Moderation is a basic life skill.

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  • Mario_Az
    Mario_Az Posts: 1,331 Member
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    yea i agree with you it is just some peoples will power are stronger than others.
  • K_Serz
    K_Serz Posts: 1,299 Member
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    So what happens when you are a glutton.....but in moderation? Does that make you bipolar or something? :huh:
  • operation_cute
    operation_cute Posts: 588 Member
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    Great post :) I agree completely, it is a learned skill, unfortunately growing up I wasnt taught this skill because I could always just eat what I wanted and never gained a pound (assuming I had a naturally rocking metabolism), so my mother let me eat anything I wanted never giving it a second thought. Once I had kids that all went away and I still just ate what I wanted. I always assumed my metabolism was shot from having children, never realizing it was because I went from being active, playing sports, lifting weights, ect to doing nothing... and that was the reason I could eat what I wanted and never gain a pound :p That and I was always told "your eating for two" when in reality I only needed to eat a few extra hundred calories :( I've learned so much in the short time I've been on mfp :)
  • Sactown900
    Sactown900 Posts: 162 Member
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    not anymore it's not...hence the obesity epidemic.

    And glutony of all types, including the HUGE entitlement issue people have developed.

    Huge truth. When I used to swing in one direction, I was eating everything in sight. When I swung too far back I "lived" at the gym, ate like a bird and no one liked me.

    Now I only lift twice a week (love my routine), cycle the other five(only 30-60 minutes) and DO have a piece of birthday cake once and awhile. There CAN be moderation in loosing 50 pounds. Thanks for posting.
  • ninerbuff
    ninerbuff Posts: 48,529 Member
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    Great thread. After my first couple of years as a PT and preaching "clean eating only" to clients (because that's what was echoed by peers and the fitness industry), I realized after a few clients regained weight after reaching goal that that way of eating may not be the choice of the GENERAL population.
    Truth be told, my main clientele aren't people who are already in shape and athletic................................they're overweight/obese unfit people. So forcing them into a lifestyle of "clean eating" only worked for the goal loss, but not the lifestyle change. Which is why I now don't dictate to people what they should eat, but how they should fit it in while making sure they just reach their macro/micro nutrient goals.
    That's not to say that "clean eating" isn't something I'm against.................if that's what they WANT to do, then I can help them with that too. My main concern is to help them reach their goal and sustain it for the rest of their life.

    And MODERATION has seemed to be the most successful program that has worked for practically all of my clients. Compared to a 3/4 weight regain after a few months after reaching goal, it's now about a 1/8 ratio which is a marked improvement.

    A.C.E. Certified Personal/Group FitnessTrainer
    IDEA Fitness member
    Kickboxing Certified Instructor
    Been in fitness for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition
  • PikaKnight
    PikaKnight Posts: 34,971 Member
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    Great post :) I agree completely, it is a learned skill, unfortunately growing up I wasnt taught this skill because I could always just eat what I wanted and never gained a pound (assuming I had a naturally rocking metabolism), so my mother let me eat anything I wanted never giving it a second thought. Once I had kids that all went away and I still just ate what I wanted. I always assumed my metabolism was shot from having children, never realizing it was because I went from being active, playing sports, lifting weights, ect to doing nothing... and that was the reason I could eat what I wanted and never gain a pound :p That and I was always told "your eating for two" when in reality I only needed to eat a few extra hundred calories :( I've learned so much in the short time I've been on mfp :)

    I also didn't grow up learning moderation. Unfortunately, it wasn't pregnancy that got me but rather my development during childhood of eating because I was bored, stressed/emotional and just overeating because of the "clean your plate" attitude.

    I'm still struggling like crazy with moderation because of the emotional eating..but it gets better little by little and yeah, it makes my progress longer, but the changes are permanent.
  • BeachGingerOnTheRocks
    BeachGingerOnTheRocks Posts: 3,927 Member
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    Great thread.
  • operation_cute
    operation_cute Posts: 588 Member
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    Good to think of this when raising your children.

