The other day I ended up talking to a bunch of random people, in a distinctly non-sexual setting. Think business bullshit. There was a surplus of women in the group, all of which seemed rather interchangeable. At one point they were talking about their favorite vegetarian recipes. At that point, though, I excused myself, grabbed an acquaintance, and we ended up treating ourselves to a nice steak.
As I was working on my 250g tenderloin, I had to laugh when I realized that none of the women who were blabbing on about their “healthy nutrition”, with all its “sustainability” were actually in good shape. They were post-college, mid-twenties. None of them seemed to live physically active lives anymore. 50 % of their bullshit jobs probably consisted of dicking clitting around on Facebook and Instagram. Yet, despite having a fat ass, they felt the need to proselytize about the importance of vegetarian cuisine. It’s a bit like Church officials telling you that you shouldn’t drink, take drugs, or have extra-marital sex. Oh, and donate as much as possible to the poor. Meanwhile, they fuck little boys, live lavish lives, and are familiar with every sin in the book.
Think about it: if you really wanted to eat healthily, chances are you would just fucking do it. Yes, you would really do it. You would probably avoid processed foods as much as possible, if not altogether, keep an eye on calories, and make sure you get enough fruit and vegetables, too. On the other hand, if you suffered from a weak ego and were part of a peer group that condones certain lifestyle choices, would just spout the party line. “Yes, of course it’s important to lead a healthy live!”, fat Suzy thinks. In her mind she is in the clear because she had salad (with high-calorie dressing) for lunch today, and spends 40 minutes a week doing Hatha Yoga. Somehow her extra 30 pounds don’t count.
I have dated women who were into vegetarianism and healthy living. They were all in great shape. In fact, considering that weight gain is a consequence of calorie consumption being larger than energy expenditure, it is easy to see why women who really focus on their nutrition are in great shape: it is very hard to overeat on grains and vegetables. Just try it yourself and eat 1000 calories worth of salad. On the other hand, 1000 calories of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream will go down infinitely easier and faster. This might also explain why Suzy has a fat ass. After all, her 200 calories of grains, veggies and fruit pale in comparison to ice cream, chocolate, soft drinks, and alcohol, which constitute a significant part of her daily food intake.
Just because you think vegetarianism is moral, healthy, safe, sustainable, good, great, best and other shit doesn’t mean beacon starts to stop smelling good.
It’s that nagging shoulder angel who comes out of nowhere after they eat a salad and whispers “treat yoself”
Not only that. It also whispers, “You deserve it!”
The thing that makes me laugh the most is when these women (some men as well) get outright obese, they will do “absolutely everything” to lose weight. One of those things include what idiotic mainstream media calls detox. That basically means you can eat all you want and just one day you will drink a “special potion” consisting of, I don’t know, water with lemon, honey and fairy juice. And that will of course magically detoxicate your entire body and you will instantly wash out all of the utter crap you ate along with losing weight, obviously. Miraculous! Another one of those “miraculous” methods include not eating in the evening. Of course none of those miraculous methods include consuming less calories than you burn throughout the day and proper exercise. Let’s not even mention eating healthy food even if there is a calorie deficit.
Aaron thinks everyone has the same satiety hormones and the same willpower which is funny. For some people the only way to lose weight is to be locked in modern day Auschwitz. For others they need a crutch like nicotine gums with some good antidepressant. That was in my case. In addition, I had to play computer games in 99% of my free time to make hunger go away and only go to see my family downstairs (in kitchen that is) when my one meal per day time was up.
And let’s add one last thing. Despite what some after before photos may suggest, many people have almost the same face having BMI of 30 and BMI of like 26. For them the effort may seem futile.
On the other hand, feel good information sells, and woman bloggers love to perpetuate information about quick fixes and opinions that calories don’t count because much thyroid. My fat mother consistently does “exercises” to lose weight, just after asking me to bring her some cookies.
Of course people differ in will power, which explains very well why some people are fat: they just can’t keep their fingers out of the cookie jar. However, we certainly differ in our view on the role of will power, because I do not think it is an adequate excuse for personal failures. If this does not sound quite right to you, then please look up research on will power. As it turned out, it can be trained. Thus, it follows that the fat tend to be lazy. But don’t tell it to them, lest you want to be exposed to “muh thyroids” sermons.
Aaron, could you provide some research links? I’m interested.
Thanks!
Here you go:
. Hagger, Martin S., Chantelle Wood, Chris Stiff, and Nikos LD Chatzisarantis. “Ego depletion and the strength model of self-control: a meta-analysis.” Psychological bulletin 136, no. 4 (2010): 495.
