You may be reading this and thinking to yourself, “I would never stoop so low as to be conned into one of these fads”, but that is how they get you. That voice in the back of your head will keep whispering, “But what if?”. This resonates all the louder after that winter binge of food and drink and summer is on the horizon again. Maybe, you are planning for a wedding, maybe, you just like taking pics of yourself topless. Whatever your poison, I can tell you why (one by one) the most common scams that absolutely won’t work.

Juicing – The forefront of many adverts and popularised by such figures as Lizzo and Gwyneth Paltrow (CEO of GOOP) but obviously not for weight reducing reasons, as that would be preposterous. The idea that mixing anything together can somehow cleanse the system and give your body a clean slate is ridiculous. Dear reader, let me introduce you to your liver and kidneys, your full time juicing cleanser that literally takes zero effort for you to prepare. These two guys clean out your system of any toxins on a regular basis and, fun fact, the liver can even regenerate itself, so you’re basically already a superhero. Why do people push juicing? To sell an idea: to sell a product and eventually make you dependent on their words for future promos. Hypothetically.

Keto – This high-fat, low-carb diet is designed to make your body enter a state called ketosis (essentially the stage where you feel like you might die and have flu like symptoms because what else could you ask for, in the pursuit of losing weight) where your body is relying on fat rather than carbohydrates for energy, ATP for you biology buffs. The state you have to be in to start burning fat is something your body will fight you on at every step of the way, even eating away muscle before your body burns fat reserves and even before that you might go into starvation mode where your body will literally use anything to conserve fat levels. Evidence shows that keto adherents stack the weight back on and end up heavier than before they began, if it is not obvious, I will tell you plainly it is not sustainable long term.

5:2 Diet – There are a few variations of this one but they all come under the same banner of a fast diet and you will hate yourself for it, if you adopt this one. Essentially, you eat normally for 5 days and starve/ eat minimally for 2 days, with variations like 6:1 or even 4:3. Without stating the obvious, this is definitely not sustainable long term as you will simply bounce back into old habits like the little fat hobbit that you are. You see, there’s this chemical in your body called Ghrelin and it will hit you like a brick in a vortex and cause severe food binging once your mental state cant take the cravings anymore, resulting, you mental state to be in a worse state than you began with. You can only imagine what that will do to your self esteem, hence, fast diet.

Intermittent – People who use this word are up there with vegans, “Karens” and the crossfitters of this world, as there’s every chance they won’t shut up about why type of diet they’re on and what cycle it runs through. Guess what, no matter what some online guru told you or what crystal gem you should hold in your left chakra point while you do this diet, it won’t help. The body is more intelligent than people give it credit for and will constantly seek an equilibrium, as such, the total you eat for that day will be the total regardless of how long you have starved yourself for. Eventually, the body will see no difference unless you under eat and then you can say hello to your friend Ghrelin again. Just eat at normal intervals and save yourself the hassle, please.

New Year New Me – This is the biggest con of them all and people have made a living on the simple phrase, “New Year New Me”.  However,  it is not all doom and gloom, all you need is some consistency in your life, that is the key. Now I know I said I would charge you for this equation, that solves all, but I am feeling generous so here it is: 

 Calories in < Calories out = Calorie Deficit = Weight Loss 

And there it is. The world’s best diet that can be completed with ease and little restraint over a short period of time. That’s just it though, you can hate the simplicity of it but at the end of the day, if you want some quick fix you can access with your debit card, there is nothing that awaits you but lies and disappointment. Unfortunately, this isn’t a pay to win game, it’s real life and the currency is time and managing it requires discipline. There are no shortcuts but there’s an apt Japanese belief for this situation; there can be no true feeling of accomplishment without the struggle that comes before, properly known as your Genkai. Whether you believe in that philosophy or not, just stick to the formula, it actually works.