As I scroll through my Pinterest board, I see pins left and right with titles reading;

"21 day cleanse"

"5 Day Detox"

"1 Thing To Lose 10 pounds In A Week"

And all I can do is just shake my head.

We live in a culture totally and completely fixated on losing weight in the quickest and most lazy way possible. Short term diets are becoming a religion, and frankly it's fleeting.

No, you are not going to lose ten pounds in a week (healthily), and keep it off. No, you are not cleansing your body by just juicing. (Hello, that's what your liver is for!) Unfortunately, your quick fixes will not yield permanent results.

The biggest flaw in modern "diets" is that it promotes this "All or Nothing" mentality. "You absolutely cannot eat cake. Or ice cream. Or pizza. And donuts? Forget it! You can only eat Food A, B, and C for the next month. Watch how much weight you'll lose!"

So, how could this end up making you fat?

Imagine that your metabolism is a battery. The more you use it (and abuse it), the quicker it runs out of juice. It can no longer do it's job efficiently if you continue to abuse the privilege. So, say you are on a diet of chicken, asparagus, and rice. You continue this diet for 2 months and you are eating nothing but these 3 foods. Your body is so used to getting the nutrients in these foods alone, yet it is still craving the nutrients these foods are missing.

You body begins to pull from your muscle mass and fat mass (both are very nutrient dense!) to survive. This results in weight loss. And to make it known, muscle mass is the main contributor to a fast metabolism. So yeah, muscle is pretty important!

This way of living isn't sustainable. So one day, you end up saying "Okay, I deserve a treat." You reach for a few slices of pizza. "A few" turns into a binge of 5 slices of pizza, three servings of ice cream and other delectable foods you have missed so much since starting your useless diet.

And this is where survival mode kicks in. Your body is SO HAPPY you are filling it with something other than the plain boring nutrients it already has plenty of, so in turn, you become a fat storing machine. It's holding on to those nutrients as body fat because you're depriving it of the very important nutrients it needs.

So why does binge-eating cause so much destruction?

According to Dr. Taylor and colleagues, "binge eating has a significant effect on metabolic and leptin dynamics" (Leptin is a hormone your body secretes in order to control hunger). The findings from this study conclude that "indigestion of a large number of calories at one time impacts metabolic parameters." Essentially, you are confusing the natural hormones your body has that tell you whether you're TRULY full/hungry, or not.

So yes, eating a large amount of food in a short period of time is very, very bad for you. And yes, your diet could be making you fat. (For a much more in depth interpretation, watch Dr. Layne Norton's "Is Your Weight Loss Diet Making You Fatter?" on Youtube).

This doesn't have to be a permanent reality.

Let's talk about this fancy schmancy word called "moderation."

mod·er·a·tion: The avoidance of excess or extremes.

According to modern psychology, all or nothing thinking is linked to depression. So, why in the world are we applying the same principles when it comes to dieting?! (Not saying dieting=depression, or maybe I am...) The world is not black or white, why should our way of eating be the same?!

A black and white mentality is extremely unrealistic. And if you have ever noticed, when you tell yourself you can't have something...it becomes even more appealing than it was before.

Moderation is a very UNDERMINED concept, especially when it comes to losing weight. Truth be told, though, there is totally a way of eating a donut every now and then and still losing weight. You must put MOST of the emphasis on whole foods, like lean protein, fibrous veggies, fruit, and slow digesting carbs.

So, instead of thinking in black or white, let's think in GRAY and enjoy healthy, nutritious foods 80 percent of the time, and still enjoy our not so nutritionally dense foods 20 percent of the time!