. Metcalfe, Janet, and Walter Mischel. “A hot/cool-system analysis of delay of gratification: dynamics of willpower.” Psychological review 106, no. 1 (1999): 3.
Awesome!
Thank you.
This is not always matter of will power. I struggled with different levels of body fat for most of my youth. Even developed a pretty severe binge eating habit. People said I am just a fat fuck and that I have a lack of willpower besides playing sports and going to the gym. Turns out my high carb cravings and binge eating episodes stem from very low serotonin levels. After I fixed it with medication a well balanced and natural is now possible and sustainable for me.
Aaron I havent read the paper you cited there, but just a quick heads up on ego depletion: that entire field of study has recently been called into question as possibly pseudocientific. I am not affirming it is, I haven’t read that much into the subject, but I know there are serious issues surrounding the reproducibility of research on ego depletion.
Not sure if this helps to boost or undermine your argument there.
Quote some sources and I’ll have a look.
I’m on the road right now, but the quickest I can link to is this article in Slate describing the controversy. Its from march 2016. This article also contains plenty of links to other sources
http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/cover_story/2016/03/ego_depletion_an_influential_theory_in_psychology_may_have_just_been_debunked.html
@Yarara
The argument for ego depletion goes sth like this: Tasks which require self control, when having occurred before, do have a negative impact on your ability to use your will power on subsequent tasks.
I mean… that makes sense, no?
Have a look at the kitchen, classic example… Most of the cooks are fat. Is it from the fact that you have to taste so much stuff in the kitchen? Certainly not. Checking the seasoning doesn’t require enormous amounts of eating. Also, there is not that much tasting going on in a kitchen anyway. But the tasks which are performed require self control. You will want to kill someone on every Sunday after 12:15 pm, I assure you. So much stress, so much random bullshit. So many dumb waiters fucking up your day. It all eats away from your reservoir. Do you really think you can say no to that non-served bit of steak you had to cut off? To that piece of cake lying around next to the pastry chef’s cutting board? That sip of Coca Cola in your refrigerator? The vanilla ice cream is just on top of the freezer, lemme get some… See? In a kitchen it’s all available on top of that. And hey… you have worked hard for it, no? Oh and that beer at the end of the service? Hell yeah. Also, where are my fucking cigarettes.. oh and Jean-Pierre said he’s gonna get some coke, boy I deserve a sniff after today’s nightmare…
I had very few colleagues who were slim, three out of around fifty. But here is the thing: they were the best cooks, the best workers, they delivered the most constant work, were mentally fairly stable (as far as that’s possible in a kitchen^^) and they were very creative, too.
All in all real professionals. Kinda makes sense that you don’t get far if you give up early due to a general lack of willpower.
Note another thing here:
It makes sense that there are different levels of will power to be found in people.
But…I’m fairly confident that this is not the whole picture.
Certain not so uncommon experiences in one’s childhood can cause self defeating behaviour later on which of course would kill any change for the better by destroying it. If you don’t work on your emotions, on your barriers, on your hidden anger and hate… no chance, you’ll keep on finding ways of fucking yourself up. Overeating is one way.
In other words, comparing people who are not on the same level of mental health, is useless in my view.
I’m one of these people.
I ate the most spartan diet for years:
= Zero processed foods
= No frying of food
= No liquid aside from water
Not a SINGLE exception for years…
Was still obese.
I can’t be accused of lacking willpower either, because I’m literally in the top 1% of success in several areas of life. I’m one of the most insane workaholics you’ll find… insane discipline.
You have no idea what it’s like to be born with a different satiety/hunger level Aaron, you just don’t. The differences in “natural” satiety/hunger differences between people are LARGER than the differences produced by eating “junk food” vs “healthy food”.
== The only two things that have worked for me are:
1) Caloric budgetting (setting how many calories you can eat per meal)
It worked for me, but i was the most miserable angry SOB. It was actually EASIER for me to restrict calories if I had more “fun food”.
Restricting both AMOUNT and type of food is more difficult when you’re born with insane hunger/lack of satiety. If I use a budgetting method, it’s actually EASIER for me to maintain a good BF by eating “semi-dirty”. It’s impossible if I only eat “clean”.