    Very true! I started teaching moderation even as a baby, while a lot of moms I knew were concerned with their babies finishing all the food out of the baby food jar and encouraging them to keep eating till it was finished, I stopped feeding them as soon as they showed signs of feeling full (turning head, losing interest, ect) and even now if my kids are full from dinner food is left on their plate, Id rather teach them to stop eating rather than the whole kids are starving in other countries tactic lol. That was more challenging once my two youngest became picky though :p now I make them eat their least favorite food first before there allowed to eat the rest lol so that did the trick ;)
  • El_Cunado
    El_Cunado Posts: 359 Member
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    Like :drinker:
  • operation_cute
    operation_cute Posts: 588 Member
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    Great post :) I agree completely, it is a learned skill, unfortunately growing up I wasnt taught this skill because I could always just eat what I wanted and never gained a pound (assuming I had a naturally rocking metabolism), so my mother let me eat anything I wanted never giving it a second thought. Once I had kids that all went away and I still just ate what I wanted. I always assumed my metabolism was shot from having children, never realizing it was because I went from being active, playing sports, lifting weights, ect to doing nothing... and that was the reason I could eat what I wanted and never gain a pound :p That and I was always told "your eating for two" when in reality I only needed to eat a few extra hundred calories :( I've learned so much in the short time I've been on mfp :)

    I also didn't grow up learning moderation. Unfortunately, it wasn't pregnancy that got me but rather my development during childhood of eating because I was bored, stressed/emotional and just overeating because of the "clean your plate" attitude.

    I'm still struggling like crazy with moderation because of the emotional eating..but it gets better little by little and yeah, it makes my progress longer, but the changes are permanent.

    I'm definitely a bored eater! I didn't realize it till I was an adult though :p thats what I struggle with most now that I'm trying to lose weight lol not cravings, or portion control, just mainly not grabbing something to munch on out of habbit when Im bored... knowing I have to measure everything first helps though, keeps me concious of what I'm doing :)
  • LiftAllThePizzas
    LiftAllThePizzas Posts: 17,857 Member
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    So, nice post, but I don't think it's true that moderation is equally easy to learn for everyone.

    I agree, but consider the following list, and any other basic life skills someone could add to it.
    how to walk,
    swim,
    ride a bike,
    reading and writing,
    basic math skills,
    polite skills,
    table manners,
    how to drive a car,
    how to use a toilet,
    basic hygiene,
    how to tie shoes,
    put on their own clothes,
    wait in line,
    take turns,
    share,
    moderation

    And notice that the same is true of all of them. Some people have more trouble learning math than others but find sharing to be difficult. And so on. So while I agree with that, I think the rest is not applicable. It's about finding a balance point. But many people don't know any better, and set their target for a balance point on the assumption that they were one of the unlucky ones who was born without automatic moderating powers, that their only two viable choices are deprivation or gluttony, and they never even make the effort to learn it.

    I think one should at least make a legitimate effort to learn a useful skill (or truly evaluate whether or not it's worth learning) before deciding they can't.
  • LiftAllThePizzas
    LiftAllThePizzas Posts: 17,857 Member
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    So, nice post, but I don't think it's true that moderation is equally easy to learn for everyone.


    I agree. I thought the OP was good but it is clear to me that fat loss is not purely a mental / rational / intellectual learned process which is unaffected by an individual's biochemistry.

    Psychology and physiology are interconnected. They influence each other and in a way are symbiotic.

    For example, we know that high circulating glucose levels can mediate neural impulses and make the desire for highly calorific and palatable food stronger. Consider two people. Person A has high circulating levels, person B does not. They are told the best way to approach their eating is to "learn" to eat in moderation. They both introduce amounts of say....poptarts and ice cream...into their diets.

