Celebrity endorsements are a big business, especially in the weight loss industry. Even Charles Barkley is hocking diet programs these days. Celebrities sell the dream that if we eat exactly like they do, we too can lose weight to reveal the chiseled physiques that we we all meant to have. Yeah right.

So why do people fall prey to celebrity diet programs?

It’s hard to ignore the visual appeal of looking like our favorite stars. It’s almost automatic to look at the washboard abs of Ryan Reynolds and think, “I want that! How did he do it?”. Before long, you’re on google, searching for the Ryan Reynolds ab diet and stocking up on skinless chicken breasts.

The same thing happens every November the week before the Victoria’s Secret fashion show. The diets of the Victoria’s Secret angels start to appear in every major women’s magazine, including tips from their trainers and recipes for their protein shakes. Last November, angel Adriana Lima famously discussed her diet with the Daily Telegraph:

Lima drinks a gallon of water a day. For nine days before the show, she will drink only protein shakes – “no solids”. The concoctions include powdered egg. Two days before the show, she will abstain from the daily gallon of water, and “just drink normally”. Then, 12 hours before the show, she will stop drinking entirely. “No liquids at all so you dry out, sometimes you can lose up to eight pounds just from that,” she says.

This is a diet that no one would recommend for someone who is trying to lose weight safely. It’s too low in calories and vitamins and minerals to be sustainable for your longterm health.

Yet “Adriana Lima diet” is searched in google 14,800 times a month.

Don’t fall prey to celebrity diet plans. They can do harm your health and your self esteem.

Here are the top 5 reasons why you shouldn’t follow celebrity diet plans:

• They are selling something.

 
Most celebrities talk about their diets only if they have something to promote or sell. Gwyneth Paltrow talks about her detox diets, her homemade Italian cooking, and her fitness routine because she has an aspirational lifestyle site called GOOP to promote. Do you want to get chiseled arms like Gwyneth? Her juice diet probably isn’t going to get you there any faster.

• They are made up.

 
Try googling another Victoria’s Secret model Miranda Kerr to see what I mean. According to one site, Miranda swears by “yoghurt and muesli together with fresh fruit salad” or “boiled Eggs with rye toast with avocado” for breakfast. Another site claims that her breakfast usually consists of “fresh green juice with kale, spinach, cucumber, beets and lemon. Then half an hour later, she a power smoothie which has Sunwarrior protein powder, chia seeds, maca powder, raw cacao, bee pollen, goji berries, noni juice, Vitamineral Green and coconut water. Then an hour after that she’ll have oatmeal or eggs. That’s her three-course power breakfast”. Yet another site claims that she eats according to the Blood Type diet. Which one of these is true? Probably none of them. The dirty little secret of the celebrity news media is that often celebrity PR agents and “writers” will collude to create quotes from a celebrity to make them appear a certain way.

• They are dangerous.

 
Actor Christian Bale is known for his extreme diets to yo-yo between gaining muscle mass and shrinking for his acting gigs. According to one news outlet, Bale had to go from his weight in “The Machinist” (121 lbs) to his weight in “Batman Begins” (220 lbs) in just 5 months! An undertaking like this is almost impossible, and the stress that is places on the body is enormous.

• They don’t tell the complete truth.

 
Even when the media promises to reveal the diet secrets of the stars, celebrities never spill it all. Actors may reveal that they trained 3 hours a day to bulk up for a role, but they’ll never add that they did it with the help of steroids. After all, they WERE in the gym for the hours a day, so it’s technically not a lie.

• They are putting their bodies at risk for their jobs.

 
Celebrities often have a team of trainers, doctors, and nutritionists around them to check on them during extreme diets. Most of us don’t have that luxury. Adriana Lima’s liquid diet is dangerous, but I’m sure she also had a doctor checking her vital signs like iron levels and electrolyte levels to make sure that she wouldn’t be close to passing out during the big show.

 
Stop trying to look like your favorite celebrities. Their real diets are unhealthy and are probably a lot different from what you read about online.

Don’t try to look like someone else. Try to be the best version of yourself, and you’ll never go wrong.