‘One Step Forward, Two Steps Back’ is an old saying, but is it really true?

When you are making healthier habits and creating a new routine for yourself, we can be hard on ourselves at the first miss. This kind of perfectionist mentality misses the opportunity to see how actual growth happens. Thinking that way often makes people eat the whole cake instead of just the one slice.

Progress is not linear. It is more likely that it may take 6 weeks of practice to figure out how to have a perfect week. Nutrition is complex. There are a lot of food options now and a lot of combinations that can make a healthy diet and make it possible to meet your goals.

It is not ‘one step forward, two steps back.’ It is one step forward, followed by back to ‘normal’ or no steps forward.

Often times I hear the saying, ‘One Step Forward, Two Steps Back’, when someone has had a misstep. I don’t think that is the case when making behavior change. If you start at a point of eating an unhealthy diet, this is your baseline. If you start eating healthier and have some success, then have a bad day or two back to your ‘normal’ eating, then you are not two steps back. You are back to your baseline. Your baseline is a comparison. If your goal is weight loss, then you can still succeed, if you get back on track (weight is a good example that is easier to measure than eating healthy.)

There are a lot of food options now and a lot of combinations that can make a healthy diet…

For example, if you were eating 2700 calories before at x amount of weight and start eating healthier cutting your calories back, you are making progress. If you have a day back at 2700 calories, it is just a baseline, perhaps even a neutral. If that is the case then it is One step forward, followed by no steps forward, staying in place. You then have the choice to continue to take a step forward. You are not starting two steps back. It is not ‘one step forward, two steps back.’ It is one step forward, followed by back to ‘normal’ or no steps forward.

You also have the practice of making that change. You have already learned how to make it happen. Even if you don’t agree with it being a neutral effect, you still have things you have learned. Just continue. You will probably have a piece of cake again, and if you just did, you can still keep going.