By answering this question I will also be explaining why diets do not work, why there is no “slow” metabolism, why medical conditions won't stop you, and why genetics has very little to do with it. To get started we need to understand how the human body gains body fat in the first place. Body fat is nothing more than stored calories. It is calories that we consumed in the past that the body did not need for energy, so they were stored in the form of body fat. This is extremely important to understand and I will come back to it later.
The 1st Law of Thermodynamics
The 1st Law of Thermodynamics says that energy can never be created or destroyed. It can only be transferred from one source to another. All the energy that is around us was already here and will always be here. Man cannot create energy from nothing, nor can he destroy energy and make it disappear. So how does this relate to body fat leaving the body? The word “calorie” is just a word man uses to describe how much energy is in food. If an apple has 70 calories what we are really saying is that if I consume the apple, I can transfer those 70 units of energy into my body. If I use that energy I am good. However, if I ate that apple and did not need those 70 calories I will store them as body fat for later. Everything we do requires energy. If we did not have energy (either in the form of food or body fat) then we would stop working. Another word for “stop working” is dead. If we do not consume energy in the form of food or have it in the form of body fat, we die. As simple as it sounds we only gain body fat when we eat more calories than we burned off. Here is how the law applies to humans. If the number of calories consumed (energy in) is equal to the number of calories burned (energy out) then there is no change in mass. See figure 1. If the
number of calories consumed (energy in) is less than the number of calories burned (energy out) then there is a reduction in mass due to a deficit. See figure 2. If the number of calories consumed (energy in) is greater than the number of calories burned (energy out) then there is an increase in mass due to the surplus. See figure 3. When someone wants to lose weight it is very important that they understand these concepts. It will save them from a lot of grief and protect them from the barrage of marketing and advertising that plagues all of us everyday. Understand that if you are not losing weight, it simply means you are NOT burning more calories than you are consuming. There is no other option. If your weight is staying the same, YOU ARE NOT IN A DEFICIT. The only way to lose weight is to be in a calorie deficit. I think those are all the ways I could say it.
What about my slow metabolism?
To address this question (because I hear it a lot) I have to first explain what your metabolism is. The word metabolism simply describes the rate at which the body requires energy. If you think about it, how could you raise your metabolism? To do that, you would have to increase your body’s need for energy. The way you can increase your body’s need for energy is to move more. You will always have a slow metabolism when you are sitting on the couch because that does not require very much energy. If you want to increase your metabolism you have to increase your body’s need for energy. This can be done by getting up off the couch (UUGGHHHHH!) and doing some push ups. Then do some squats. Guess what everyone? Doing push ups and squats requires significantly more energy than sitting on a couch. So by definition I have just increased your metabolism. You could also say I have discovered the cure for a slow metabolism. I really feel like you should be paying me since I just cured your slow metabolism with that little bit of information. Now, some of you may still not be convinced and say something like “that sounds good for when I am moving but what about when I am resting? I naturally have a slower metabolism than most other people.” I have heard that one a lot too. My question is this; “How do you know?” How exactly are you measuring the rate of your “slow” metabolism? It is simple, if you want to increase your metabolism get up and move. Even if we were going to say that there was such a thing as a “slow” metabolism, check this out. If you have a slow metabolism then your body does not burn as many calories as someone with a faster metabolism. Well guess what? If you are burning less calories then you do not need to eat as many calories. Either way the “slow” metabolism myth is now debunked. One last thing, studies have been done on metabolism and yes, they can measure metabolic rate and here is what they have found. The difference between the world’s slowest metabolism and the fastest metabolism is only 20%. If the person with the fastest metabolism burns 2000 calories a day while doing nothing then the worlds slowest metabolism will still be burning 1600 calories while doing nothing. Remember though, if you think you have a slow metabolism then you are saying your body burns less calories. If your body burns less calories then you need LESS calories. I will say it one more time because some will still not get it. If your “slow metabolism” body only burns 1200 calories a day then you only need 1200 calories to function. If your body only burned 500 calories then you would only need 500 calories. By the way, it is impossible for your body to only require 500 calories since a 150 pound person can burn 500-600 calories in their sleep.
What if I have a condition?
