The Integrity Diet–how To Lose The Dead Weight In Your Life

Everywhere I turn, people are on some kind of a diet. Whether
it’s Atkins or South Beach, people are obsessed with the right
mix in their food choices to reach their ultimate weight. Of
course, the most popular diets involve carbohydrates and
proteins. The idea behind these diets is that foods are divided
more or less into three categories:

Proteins—Chicken breasts and salmon (all good)

Good Carbs—Whole grains and leafy vegetables (necessary, but in
moderation)

Bad Carbs—Breads, pizza crusts, and pastas (avoid these unless
you want to stay overweight).

It’s a structure that also applies pretty well to the people
that surround us.

People Proteins

We all know our proteins. These are the people who bring out the
best in us and give us energy and support, reinforce our drive
to achieve, and help us grow personally and professionally.
These can include our mentors, our most unconditionally
supportive or inspirational friends, our spouses and partners,
and our children.

Good Carb People

The good carbs may be the trickiest to identify. These can be
friends and associates who are generally good influences, and
provide useful help, but may be best experienced in small doses.
Maybe these are loyal colleagues who provide useful support at
work but maybe they lack the same drive we do. Or they can be
good friends who care about us and are always there to lend an
ear or can always be counted on the make us laugh, but may have
a few bad habits we don’t want to rub off on us.

You can’t and shouldn’t get rid of good carbs, since they do
provide some value in your life, but you have to be careful not
to spend too much time with them or rely on them too heavily.

Bad Carb People

Of course, you can easily recognize the bad carbs in your life.
These are the toxic people who waste our time, drain our energy,
dampen our self-esteem or try to influence us in the wrong
direction.

These are the “friends” who envy everything we achieve and
posses, and try to undermine us, usually just at the moments
when we are feeling good about what is going on in our lives.
Have you ever heard a “friend” downplay a promotion (“Well, you
must not have had much competition”) or try to make us insecure
about our appearance (“So, you wore that to the interview and
they still gave you the job?”) Too often, the underminers in our
lives are old friends who we have tolerated out of a
misplaced—and unreciprocated—sense of loyalty. And sadly,
sometimes they are family members. If you want to investigate
this further, check out the new book The The Underminer: The
Best Friend Who Casually Destroys Your Life by Mike Albo and
Virginia Heffernan.

Other “bad carbs” include toxic co-workers. You know these
people, the ones who never have a kind word to say about anyone,
especially if they are in management, and spend more time
complaining about work that actually working. These are the
people leaning against your office door, looking to waste time
and gossip when you want to hit an important deadline. These are
the peers who only call you when they have a problem, and take
up long lunches talking only of themselves and their woes. These
are the unhappy, self-absorbed, tiresome people that we always
wonder why we tolerate. When was the last time one of your bad
carb friends asked about you and actually listened to the answer?

How to Lose Dead Weight—The Integrity Diet

If you can go on a low-carb diet to lose weight, why not do the
same with the people you surround yourself with? Go on an
“integrity diet” and rid yourself of the bad carbs in your life.
It isn’t easy to give up pizza, pasta and doughnuts. And it
isn’t easy to look a longtime “friend” in the eye and say you do
not want them to be a part of your life any longer. But the best
part is, while you might miss pizza, you will never miss a
“toxic” friend.

To get you started on your Integrity Diet, try the following:

Make a list of the important people in your lives.

Divide them into proteins, good and bad carbs.

Make an effort to strengthen your relationship with the
proteins—the people who inspire you, energize you and make you
happy.

Enjoy the good carbs in moderation.

Minimize your time with the bad carbs.

Remember to pay special attention to the bad carbs. Eliminating
them will not be easy or pleasant, but the positive results in
your emotional and professional lives will appear as fast as the
pounds shed when you say goodbye to white bread, French fries
and cupcakes.

You can eat all the protein in the world, but if you keep taking
in the bad carbs, you won’t get the results you ultimately want.

And be sure to let us know how much “dead weight” you lose in
the next thirty days!

1. Prev:Why Dieting is Keeping America Fat
2. Next:Help! Which Diet to follow, High Protein or Low Carb?