The vast majority of diets fail in the long run. Fat people forced to lose weight develop the symptoms of starving people and obsess about food, and always quickly return to their previous weights after release. During diets their metabolisms slow down to keep them at the same body weight despite the decreased calories.

that's because people are 'lazy' - they don't want to do the hard work, rather they spend significant amount of time, energy and cash to chase pure dietary solutions. they expect that some 30-day dietary course will change their life, especially when right after they go back to their old eating habits. obviously, it doesn't work, ever. so they try another diet and so on...

I believe massive changes in life can be done just by permanently altering diet, but best, fastest and most durable results are in combination of diet and exercise. proper workout stimulates metabolism, makes people more happy and the feeling of strength and endurance coming from your own body is just priceless. oh and it prolongs life too on top of adding massive quality to it.

did I laid out a massive change in somebody's life? yes. so what? great rewards come after great hardships, naturally. but many people will keep throwing money at their problems, refusing to change, instead of pouring sweat for free and keep wondering why it doesn't work.

People don't have infinite willpower. There is no magical distinction between minds and bodies. We are just animals and we are genetically programmed to strongly desire to eat food. The vast majority of people who attempt to diet fail.

When diets work, they require pushing the body to the point of starvation and keeping it there, which is just not sustainable. The body goes into starvation mode and tells the brain to do everything it can to sustain food. No amount of willpower can overcome that.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/08/health/08fat.html?pagewant...

> fat people who lost large amounts of weight might look like someone who was never fat, but they were very different. In fact, by every metabolic measurement, they seemed like people who were starving.

>The Rockefeller subjects also had a psychiatric syndrome, called semi-starvation neurosis, which had been noticed before in people of normal weight who had been starved. They dreamed of food, they fantasized about food or about breaking their diet. They were anxious and depressed; some had thoughts of suicide. They secreted food in their rooms. And they binged.

>Eventually, more than 50 people lived at the hospital and lost weight, and every one had physical and psychological signs of starvation. There were a very few who did not get fat again, but they made staying thin their life’s work, becoming Weight Watchers lecturers, for example, and, always, counting calories and maintaining themselves in a permanent state of starvation.