    Person A: physiologically results in intense cravings - they in turn are hard to resist - try and exercise willpower - feels psychologically and physiologically ill at ease due to the conflict of body and mind - binges - feels psychologically a failure - falls off their programme

    Person B: physiologically results in moderate cravings - they in turn are more manageable to resist - try and exercise willpower - feels psychologically and physiologically steady due to the lesser conflict of body and mind - maintains - feels psychologically a success - adheres to their programme

    For Person A the advice to learn moderation is poor until their glucose levels falls (which they make never do if they are continually trying to incorporate very sugary items into their diet.) For Person B it is great advice.

    Ironically for Person A "learning" avoidance in the short term may exactly be what they need to achieve moderation in the long term.

    I think balance is important in life. I also think finding happiness, contentment and your unique way of doing so, whatever that may be and as long as it is safe and healthy, is much more important.
    I agree, not everyone learns moderation in the same way and there are different approaches/strategies. Some may do better to start from a restricted point and work their way up to it, while others may find it easier to whiddle their way down to a happy medium. The larger point, which you appear to agree with, is that in the long term (and let's face it, we're talking about the rest of your life here so that's a pretty big deal) the benefits are extremely likely to be worth the effort.

    The biggest issue IMO is that so many people go from the one extreme to the other and think those are their only two choices. It's made more psychologically comforting (again in the short term) to choose deprivation because it feels like a just punishment for gluttony. This is also where a lot of the "this food or food group is bad and needs to be completely avoided forever" mentality comes from. And then when they find they are miserable and don't want to eat like that for the rest of their life, they (again thinking there are only two choices) go back to gluttony.
  • sweetnlow30
    sweetnlow30 Posts: 497 Member
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    Bumping this because it really spoke to me! As a previous binge eater, I still struggle with moderating certain foods. I admit I used to feel protective and almost hostile over my food lol. Sharing was very difficult for me because I had this mentality that I didn't know when I would get to have this food again and I better enjoy every last bite. It stems from growing up in a low income "clean your plate" home. There was a whole wack of emotional issues tied into it too. Great post OP!
  • neandermagnon
    neandermagnon Posts: 7,436 Member
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    So what happens when you are a glutton.....but in moderation? Does that make you bipolar or something? :huh:

    gluttony isn't moderation, by definition. Being a glutton in moderation is like trying to be a tall short person. If you're one, you're not the other, end of.
  • rose228822
    rose228822 Posts: 186 Member
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    When moderation is mentioned, a lot of people act like it is some sort of magical superpower that some people are just born with, and you couldn't possibly expect them to ever practice moderation because they weren't lucky enough to be born that way. But the fact is that it's one of a great many learned skills that is necessary to getting along in a modern civilized technological society.

    People have to learn how to walk, swim, ride a bike, reading and writing, basic math skills, polite skills, table manners, how to drive a car, how to use a toilet, basic hygeine, how to tie shoes, put on their own clothes, wait in line, take turns, share, oh and also, how to practice moderation. These are all basic life skills that everyone should have and preferably should be learned as a child.

    Gluttony, moderation, and deprivation all lie on a spectrum that looks like this:
    moderationgraph_zps6429b6d1.png

    Gluttony is what happens when one is only concerned with short-term happiness and ignores the long-term consequences of their choices. Deprivation is what happens when one is too concerned with long-term consequences and never lets themselves enjoy things in the moment.

    What is moderation? It is the balance of both long-term and short-term. Moderation is finding that point where you can enjoy yourself in the moment in a way that is sustainable, so that you are not destroying your future ability to keep doing the same. Moderation is sustainable behavior. It is grown-up, responsible behavior.

    If you consider it in terms of money, gluttony would be spending your entire paycheck the moment you get it on pointless shiny things and maxing out any credit cards you can get, and deprivation would be putting all of your paycheck into a savings account that you can never touch for the rest of your life. As you can see, somewhere in the middle there is a happy point where you can enjoy spending some of the money you make AND do so without going broke. The same can be done with food.

