Most nutritionists and dietitians agree that a food diary is critical to weight loss success. Here's why:

When you keep a food diary, you're basically undertaking a project in which the sole purpose is to understand yourself better. Keeping a diary makes you feel in control by giving you the power of your own voice. In our case, the universe we're attempting to master is that of our own bodies.

Fact vs. fiction

The diary helps you to differentiate what you're feeling and what is actually happening. This is important in the weight loss battle because the facts usually don't make us miserable or force us to fall off of the diet wagon. The meanings we attach to them do.

For example, here are some neutral facts: I put on ten pounds. I ate five biscuits today. The facts only become problematic when we make them 'mean' something. 'I'm a fat slob with no will power' are meanings that we attach to the previously mentioned facts.

The 'facts' are: You put on ten pounds and you ate five biscuits. Everything else is your made-up version of events. Well, having a food diary lets you clarify this all-important distinction, so that you can deal with the facts and forget the attached meanings. The facts by themselves are never as bad as what you attach to them.

Conscious eating

Food diaries also have the more mundane function of showing us what and how much we eat. A lack of consciousness is the biggest enemy of success in weight loss. Most overeating - in fact, most eating - is unconscious. It's a mindless, habitual, conditioned reaction to a wide variety of cues, few of which have to do with hunger.

By writing down what you're doing, when you're doing it, and how you're feeling at the time, you will give yourself the opportunity to examine what transforms a habit into a conscious choice.

Food and mood

Diaries also let us begin to make connections between food and mood. One of the problems with our diets is that our physical and emotional reactions to food are often delayed. As a result, we lose sight of the effect food has on our moods, energy levels, and mental outlook.

By making room in your diary for notes about what is happening and what you feel when you eat, you can also focus on what conditions are dangerous triggers for bad eating habits.

Finally, for many people, the diary is one of the only places you can really be alone with yourself. Free from the knowledge that someone else will see and judge what you're feeling and saying, you can make many personal discoveries. You can explore feelings, behaviours, fantasies and even 'unacceptable' thoughts that you spend a great deal of energy keeping hidden. The diary is your private letter to yourself. Since the constraints of social acceptability and 'proper behaviour' are not applicable, you're able to delve into how you feel.

The best part about keeping a food diary is that there's no 'right' way to do it. You can scrawl angry words on the page, 'say' things to parents, husbands, and loved ones that you've never been able to 'say' in real life, or just make a simple old list of what you're eating and when.

Be willing to be surprised by the results. You almost certainly will be.

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