Wednesday 14 January 2015

How To #19: How Not to Diet




January should be a time of recovery and restoration from the madness (or lack thereof) of the festive period. Instead, some moron decided January was a time where we embark on some insane health and fitness craze, where we end up hating ourselves for the entirety of the month because we ate that one mini cheesecake left over from the Christmas party (just me? Awkward.)

Like many others, I jumped (or rather, clambered lazily) onto the diet bandwagon. Because, well you kind of have to because society sucks. Now, I’m no scientist, but I’ve learnt a thing or two about how not to diet since going along with this "healthy eating" madness at the start of January, which I’m going to share with you lucky people. Note that my tips are based on no scientific or factual research whatsoever, I’m just bored.

DON’T: Adopt a “waste not, want not” mantra when it comes to food. I hate wasting food- to me it’s the equivalent of a gym membership or leaving a £10 note in the back of a cab- A TOTAL WASTE OF MONEY. I’ve been brought up on the notion that wasting food meant you were contributing to world hunger, because DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY STARVING AFRICAN CHILDREN WOULD KILL TO EAT THE FOOD YOU’VE JUST CHUCKED IN THE BIN? Thus, as heart breaking as it is, you need to let go of those Christmas tree shaped shortbreads.

 *p.s. I don’t know why I’m capitalising everything- food just makes me emotional.

DON’T: Go on a crash diet. I’ve tried. Life may be going swimmingly for a few days living off of coffee and cornflakes, but as soon as someone offers you a chocolate digestive, you cave in because it would be just plain rude to refuse food. The aftermath of this involves crying and eating another biscuit to ease the pain.

DON’T: Spend hours looking at pictures of Jourdan Dunn on Instagram. Although she is only one example of a near perfect human being, looking at anyone’s unachievable figure for too long is dangerous. You just end up hating Jourdan Dunn for being so goddamn perfect and yourself for being… well, not.

DON’T: Join the gym. Because everyone joins the gym in January and ends up dropping out by February. Therefore, this trend can only imply that joining the gym in February means that you’re much more likely to stick at it and pass for Nicole Scherzinger’s twin by March. Common sense really.

DON’T: Have a breakdown one Wednesday evening and randomly turn up to a Weight Watchers meeting. You’ll only end up embarrassing yourself by saying “my name is Georgia and I have a problem with biscuits and £1.50 jägerbombs…wait, this isn’t AA? Oops.” *hangs head in shame*

DON'T: Watch "Weighing Up the Enemy," a dieting programme where contestants part with their hard earned cash with the promise of winning it back providing that they lose more weight than their competitor. Apparently based on totally legit research by Yale University adapted by Dr Christian Jessen to exploit people's January body blues and make us all feel disgusted with ourselves. Well played Channel 4, well played. 

DON’T: Organise an ordering of Indian and Nando’s with your flatmates via Twitter, even though you’re fat. And poor. Plus, what you agree to on Twitter is basically law binding so there is no escaping the Sunday night Indian. Ever.


DON’T: Work your way through an entire box of nearly stale Christmas biscuits whilst writing a blog post on dieting. Oops. 

Happy frickin' January. 

Love Georgia x 


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Thursday 1 January 2015

Why New Year's Resolutions Were Made to be Broken




If you’re sitting there hungover and bloated from your New Year’s celebrations, swearing to yourself that you’ll cut down on the booze this year, you may want to ask yourself a few questions first.

How likely are you to stick to your resolutions? How realistic are they? (You may want to scribble out that round the world trip now.) And perhaps most crucially, why do we even make these resolutions that were, let’s face it, made to be broken?


The origins of the New Year’s resolution actually goes back donkey’s years- the ancient Romans began each year by making promises to lead a better life to Janus, the god after whom January is named. Fast forward a few thousand years and the New Year resolution was turned into a Western tradition by, who else- our good old friends across the pond. America’s obsession with self-improvement meant that many resolutions centred on the individual and ways of “bettering” yourself. The US government even has a website offering tips on ways to keep the most popular New Year’s resolutions including losing weight; volunteering more; stopping smoking; eating better and saving money.


Despite this tradition, statistics show that making New Year’s resolutions have actually fallen out of favour. A CBS News poll in 2013 reported that 68%of Americans don’t make New Year’s resolutions, and that those under 30 are also more likely to make them. As for keeping them? We’re not too great at that either, with just one in 10 of us achieving our goal and most of us throwing in the towel as early as January 23rd, according to Professor Richard Wiseman from the University of Hertfordshire.


I used to make New Year’s resolutions religiously; the ones cropping up the most being writing a book (never made it past the first chapter) and getting fit (forever a work in progress.) Now, I know I’m never going to be as talented as J K Rowling or as fighting fit as Gwyneth Paltrow, so why do we bother? Laurie L. Dove, a writer for howstuffworks.com, claims “they are a method of erasing the errors of the past year,” and that they are a “means of cataloguing our personal dissatisfactions.”


I suppose from a psychological perspective, as humans we are always looking to better ourselves. In this competitive age where everyone is in the pursuit of happiness, we are just looking to be the best person that we can be, even though we all know that that is easier said than done. In my experience, you often can’t make certain things in your life happen, often they just, well, happen.


Yes, New Year’s resolutions are a ridiculous tradition. Yes, you’re probably going to be too skint to go on that once in a lifetime holiday. And by now you’ve probably formed too close a relationship with Netflix and Cadbury to start a love affair with the gym and lettuce. But it’s the human sense of hope that makes New Year’s resolutions worth doing. New Year’s resolutions were made to be broken, but hey, this might be your lucky year…


Writing your New Year’s Resolutions? Before you do, here are the 25 of the most commonly broken New Year’s Resolutions of 2014 according to List 25:


25. Lose Weight
24. Exercise
23. Quit Smoking
22. Quit Drinking
21. Get a new job
20. Get out of debt
19. Save money
18. Eat Healthier
17. Get organized
16. Spend more time with family
15. Manage stress better
14. Enjoy life to the fullest
13. Stop procrastinating
12. Travel
11. Improve a relationship
10. Learn a new language
09. Get more sleep
08. Spend less time on Facebook
07. Spend less time watching TV
06. Clean out old belongings
05. Cycle more (instead of driving)
04. Run a half or full marathon
03. Try an extreme sport (most commonly bungee jumping)
02. Do something for charity
01. Having a baby




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Love Georgia x