube (I’ll refer to Mike as RP from now on) and he’s got a lot of good information. I quantify “good” as he seems to know what he’s talking about, he cites papers, he has a consistent vocabulary that he defines, and yes many of those terms are in-line with other research I’ve done previously.
One of the videos I came across is on Diet Soda and how it’s a “hack” and he used the term properly – doing something unexpected within a system for a desired outcome.
I’ve started drinking diet soda – more as a psychological hack than anything – the thing is it works. I was listening to another of RP’s videos and he mentioned people having a hard time with dieting simply because they’re bored. That’s something I realized when I started this challenge.
Yeah, I should do a dopamine fast – but lets focus on one major life change at a time okay?
So yeah, I bought a couple six packs of Cherry Coke Zero last night and I drank three bottles – yeah it’s excessive, but there isn’t any downside to it aside from the few bucks the sodas cost. Still cheaper than alcohol and better for my teeth, gut, weight, and liver. So I’ll take take that as a big life improvement.
One thing I will say about switching – it’s easy enough to deal with diet – just accept that it will taste different. The soda will taste close, but it won’t quite be right. Although yeah the Coke Zero does taste like 99.5% the same where diet tastes like 98% the same.
Anyway, I was thinking about how I don’t talk much about “not drinking” during these journals it’s been more about what else I’m doing as a result of “not drinking.” Simply stopping behaviors are nearly impossible – they have to be replaced with something else. There are these behavioral loops that play out over and over – if you try to remove a loop, then your brain is effectively stuck waiting for the loop to finish. Thus you’re constantly thinking about the behavior you’ve removed. But if you replace the undesired loop with another loop, then your brain can keep moving forward. Yes, opportunities for the old loop will still come up, but if you change the response to the desire for the loop to another loop – then you’ll build a new pattern of behavior.
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