We Don’t Give Out Meal Plans

You Still Have To Cook

A big complaint I hear from people who are apprehensive about starting a nutrition plan is that they “just don’t have time/don’t like to cook”. Aside from the fact that the time excuse makes me crazy, a meal plan will not save you from the time suck that is preparing your meals. In fact, it most likely will take more time out of your week.

Think about it, if you have a meal plan that stipulates 4 meals per day and a snack you will need to have those meals prepared exactly the night before. So you might need to make some eggs, a small salad, some grilled chicken, some steamed broccoli, a cup of rice, and pack a piece of fruit with some cottage cheese. That is a lot of individual items that will need to be cooked and separated in order to be prepared for the next day. And that’s just one day. If the menu changes from day to day then you have to do this every single night. Hopefully, there will be some overlap in menu items but there is no guarantee.

Compare that to our 3-3-3 method. Basically, pick 3 lean proteins, 3 carbs, and 3 fats and use them to make up all of your meals for at least the first couple of weeks. So in order to prep for the week, you might cook a few pounds of chicken, a couple pounds of shrimp, and have some liquid egg whites ready to go for breakfast. Make a big pot of rice, buy some fruit, and have some instant oatmeal ready to go for breakfast. Use peanut butter, olive oil, and feta cheese for your fats, and you are ready. That two hours on a Sunday and a Wednesday each week is immensely preferable to nightly prepping.

You Aren’t Learning

We love to educate our clients along the way. Research shows that many people who lose weight to dieting often gain in back over the next few years. If people are successful at losing weight, why do so many people gain it back? And what is the secret that SISU members have found that has helped them to keep it off?

For one, many diets are just telling you what to do, but they aren’t educating you on “why”. A meal plan hands you an specific menu that you must recreate exactly if you wish to see success. But what happens after the meal plan ends? Will you continue to recreate it forever? Or will you at some point hope to make your own meal plan? Have dinner with friends? Go to a restaurant with your significant other? Good luck with that.

Some of our most successful stories continue to keep the weight off well after they have “graduated” and no longer work with a SISU coach directly. They weren’t just told what to eat; they were educated on the mechanisms that drive fat loss, muscle gain, and were given guidelines on how to maintain. The education is the greatest value that one can take from investing in a nutrition program such as ours because it lasts forever, not just the duration of the “diet”.

They Are Too Restrictive

A big issue with lack of diet adherence long term is the diet itself being too restrictive. While this can actually be a positive in the short term by eliminating foods that were major culprits in the client’s weight gain (high-calorie beverages, alcohol, highly tasty foods), in the long term it can lead to breakdowns and “cheats” or lessened adherence. It’s why we see so much success short term with 30-day challenges such as Whole 30 only to see them gain back the weight and then some. Many people can white-knuckle it for a few weeks but when the dam is released the flood waters come rushing in hard.

A meal plan is no different. There is no room for variation, no allowance for socialization over food, and no way to adjust your diet when you aren’t able to eat the meal that has been prescribed that very moment. There is no option to adjust when your plan gets blown up. We have found that a better way is to allow for some variance, limited at first, in order to help the transition from diet mode to lifestyle mode more seamless. We believe that it is much more realistic to hope for success in normal life after having practiced while under the guidance of a coach than to start practicing the day after your precise nutrition plan is over.

If your goal is long-term success in the area of body composition you must learn to exist in a real-world environment. Meal plans just do not give you that allowance.

There Is No Self-Determination

A determining factor in long-term success in both nutrition and exercise is one of motivation.

We hear a lot about motivation in the fitness and nutrition spheres and let’s just understand that every behavior has a motivating factor and that it can either be external (extrinsic) or internal (intrinsic). When you receive a meal plan it removes freedom. But as the new car smell starts to fade from your diet, as weight loss fades or plateaus, as you start to get sick of the foods you are eating you will begin to lean on any motivating factors you may have available to you. If you have not had the freedom to develop your own intrinsic motivation, to learn to love the process, you are doomed to failure.

If, instead, you were to commit to a nutrition plan that allowed you to make individual food choices and also allowed you to decide when and what to eat (within certain parameters) how would you feel when things became difficult? If you were motivated by the process and how you have changed as a person and had exhibited control over changing yourself how much easier would it be to continue? We believe, and have the success stories to prove it, that giving you the freedom to make better choices (and sometimes to let you fail a little) you will become self-motivated to continue a healthier lifestyle long after you no longer need a coach.

It Alleviates You Of Responsibility

A meal plan is a simple way for you to remove any responsibility or accountability for your own success or failure on a nutrition program. It might sound harsh but sometimes that is just how reality is. I have found that those who are insistent about wanting meal plans are the same ones who have a laundry list of excuses for everything from why they can’t work out to why they can’t prep meals. I always say, “I will do everything in my power to help you reach your goals, but I can’t eat and train for you. That is on you.”

A meal plan lays it all out. You just eat what’s on the plan. And if it works, great. If it doesn’t, it’s not your fault. After all, you have done everything and just can’t lose weight. You must be different/special/damaged. In reality, though, there is nothing wrong with you that can’t be fixed. It will just require a bit of work on your end. And that is where your coach can add assistance.

In a nutrition program set up for long-term success, you will be held accountable for your actions. You will be responsible for planning, cooking, and tracking your food. You will be the reason if you succeed or fail. The coach is there to help you realize your potential for greatness and to bring that out of you. No meal plan can do that.

So while it sounds scary to be told that your eventual failure or success lies in your own hands, it is actually freeing. You no longer will have to rely on someone else to do it for you. You will be your own motivation.

PLAN YOUR MEALS, DON’T ASK FOR A MEAL PLAN

We believe in change. Sustainable change. In order to promote that change, we have found that there are very definitive strategies for success. Giving our members freedom, personal responsibility, nutritional education is why so many continue to be successful on their own.

Give up the meal plans. Find a plan that teaches you to make your own meal plan. Find a coach that understands you and your personal struggles. Learn to fish. And I guarantee that you will find success in ways that you never before imagined.