When Anti-Diet Influencers Start Talking Weight Loss: The Difference Between Evolving and Selling Out

Evolution speaks in groundedness and curiosity. Selling out asks you to abandon yourself.

The other day, an account I used to admire posted about protein intake for weight loss.

A few short years ago, this same account was a stronghold of anti-diet messaging — refreshingly rebellious, a voice of advocacy in a sea of diet culture. 

Now? Protein. Strength training, protein, and oh yes – protein.

A part of me felt disappointed. And kind of judgmental?

Not because I believe people owe it to me to stay the same. I admire the audacity it takes to pivot in public. Critical thinking should evolve, not fossilize. 

But not all pivots are growth. Some are evolution, and some are selling out. It can be hard to tell the difference, and it can be easier to categorize change as a betrayal.

But you know what? What actually matters isn’t what the influencer is doing. It’s what it wakes up in me.

Is this touching a nerve I’m supposed to face, or poking a wound I don’t need to keep pressing?

I’m not in a season of protecting myself from hard questions. So I stayed with the disappointment and the judgment. Instead of running from it or justifying my scoff, I asked: What part of me is threatened here? And what part of me is open to learning something new?

Because triggers aren’t always a villain. Sometimes it’s an invitation to evolve.

First, Why Am I Even Slightly Attracted to This Message?

Question One: Is there anything about this messaging that actually appeals to me?

Let’s take protein. I’ve played this game before: cramming protein into every meal, forgoing fiber for turkey roll ups and cheese, crowding out carbs.

It didn’t work. And beyond that, it flattened my life into a series of transactions: the high of the pursuit followed by the slow burn of the cravings for different textures, flavor profiles, life itself.

But (recovery years) later, I came back to protein as part of satisfaction. As part of nourishment, not sacrificed for balance.

(It’s amazing how quickly “protein” translates into “low-carb” when we’re acting from fear.)

Today, I know where I stand with protein, and hearing someone glam it out doesn’t convince me I’m not already eating it. I don’t need a 30-gram hit of cottage cheese before the sun comes up. These posts are hooking into a fantasy, not a reality.

If there was something here I needed to know, I’d feel expansive—I wouldn’t be contracting.

The part of me that’s tempted? It’s not hungry for protein. It’s hungry for control. And I know how that road ends.

Coming Back to Attunement and Context

Sometimes I wonder if my body could tolerate a little restriction — a little more reorganization of the range of my appetite — in the name of weight loss.

Maybe it could.

But even entertaining that thought feels slippery. So I don't linger there. Instead, I bring my focus back to attunement: eating in a way that respects my body’s signals and the realities of my life.

Because attunement isn't just about hunger and fullness. It’s also about context.

And right now, my context is raising kids on peanut butter sandwiches and mac and cheese and cereal. Carbs live in my house.

Real attunement means incorporating those nudges, not pretending they aren't there.

Maybe there’s room for some streamlining—for small, natural shifts that support energy and ease. But that’s different from restriction. Restriction would mean cutting against the grain of the life I'm living.

And I’m not interested in doing that. When a post like this feels like a “lifestyle change,” I’m out.

When I Started Leaning In

When this influencer started posting about lifting heavy things, I didn’t feel disappointment or judgment. I felt a leaning in.

Maybe because strength training actually aligns with my life right now: A knee injury earlier this year got me back into the gym. Weight machines for rehab. Low-impact cardio to keep moving without hurting more.

Strength training isn’t an algorithm trend for me. It’s a return to a basic truth: I like to be active.

There's no existential panic in lifting a heavier dumbbell. No desperate reaching toward being smaller. It’s a stretch goal. An edge. An effort. But it’s not a betrayal.

And that distinction—between an effort and a betrayal—is it.

That topic spoke to me in a way that is asking me to evolve, not to regress. 

We talk a lot about triggers in recovery spaces. I’ve personally advocated for avoiding them (to survive) and then exposing yourself to them (to build grit). But at some point, if you want to keep growing, the question becomes less about whether you're triggered — and more about what the trigger is communicating.

But at some point, if you want to keep growing, the question becomes less about whether you're triggered — and more about what the trigger is asking of you.

Sometimes the answer is: This is dangerous. This is a NO. Where the discomfort is proof it’s a no.

And sometimes the answer is: it’s time to stretch out.

Where Do I Draw the Line?

Protein gets co-opted by weight loss culture. Strength training gets co-opted too. All wellness endeavors will be corrupted by Wellness™ endeavors.

But which is which isn’t up to them. It’s up to you.

If I lift heavier, it doesn’t have to mean I feel desperate to lose weight. It’s because I am allowed to want to be strong or build muscle.

If I want to include protein in my meals, it doesn’t have to mean I’m trying to hack my metabolism. It’s because I am allowed to be invested in more streamlined satisfaction.

And if my body changes? I won’t pretend I would mind, but I’m sure as shit not chasing it at the expense of my mental health.

But if my mind changes—if my values change to accommodate a growth edge? That's where I draw the line. Always.

So how do you tell the difference? How do you know when something is an invitation back into disorder versus a call to action that belongs to your next evolution?

You have to listen for the energy underneath the impulse. Disorder speaks in urgency, desperation, and fear — it demands, it contracts, it makes your life feel smaller.

Alignment, on the other hand, speaks in groundedness and patience. It doesn’t ask you to abandon yourself; it asks you to become more of yourself. Without urgency.

If the energy feels like a high or a chasing, it’s not for me.

If it feels like a deepening — a stretching into something (even if it’s hard)...

Then I’m listening.