My Story (cont.)...

...back to the day I saw Pete walk onto the court.

If you haven't guessed, I did not watch the tennis match. Instead, I decided to face my challenge head on...or belly first, as it were. How should I go about losing weight? Do I need to be in The Zone? Should I move to South Beach and eat cabbage soup or have a cookie? And what about that Atkins guy?

All kidding aside, I was determined to lose weight and keep it off. So I started searching for a diet that fits my lifestyle. I'm on the run, quite a bit. My schedule changes daily. When I get into a project, I forget to eat...when I'm out with people, I remember it a little too well. So, any "diet" that would work with my life had to have the following characteristics: (1) It must work under any condition. (2) It must be healthy. (3) It must work over the long haul.

You see, I was equally determined to improve my health...not just my weight. Therefore, I was not interested in any of the quick fixes. No unsafe practices. No drastic loss. And definitely no Yo-Yo dieting.

But also, I was not going to restrict my food. I enjoy eating the occasional five meat deli sandwich, mashed potatoes and gravy…and have you had the banana cream pie from Marie Callender’s? Mm, mm, mm! My “diet for life” had to have room for that. This was my first diet...and I was committed to it being my last!

GET THE DIET

Plunging into research that day, it became very clear very fast that there really are only two things that matter when it comes to dieting. One is universal…the other is as individual as there are people on the planet. One I feel very comfortable sharing with you. The other is between you, yourself…and maybe your love for too much banana cream pie!

Insight# 1 -- KNOW YOUR NEEDS

So, here’s the universal one: It does not matter if you eat blanched green vegetables with pumpkin seed dressing…or ice cream sundaes. To lose weight, you must burn more calories than you consume. To maintain your weight, you must burn as many calories as you consume. To gain weight…you guessed it.

That said, your body is designed to burn food for fuel…and performs best when good food fuel is provided throughout the day. In other words, you could lose weight with a big ice cream sundae a day…but if you actually want to do stuff, you may want to reconsider.

So, what did I need? I needed 2200 calories per day to maintain my weight…and 1,700 calories to lose a pound a week. (The diet instructions show you how to determine your calorie needs). Why a pound a week? Literally every diet I researched that was recommended by a major medical institution or a credible scientific authority warns against plans that produce in excess of 1 pound or so of weight loss per week.

So OK, I have to lose 34 pounds...that's 34 weeks of following a diet. Gulp! 34 weeks. I realized that would not see results quickly. But, I committed to health, and there was no way I'd give up on that.

Insight# 2 -- LOG YOUR PROGRESS

But what if I logged my progress? As long as I KNOW I'm heading in the right direction – and as long as what I'm doing is healthy – who cares how long it takes. After all, I've been heading in the opposite direction for 36 years.

The next morning I took out my scale, weighed myself before breakfast, and wrote that number in my calendar. Lo and behold, a week later, I was down 2 pounds...32 weeks to go ;-)

Now it gets interesting, really interesting. No matter how healthy the plan was, I also realized that discipline plays a major role in sticking to anything for 34 weeks and beyond...and I knew that I didn't have any. Apparently, I'm not alone. Here, in a nutshell, is the healthy diet breakdown: (1) You learn about a healthy 'pound-a-week' diet. (2) You start...maybe even see some beginning success. (3) Life takes over, old habits resume, and your former weight loss is replaced by an equal or greater weight gain. Discouraging, you bet...and unhealthy to boot.

In other words, the missing link was not The Zone, The South Beach or even The Cookie. All fine diets... The missing link was, is, and always will be your ability to permanently modify your eating habits, that is, to stick to it. And this is what the iPhone Diet is all about!

Insight# 3 -- AUTOMATE YOUR PLAN

Self-discipline is a proven recipe for almost any great success...however, relying on self-discipline is a recipe for failure. Anything you can do to turn sheer willpower into automatic behavior will get you to your goals quicker, easier, and with way more certainty. It's true for saving and investing money...and its true for dieting and eating right!

Once I had the last insight, everything fell quickly into place. I wanted to eat five healthy meals per day, so I bought myself a sports watch with 5 alarms. I wanted to know what I'm eating, so I carried nutrition information wherever I went. I wanted to log my progress, so I made a table in MS Word, etc. etc. ...and that works.

Remember: You do NOT need an iPhone. I started this diet with a cheap digital watch and a sheet of paper. (See the diet instructions on how to do it without an iPhone).

But today, thanks to Steve Jobs, I do it all on my iPhone. Then I simply follow its “advice”...no thinking, no remembering, no self-discipline.

GET THE DIET

Thank you for your interest in my story. May you too find the lasting diet success, health and well being you’ve been looking for.

Warmly,

Thorsten

PS: I'd like to thank Dr. Robert Kushner at Diet.com who's diet personality assessment was a big eye opener in my research and Dr. Barry Sears for writing The Zone, the first diet book I have ever read. 30:40:30 in three meals and two snacks made much sense – and with the iPhone Diet, anyone can pull it off.

Thanks also to every doctor, author and dietician out there that has committed their lives to increasing the variety of healthy eating options. While the iPhone Diet stands on its own, it is my hope that I am adding a little to the conversation so that simplifying and automating their healthy diet programs becomes commonplace.

I also want to tip my hat to Jared Fogle – not for showing America that a properly assembled Subway® sandwich can be part of a healthy and effective weight loss program – but for giving my friends an easy way to tease me: "Hey, what's going on? You eatin' Subway?" That said, I do want to thank everybody who kept bugging me about what I'm doing, how I'm doing it, and if I could write it down for them. Well, here it is. Now get yourself skinny.

GET THE DIET

Last but not least, I want to acknowledge the greatest tennis player ever. Pete, if you're reading this, thank you for the inspiration!

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