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Email ThisEveryone is in love with moderation. We’re told to eat a “balanced meal.” Fox News proudly claims it is “fair and balanced.” Moderation dates back at least to the ancient Greeks who said “nothing in excess.” Today, the same idea holds but with a slightly different wording: “everything in moderation.”
While moderation is universal, it fails as a practical rule. Moderation has no clear-cut definition and it can be exploited. Fifty years ago, one soda per week might have been moderate; now, it’s more like one per day.
Societal-defined moderation inflates baselines as we “keep up with the Joneses” and it simultaneously justifies bad behavior. Rarely do people cut out soda. They instead make a moderate change to diet soda, a switch that might be counterproductive for weight loss.
Money moderation fails
A few years ago I had a chance to counsel a friend. He was in credit card debt and wanted to get out. His problem was clear: while he earned a good amount, he was spending all of it.
What did I advise him? Money is a touchy subject, so I told him to make some small, moderate changes. I went with the popular advice of using budgets and cutting back. Every penny counts, I said. I told him to tackle small debts first, for a psychological advantage. I told him to eat at less expensive places and buy fewer clothing items.
I didn’t tell him the truth for fear it would be “extreme” and that he’d be overwhelmed to follow it. But in judging his behavior, I failed him. To this day, he’s still in debt and feels guilty he can’t keep to his budget (a fault of budgets in general, not with him). But to his credit he has improved—moderately.
I should not have sugar-coated the task. I should have told him to do everything to save his credit and take control of his money. Rather than focus on helping him make small changes, I should have focused on getting him to want to save money. Then he wouldn’t need to budget. A simple and free expense spreadsheet would suffice to keep him on track.
I feel guilty about my role in moderation. I have since vowed to spread the truth, even if it is unpopular or unconventional, and that’s what motivates every article I write.
In conclusion
Realize that “everything in moderation” is typically an excuse to justify bad habits. Even worse is that most advisers who know better still offer moderate advice. They think clients won’t listen to “drastic” but necessary changes, so they just avoid it. When they do that, they have failed not only themselves, but society at large. Be weary about joining the crowd.
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I think the key is that moderation is maintenance. If you’re working in moderation, then problems shouldn’t arise.
However, if you’ve got an extreme problem, moderation won’t fix it. You need to go to the opposite extreme to bring things to balance.
Basically, if you’re at a scale of 100, and you need to bring it to an average of 50, you don’t just start working at a level of 50 and then you’re moderate. The average then becomes 75, still not where you need to be.
If you want to go from 100 to 50, you need to get as close to 0 in that second phase as possible.
The key to moderation is #1 Defining it and #2 figuring out what it personally means to you and then #3 actually applying moderation overall.
You can’t spend moderately if you are in debt and expect to save. You can’t eat moderately and expect to lose weight. Sometimes you have to act in extremes to get yourself back to where you need to be- then you can act moderately going forward.
The idea is that overindulgence in one part of your life (eating too much) throws another part of your life way out of wack (your health). To bring your health back to good levels you may have to act in extremes when it comes to your diet. Once you reach a good level you can begin to eat in moderation.
I think Adam says it right: “You need to go to the opposite extreme to bring things to balance.”
That way I think about it is that I HAVE TO BE BORING THIS MONTH. Stay in more often, buy no product (’things’), have less fun. Etc…
…fun costs too much.
Adam: I think you explained the idea very nicely. The second issue is dealing with a society where moderate and conservative have strange definitions. As Dr. Dean Ornish puts it, he doesn’t know why advocating a well-balanced vegetarian diet for heart disease is considered extreme, when it is medically conservative to cut people open and put them on cholesterol lowering drugs the rest of their lives.
Melissa: I like how you emphasized moderation should be a personal thing, not a social thing.
Then the question becomes how do you maintain good habits. This is certainly debatable. You wouldn’t tell alcoholics to moderately consume alcohol or drug addicts to moderately return to their old habits.
But with something like food it might be different. Someone that goes on a very extreme diet to get in good health might improve insulin sensitivity, so say, sugar would be more tolerable.
The question of maintenance is also personal. And for me, it’s usually easier to go “cold turkey” than tread through the slow torture of portion control.
But yes, to each his or her own.
Torbjorn Rive: You brought a smile to my face because that is how we think about it.
I am beginning to think fun doesn’t have to cost a lot, but to have cheap fun requires more preparation. Hosting a dinner party costs less than half as going out to a restaurant, but it takes preparation to get everything ready.
But you give me a great idea for an article: how can you make fun cost less? I’ll have to think about that one
…speaking of fun vs. cost. we’re going camping this weekend which should in theory be cheap, but the prep and overall one-time cost before we leave is a bit of a lump sum. for 4 (three days), when all’s said and done, $120 each.
BUT, to have as much fun and freedom in the city (without sitting on the couch and computer all day which costs little more than cheese and bread for sustenance) it would cost a lot more. Actually I shouldn’t even compare camping with not camping.
…end of story, it’s cheapish fun that is worth the end result; relaxation, time, and non-worridom.
Looking forward to less-cost fun article. In that case, it’s all about relativity ie. camping vs. city.
Yes, it’s somehow just not right to compare costs when doing something as fun as camping. Nature is its own reward.