Preparing for a Diet

I have past experience with diets since I tend to enjoy experimenting with nutrition if the proposed change in eating habits promises something beneficial enough to warrant the change. I am usually very strict when it comes to diets since I do not want external factors affecting my results (among other reasons), and become very upset when I accidentally do something that goes against the diet. I’ve noticed that if I make a mistake like this, it happens only when the following two conditions are met
• I started the diet a few days ago
• I am not at home (a friend’s house, shopping at the grocery store, etc.)

For example, imagine you’re shopping at a health food store and some tasty snacks are being sampled. You’re almost positive that the food is allowed on your diet and help yourself to a few bites. You then come home and realize that whatever you ate is in fact a big no-no food on your diet. Of course, an easy solution would be too never sample snacks in such places, but I find that one way or another, if I don’t really know the diet rules too well, I will usually slip in the early stages of the diet, and this is really frustrating for the perfectionist in me. Additionally, many seemingly innocent products you're consuming may actually contain disallowed ingredients. For example, the green tea you drink every morning may contain "natural flavors" when you're diet prohibits any added flavors, natural or not.

Now to find a workaround to this problem, you would have to find a way to acquaint yourself well enough with the diet to avoid any slips. To do this, I propose rehearsing the diet for about a week in advance before you actually start it full-on. For example, I’m planning on starting McCombs Plan sometime soon. The “Plan” consists of four components: supplements, diet, sweating, and drinking lots of water. For the “trial period” I’m going to rehearse three components of the Plan as best as I can: eating the permitted foods, drinking all the water required, and sweating every day by spending a half-hour in a warm bath. Any unintentional errors will be permitted since I have not officially started the Plan.

Additionally, I will take “mock supplements” as part of my trial period since there is a specific protocol for taking them. For example, when the time comes to take my Detox Essentials supplement, I will dedicate a few seconds of my time to envision myself taking the supplement.

Now the McCombs Plan has two phases regarding supplements. Though Detox Essentials is taken throughout the whole time you are on the plan, Candida Force is only taken during the first phase and Flora Prime is only taken during the second phase of the plan. However, there is an overlap period one week in which you are to take all three supplements. It is this period of overlap that I will be basing my trial period on in regards to supplements.

Lastly, I’d like to clarify the reasons why I’m not going to conduct the trial period of the diet with the real supplements. First off, the supplements must be ordered and they are sold in the exact quantities necessary for the Plan. If I were to take the real supplements during the trial, I would have to spend an extra an extra $89 plus shipping and taxes for supplements. More importantly, I see that for psychological reasons, the trial period must have some aspect that differentiates it from the true diet. If the trial diet is identical to the real one, then it becomes difficult to view them as distinct phases. By loosening some aspects of the diet for the trial period, you are psychologically reinforcing that what you are doing is preparing for the diet and not actually starting.

For example, lets say I wanted to try a vegetarian diet; for my trial week, instead of eating vegetarian all day long, I would eat purely vegetarian for all meals except for lets say dinner. In this case, I would be careful to make sure throughout the day that the food I’m eating contains no meat. At dinner time, though, I would resume my regular eating habits. Once the initial trial week was over, I would be ready to begin my vegetarian diet and would eat all my meals vegetarian.