2) Intermittent fasting/dieting
– Intermittent dieting is where you only restrict calories on certain days. This allows people like me to not snap and go berserk by always being “on a diet”
– Intermittent fasting is where you have periods of “not eating”. The way it works is that it’s actually easier for some people to “eat nothing” than to “eat little”. It works for some of us, because we can eat less calories in the day, yet it doesn’t have the same negative effect as “caloric budgeting” where you eat a bunch of small healthy meals.
The “Don’t stuff your face with cheetos” is a silly stereotypical oversimplification. So is “get off your couch”. Every tracker I’ve ever used tells me I’m in the top 99% percentile of physical activity. (I had the same activity when I was obese). And you know what, if I stop fasting I’ll become obese again. No matter how “clean” my diet is. Despite being more active than 99% of people.
What are your thoughts on taking high quality multivitamins? (whole food multivitamins,not the cheap synthetic crap that most people who haven’t done their research buy.)
I know its not as good as eating clean,but I’m assuming its better than not doing it. I speak as someone who loves meat and hates most vegetables (there are a few ones I like though..)
Aaron isnt a specialist in diet and health things, so he can’t give you a full answer on that.
Do your own research and find out what works best for you, but keep in mind: eating an apple or some citrus fruits is far more healthy and digestive than taking some vitamin c supplement. And not to forget, fruits are flavorful and filling.
On the contrary, if you do your research (and reading manosphere redpill or bodybuilding blogs isn’t “research”) you will come to the conclusion that buying cheap vitamine supplements with a lower bioavailability is the better idea if you really need supplementation (which most people don’t: http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2013/12/19/supplements-flushing-your-money-down-the-toilet-in-expensive-urine/). You just take two cheap pills to compensate for a lower bioavailability and save money.
@Martin
The problem isn’t just the lower bio availability,but synthetic vitamins can actually be potentially harmful,read this:
http://effectivediagnosis.org/synthetic-vitamins-and-minerals/
You should read the whole article,but to take a specific quote regarding the “expensive urine”:
“This is what occurs with all synthetic vitamins: the body treats them as toxins,leading to the “expensive urine” of excess vitamin intake referred to frequently, since the human system via the urinary tract attempts to rid itself of the major quantity of such foreign chemicals.”
You are probably right however that most people don’t really need supplementation. but if you’re gonna shell out cash for vitamins,you might as well get something that is high quality and trusted,or don’t buy any at all. Of course,just because a product has the word “Natural” in it doesn’t automatically make it good/reliable,but with enough research,you should be able to tell if its good. this video should be a good start:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-aG2RGABQDA&t=162s
Again,this is obviously not a replacement for good nutrition,although it can somewhat serve as a band-aid if you eat like shit. I’ll be getting a whole food multivitamin myself soon,and see for myself what it’ll do for me and if I need it. I’ve tried synthetic vitamins before in the past and it wasn’t worth it for me.
I stay away from B-Vitamines, i.e., in particular riboflavin which is a photosensitizer (basically makes your skin age quicker under UV light)
See:
Food Funct. 2012 May;3(5):487-502. doi: 10.1039/c2fo10246c. Epub 2012 Mar 12. Riboflavin as a photosensitizer. Effects on human health and food quality
@ Alek
I absolutely agree with you. I have successfully implemented the IF protocol in my busy lifestyle with ease. Only now I can control my calorie food intake and feel fully satisfied during the day. It also caters well better to social life as you can set your eating window around the time of social gatherings. But some people just use it as an excuse to binge eat. Two to three meals work best for me.
By the way, I loved your blog post “Greed is good”. I am just in the process of reading through Mating Selfishness which has just come to my attention. Marvellous! Someone mentioned you are an successfull entrepreneur. Do you mind sharing your industry without giving out any details?
Vegetarians for health? Most do it for animal rights in my experience. And mask it as an environmental issue nowadays. Which is infuriating, as this means they spread bullshit about the environmental issues (*). I was a vegetarian for environmental issues myself. Which made the lies a bit obvious.
*: Eating meat is bad for the environment. (Not only co2, but also the usage of water supplies, fossil fuels (which are limited), land usage, etc). But everybody always compares eating beef with eating only vegetables.
Of course, beef is the worst (cows are pretty bad). By a huge factor. And vegetables are the best. The rest of the food ends up fairly in the middle. But cows are so bad that eating cheese is worse than eating chickens. So the standard story (eating meat is 10 – 100 times as bad as eating vegetarian) is not totally true. Standard comparisons also compare 100 grams of meat with 100 grams of veggies. And we all know that these are not nutritionally equal.
tl;dr Don’t want to stop eating meat, but still want to reduce your footprint? Cut out beef.
