Selfies are everywhere, and even heads of state and world leaders have gotten in on the selfie frenzy. So what is the selfie diet?
1. What is the Selfie Diet?
The selfie diet is more about keeping track of your weight loss progress than having a specific list of foods you can and can’t eat. You take selfies to track your fitness and weight loss progress, and this helps to keep you accountable and motivate you as you see the photographic proof of your body’s changes.
Women’s Health experts endorse the idea that keeping a record is a good idea:
tracking your weight loss—whether it’s through counting calories, measuring your waist, or taking selfies—will help you stick to your weight-loss goals.
2. A Selfie Diet Makes Your Instagram Followers Your Weight Loss Buddies
Many doctors, nutritionists, and diet programs like Weight Watchers stress the importance of accountability and having a support group while you try to diet and lose weight. Putting your fitness and weight loss journey on social media can keep you on track and accountable. In a way, it can make all your online friends and family your support group.
In one of the most famous recent selfies of all time, Kim Kardashian took a rear view selfie to celebrate her post-baby weight loss success.
3. Start a Selfie Diet and Join the Fitspo Movement
What is Fitspo?
Fitspo is pictures, graphics, and inspirational quotes that inspire a healthy, fit lifestyle. It’s short for fitness inspiration. (There’s also thinspo and curvespo). There are thousands of fitspo blogs and fitspo accounts on instagram, Pinterest, Facebook, and tumblr. The fitspo photo above is from Jen Selter’s hugely popular instagram account. She’s famous for her fitspo and for having one of the ‘best butts’ on instagram.
By putting your before, after, and in-between selfies online, you join part of the fitspo movement by hashtagging, pinning, and following other health and fitness accounts on instagram, tumblr, and Pinterest. Hopefully, being part of a larger movement will help to keep you motivated and on track.
4. How to Start a Selfie Diet
1. Take Your ‘Before’ Photo
Everyone has their own method, but a selfie diet usually starts with one bold ‘‘before photo. You can create a public social media account to start here and document your journey, or you can just send your ‘before’ selfie to friends and family in a more private manner.
2. Document Your Weight Loss Journey
You can do this daily, weekly, or every time the spirit moves you. You can take your selfies as a record, to motivate yourself with your success, or as a celebration when you reach a milestone (lost 10 pounds, ran 5 miles, did 20 push-ups, etc).
3. Take Your ‘After’ Photo
Fitness if a lifestyle, so you can always document your workouts or your successes as part of the fitspo movement. But if you’ve started an actual selfie diet, then hopefully you will reach an end goal to document. Remember, you’re not striving for visual perfection as that comes from Photoshop. Give yourself a solid goal and then take a selfie to document that success (whether it’s a weight loss number or that strong core).
5. Is the Selfie Diet Healthy?
If you start a selfie diet to keep track of your progress and to join a larger movement, then it can be healthy. However, experts recommend selfies in moderation. There are jokes about ‘selfie addicts’, but one British teen attempted suicide because of his obsession with the perfect selfie. Some psychiatrists do see a link between selfies and body dysmorphic disorder. From the Daily Mail:
Dr David Veale, a consultant psychiatrist in cognitive behaviour therapy at the South London and Maudsley NHS Trust and The Priory Hospital, told The Sunday Mirror: ‘Two out of three of all the patients who come to see me with Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD) since the rise of camera phones have a compulsion to repeatedly take and post selfies on social media sites.’
He went on to the tell the Daily Mail:
‘Taking Selfies is not an addiction – it’s a symptom of Body Dysmorphic Disorder that involves checking one’s appearance.’
If you find yourself becoming obsessed with your selfies or fitspo in general, step away from the phone. See a doctor if you feel that it’s also becoming compulsive behavior.
Need help getting the best images of yourself from all angles? Considering getting a selfie stick to take pictures from all angles, and give yourself a more comprehensive view of your body.
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Selfie Diet: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know