    Something moderation has in common with all other learned skills is that people make mistakes and have failures while learning them. But if they keep trying they can eventually learn from their mistakes and their success. That is when it becomes useful and the previous efforts pay off. Nobody just says "I'm going to practice moderation from now on" and then goes on without ever making mistakes, any more than one would say, "I choose to instantly become a saxophone virtuoso."

    The reason to learn moderation is that the alternatives both lead to unhappiness. Gluttony also typically leads to poor health and early death. Deprivation also leads to unhappiness, or bad health in the extreme as well. And even if you 'succeed' at depriving yourself of the things you enjoy, what have you won? What is your prize? Prolonged misery? And the stress of depriving yourself also can lead to health problems, so there's not even "but at least I won't have any health problems" as a consolation prize.

    As you can see on the chart, the best combination of happiness, and good health, and sustainability lies not on either ridiculous end of the spectrum of eating everything ever, or living on a strict diet of kale chips and twigs, but on finding the balance between 1- all the foods you enjoy, and 2- all the foods that give your body the fuel and nourishment it needs. You can do both, and it's worth learning how to do it.

    Now I understand that many people come to the point of being overweight because they have other problems they need to work on as well. And also that many people are not fortunate enough to have been taught moderation as a child. But it is important, for your long term health and happiness, to understand that moderation is something you can learn, and that it's well worth the effort it takes to do so. :happy:

    If you don't mind I am going to print this and put this on my desk at work and home because it makes so much sense but sometimes a person needs to be reminded from time to time that "moderation is a basic life skill"...
    I definitely don't want to live on a strict diet where I am miserable but I also don't want to eat in excess and end up back to where I was...never again.
    I think anything done in excess is not going to be good for you and as you say basic skills should be learned in early childhood but even if learned early on some may choose to forget.
    Thank you for posting:happy:
    p.s. now if only I could learn to play pool :laugh:
  • LiftAllThePizzas
    LiftAllThePizzas Posts: 17,857 Member
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    So what happens when you are a glutton.....but in moderation? Does that make you bipolar or something? :huh:

    gluttony isn't moderation, by definition. Being a glutton in moderation is like trying to be a tall short person. If you're one, you're not the other, end of.
    I think maybe they mean IG, or Intermittent Gluttony. For example, instead of spending a little bit every week on small toys, saving your money to buy one big toy.

    But I agree with you, in the end if it is not negatively impacting your health or happiness or lifestyle (etc) then it would still be moderation.
  • Calliope610
    Calliope610 Posts: 3,771 Member
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    Now I understand that many people come to the point of being overweight because they have other problems they need to work on as well. And also that many people are not fortunate enough to have been taught moderation as a child. But it is important, for your long term health and happiness, to understand that moderation is something you can learn, and that it's well worth the effort it takes to do so. :happy:

    Haven't read all the replies, so I don't know if my point has been made by a previous poster, but many of the "other problems they need to work" are the result of the same "all or nothing", "black and white" thinking.

    A therapist once told me "Life is not black and white; there are many shades of grey." Moderation is just one shade of grey. Find the shade that makes you happy.

    BTW, great post, OP.
  • maeveslim
    maeveslim Posts: 69 Member
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    Good post, thanks :)
  • LiftAllThePizzas
    LiftAllThePizzas Posts: 17,857 Member
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    Now I understand that many people come to the point of being overweight because they have other problems they need to work on as well. And also that many people are not fortunate enough to have been taught moderation as a child. But it is important, for your long term health and happiness, to understand that moderation is something you can learn, and that it's well worth the effort it takes to do so. :happy:

    Haven't read all the replies, so I don't know if my point has been made by a previous poster, but many of the "other problems they need to work" are the result of the same "all or nothing", "black and white" thinking.

    A therapist once told me "Life is not black and white; there are many shades of grey." Moderation is just one shade of grey. Find the shade that makes you happy.

    BTW, great post, OP.
    Yep, only considering extremes tends to cause a lot of problems.
  • KANGOOJUMPS
    KANGOOJUMPS Posts: 6,472 Member
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    well said.

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