Funny thing: most vegetarians and vegans are not the brightest people. They see some video on facebook or YouTube where animals have been killed in a masochistic and torturous way and outraged repost it with “this is how animals will be killed to satisfy the hunger of you f**** meat eaters”
Some videos are made in third world countries and that definitely means the circumstances are the same here, no control and legislation…yeah right. And the fact that the video has been posted on facebook proves that it’s from neutral sources and not again propaganda of vegan associations.
“Most vegetarians and vegans are not the brightest people.” That has not been my experience. But then again, I know a lot of people who are (and were) vegetarians/vegans before facebook was a thing.
And I have never even heard of anybody seriously being converted to being a vegetarian by random facebook shares. (Same with the anti smoking stuff with the bunnies being forced to smoke).
Humans definitely were not vegetarians as they evolved, and a strong case can be made that the bulk of what is found in the supermarket is not part of our natural diet, and probably should not be consumed. Studies of hunter-gatherers tend to show that they get two thirds or more of their calories from animal products, and they also tend to be in the best physical condition.
Interesting fact- according to a norwegian study- the reason there are more severly obese women than men- is because women to a larger extent then men use food to comfort themselves….
No kidding.
A previous job I had a few years back was so stressful (low level manager in customer support) I gained a few kilos stress eating cookies. Caught between legitimately angry customers and non-cooperating upper management, I could literally not keep my hands from the cookie jar! 🙂
I never had any shoulder devils telling me I deserved them… It was more like “I know this is not healthy, but fuck it. Everything else already is!”
@ Yarara
Didn’t you mentioned how you’re income grew a lot?
My guess is that this job as a low level manager in customer support didn’t pay that much? I’m curious to hear about you’re story and how you found the drive to turn you’re life around.
Aaron’s post about complacency was also great but just like you back then, I’m also at a point where I have to change directions in life. So stories that inspire are always welcome 🙂
@Sleazy, maybe this should move to open thread? or the discussion about complacency?
Perhaps this too is a conversation to move to the forum. I will give a short version here, if anyone cares for more detail I will develop further in the forum, which I think allows for a smoother dialog than a comment thread. BTW if no one has yet, I am starting that thread on personal finances too.
So the short version is, after university I struggled to find a job that I both liked and paid enough to move out of my parents place, so when I got the chance at an entry level job at this company I took it, and somewhat unexpectedly found myself running the place at the operational level. But the job was demanding, poorly paid, and stressful. I am naturally austere, so I managed to save enough to be able to quit my job and not have to worry about running out of money (or borrowing from dad) for at least 9 months. I still had not moved out of my parents place, that was a big plus on the savings side. I was barely ever home anyway, just came home late from work or university (I was doing post graduate courses at the time) and left early.
I tried to quit after 2 years, when I realized there was not any room for further advancement at this company, despite putting in my best efforts. I felt cheated and increasingly depressed, could hardly get out of bed in the morning. Thats not a life to live.
When I told him I was leaving my boss pretty much begged me to stay and gave me a moderate pay raise. I put up with it for another 6 months and quit for good. It was somewhat of a leap of faith, but I felt reassured that I had a cash cushion to fall back on for some time. For the first time in three years I felt some freedom, and it was delicious!
At the time I had a long time girlfriend who was messing up my life, although I was oblivious to that fact at the time. My quitting my job led to a big fight with her and I suddenly realized… I can walk out on her too! The separation process was unnecessarily long and bitter, but just like my job, I had come to the conclusion it was going nowhere (it was going somewhere allright – just not where I wanted it to go) 🙂 and stuck to my determination to break free. The taste of total freedom was amazing.
Without a job, a bitchy gf, or any other responsibilities to take care of I thought: I might never have another moment like this in my life. Lets make the most of it! So I took my savings, and went backpacking to see the world.
It was the best thing I did in my life.
Ps: How I got to be financially independent later on is a topic for a different post entirely….
Quote from Sleazy:
“Of course people differ in will power, which explains very well why some people are fat: they just can’t keep their fingers out of the cookie jar. However, we certainly differ in our view on the role of will power, because I do not think it is an adequate excuse for personal failures. ”
That goes for everything (underlined) in life, not just fatness and weight loss. The lack of will power is the main result for the lack of success in life in general, including the lack of success with women.
And yes, it can be trained, just like with anything else, from easy to hard, to extreme and beyond extremity. Each step towards the insane willpower, I’d say.
