Through the Smoke and into the Clear

I talk a lot about dieting here, I know this. The fact that I talk about dieting more than training or steroids is because of the fact that diet is really 90% of the equation. Steroids are overrated, most supplements are hype, and when you see a guy with rock hard muscles, good aesthetics and detail, that guy has dieted his ass off. There are no 2 ways around it.

It's not easy, if it were easy then everyone would be doing it. But there is going to come a point in your diet where you're going to question yourself. You're probably going to get depressed at times, and you're going to get hungry and possibly irritable. When you're in the thick of it all, this is going to seem like a war.

So, what gets me through it all?

I'm not going to bullshit you guys. I'm going to give you the straight up truth about what I do. There are times when I will get a few pinches of cereal, a few Ritz crackers, or maybe a couple light beers twice a week. I can't drink much anymore, but a couple light beers twice a week doesn't hurt me when I'm dieting. Sometimes your stomach just needs something to fill it up, and taking the edge off makes things easier.

I look at these things like coming in for a pit stop, not necessarily sitting out a race. If doing these things allows you to go for longer periods of time without a full on cheat meal, my advice is to do it. I've laid out some diets here, and my diets are pretty straight forward, but just know that there are days here and there where I will do some of these things to help keep me going.

Something else you can do without blowing the diet is to take in some form of heavier carbs on occasion. There are numerous times throughout my diet where I'll have a couple packs of instant grits instead of rice or potatoes. It's still only a couple hundred calories, maybe 40-50 grams of carbs, and keeps me within caloric ranges, but it just seems more filling to me. Usually I even look better the next couple days when I throw something like this in there.

The few pinches of cereal is most often post workout, when I'm fucking starving and I'm waiting on something to finish in the microwave or cook. Now I'm talking a few pinches here, we aren't sitting down to a bowl of Frosted Flakes with milk! It just helps keep my head on straight. What you have to understand is there are times when I come home from the gym and I feel like I'm going to collapse. I'm in a hurry to eat, I'm irritable, and if this keeps me from totally blowing the diet then I'm going to do it.

When it comes to having a cheat meal, it's really not the taste I'm craving. I believe that there is something my body is telling me it's missing that leads me to have a cheat meal. Probably calories and fats, and there is really no set day to have a cheat meal. I really just go as long as I can handle before I do it. Sometimes it's once a week, sometimes it's once every 2 weeks, or other times it's once every 5 or 6 days. It really just depends on how I feel and also how I look.

The further you get into your diet, the more your appearance changes day in and out. One day you could be looking flat, and the next day you're looking pumped and full. You'll start getting very defined and you might find that for some odd reason there is a day where it looks like it's started to go away. Your body will play tricks on you, and so will your mind. There are going to be times when you think you look off, and other people are telling you that you look spot on. My advice is to take a period of a couple weeks and don't even look at your physique. Just keep sticking to the game plan.

If you're craving something sweet then another thing you can do is a few sugar free Popsicles. Sugar free Popsicles have gotten me through some rough times. I'd highly suggest them.

Something else you could do is just eat healthy but switch the foods around for a day. If you've been eating chicken each day then switch to fish or steak. Instead of eating oatmeal for breakfast, throw in a few pieces of Ezekial toast and a Greek yogurt.

You may find that dieting is not as difficult as you once thought when you have random days where you do things like this. You should have no trouble achieving a lean and mean physique when you practice some of these things. It's only the last month before something like a competition where I cut out shit like this and just go 100% to the said diet.

Yes, 90% of the time I'm not deviating from the diet, but if I do stray off course there are ways of doing it without blowing it. This is especially important if your diet is a 24/7/365 deal where you're trying to look good all the time, and not just for a specific time frame or event. Sure there are times when I turn up the heat and try getting ready for something, but to eat strict and then just go back to throwing on useless weight or body fat, that makes no sense to me.

So if you find yourself in the smoke and are trying to fight through to the clear, my advice is to utilize some of these tactics and keep on pushing. This is the truth about how I do things, I'm not going to candy coat shit and make myself out to sound like someone who is any different than the rest of you. I get cravings, I get hungry, and it's tough for me too.

Train hard brothers!

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