Ok so a few articles and studies relevant to this thread:
In this article they reference a study where- “signs of ego depletion were observed only in test subjects who believed willpower was a limited resource. “:
https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/automatic-you/201611/the-way-you-think-about-willpower-is-hurting-you
And I was reading up on serotonin- low serotonine levels is as far as I can see correlated with increased compulsiveness and aggression and more difficulty in controlling food intake. When dieting all people experience lower serotonin levels, but this happens to a larger extent for women than men according to a study referenced in this article:
http://nutritionwonderland.com/2009/06/understanding-bodies-serotonin-connection-between-food-and-mood/
But then again does that necessarily mean that girls end up in a more compulsive state than men…. maybe, maybe not- there are differences between male and female brains….
And also when we are talking about what weight a person is at- it isn’t that much about what happens while you are dieting- it is about how much food/calories you generally eat under “normal” circumstances.
And of course “more difficult” means “more difficult”, it is not the same as “impossible”….
I should also add that there does not seem to be a clear correlation between low serotonine and depression in research, that is primarlily Bigpharma marketing ( a certain percentage of depressed people non the less feel less depressed if they raise their serotonin levels..) And higher than normal serotonin levels seem to be correlated with social anxiety…
Cmon Aaron stick to Women and politics man, you clearly do not have a good handle on nutrition. Nutrition and weight are two separate things. Given calories are king when it comes to weight and vegetarians that subsititute chips and animal products for meat are going to pack it on. But in almost all instances vegetarians life expectancies are far higher than omnivores because meat, red meat in particular is terrible for you. Fat people can live longer than skinny people, appearance is not always a reflection of health.
Inb4 ” but muh protein”
seitian (vital wheat gluten) = 75g of protein per 100 grams
steak = 25g of protein per 100grams
> Do more research rather than using pseudo logic inspired by a false masculinity
The evidence is not nearly as clear as you claim. For instance, a well-known study compares the life expectancy of Seventh-Day Adventists with regular Joes, and found that the former life longer. However, the study didn’t control for the fact that that the former also avoid alcohol and nicotine.
Furthermore, I doubt that many vegetarians use protein supplements. That was certainly not the case with those I met.
Lastly, I would very much like to see a study on the life expectancy of the kind of fat vegetarians I mentioned in my post. Compared to someone with a balanced diet and an active lifestyle, it may be years less.
>WHO declared red meat as a class 1 carcinogen
>China study – The largest dietary study of all time showed a strong correlation between vegetarian and vegan diets and higher life expectancies
>Dietary blue zones of higher life expectancies in China, Russia and the Mediterranean where people ate diets consisting of predominately carbohydrates with little to no red meat . Areas in rural china showed residents lived longer than their city counterparts due to carb based diets.
“Furthermore, I doubt that many vegetarians use protein supplements. That was certainly not the case with those I met.”
Anecdotal claims are not accurate representations of reality, you know this. Sietain is not a protein supplement but a meat substitute just like tofu ,tempeh ect ect. In my experience Vegetarians generally only tend to use protein supplements if they are avid lifters or athletes .
There is no study for specifically fat vegetarians but through the power of deduction I think it would be fair to say at the very least 25% could be considered overweight and yet in countless studies outlive their omnivorous counterparts. Discounting genetics which is the major contributor to lifespan there is an undeniable trend towards a good diet and extended life span.
If you do eat meat a max 2-3 serves a week is recommended by dietetics. Most people eat way more (some everyday) therefore do not stand a chance against the average vegetarian even if they are fat.
The “power of deduction” would lead to the assumption that if you are fat, the occasional token vegetarian meal you consume will do very little for your health.
Feel free to list a few of the “countless studies” you refer to. Just for starters, the book “The China Study”, which you mention, has its fair share of critics. At the same time, you may want to work on your reading comprehension because you obviously don’t get what phenomenon my post describes. For my argument, it is simply irrelevant whether there are any health benefits to vegetarianism at all as it would be an entirely separate question.
The “power of deduction” would lead to the assumption that if you are fat, the occasional token vegetarian meal you consume will do very little for your health.
I agree, you do realise I am referring to strict fat vegetarians (no meat at all). I was under the pre tense that you were talking about these types, not just fat chicks who eat lentils once a week. It is entirely possible that I have misinterpreted your points.
http://www.who.int/features/qa/cancer-red-meat/en/
http://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/article-abstract/2540540
Heart disease:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7019459
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17364116
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15172426
Vegetarian diets favourable to general population diets:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25198208
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9989963
Ive got plenty more studies if these are not satisfactory.