Doctors, pharmaceutical companies, supplement companies, diet companies, and advertising agencies have really cashed in on this concept. How wonderful it would be if we discovered that being overweight was truly “NOT” our fault. The condition I most often am told about is Hypothyroidism. Although this does pose certain challenges, we still have to observe the 1st Law of Thermodynamics. If you look up any website on Hypothyroidism you will find that the top two symptoms of hypothyroidism is chronic fatigue and muscle weakness. If you have chronic fatigue and muscle weakness on a regular basis you will move less. If you move less, you will burn less calories. If you move less but do not adjust your daily intake of calories to accommodate your lack of movement then you will store the extra calories that you did not burn off. End of argument. I am sorry but it is the truth. Again, if you burn less calories because of your “condition” then you require less calories to survive. This is not to say that it is not difficult to lose weight if you have a condition, however, it is not difficult because the condition has made your body somehow defy the 1st Law of Thermodynamics. It is difficult because the condition causes a person to move less. Then the person is surrounded by high calorie-low nutrition foods. (Please read 6 turkey sandwiches Part one and two for more info on this.) I can assure you that if I take a person with ANY “condition” and place them on a tropical island where they had to work for their food and they only had access to fruits, vegetables, and seafood, they would lose weight like crazy.
Will my genetics have an effect on my weight loss?
We have been searching for the “fat” gene for years now and there is a pretty good reason we can not find it. The reason is that it does not exist. Whether you are overweight or not has NOTHING to do with your genetics at all. Now, there are some things that do adhere to genetic makeup. The shape of your rib cage, which ultimately determines your upper pec development is very genetic. Whether you have a “round” butt or “flat” butt can be genetic. The way your body develops muscle is also at times, genetics at play. Whether you are 15% body fat or 35% body fat is 100% up to you. Being overweight is not a reflection of bad genetics being passed down to children from their parents. It is, however, at times a reflection of bad habits being passed down to children from their parents. We have found that when parents eat out a lot, their children eat out a lot as adults. We have also found that when parents are very selective about giving their children junk food, sugar, and processed foods, that the children or more likely to develop the same habits as they mature into adulthood. I want to stress that just because parents eat healthy, this does not mean the children will eat healthy as adults, but it does increase the odds of good choices later in life. To the same respect, just because parents have bad eating habits, a child can still grow up and learn to make their own positive choices. Sorry; this is just another example of a weight loss myth debunked.
What about the HUNGER?????!!!!
Oh yes, the hunger. The infamous saboteur of weight control. Let’s first discuss why the hunger is there and then we will talk about what you can do about it. I have been getting some feedback from some of you that you dropped some weight in the beginning but you have recently hit a plateau and stopped losing weight. In addition, the only thing you are noticing is that you seem to be starving to death all the time. To understand this, we first need to back up and understand body fat; what it is, how it works, and what your body does with it. Body fat has had several nicknames over the years. You may have heard some of the ones like “stored energy,” or stored calories.” Both of these are correct. Body fat is simply calories that you consumed however; you did not need them for energy at the time so your body stored them for future use. Excess body fat occurs when we develop a habit of eating more calories than we need to survive. So what exactly are calories? Calories are a word that we use to describe how much energy a given food has that if we consume, can be transferred to our body. For example, if I say and apple has 70 calories what I am really saying is that if I were to consume that apple, I would be transferring 70 units of energy to move my body and provide energy for my body’s day to day activity. If I needed those calories for energy then they will go through the energy conversion cycle and eventually the byproduct would transfer out of my body in the form of heat. If I did not require the energy then I store them (in the exact place I DON’T want to store them) to be used at a later time. That is why body fat is sometimes called stored calories or stored energy. Now that you understand body fat, calories, and energy let’s talk about how the body uses energy. This is called the First Law of Thermodynamics. It states that energy can never be created or destroyed; it can only be transferred from one source to another. So how does this apply to the body? Well, if you were to eat 2000 calories and throughout the day you burned 2000 calories does it make sense that you would not gain or lose any weight? Remember, body fat is stored calories not stored carbs or even stored fat. The fat we get from food does not turn into fat. It stores fat soluble vitamins, (A,D,E, and K) it insulates our organs, and is the start of all hormones. Fat DOES NOT turn into fat. Excess calories turn into fat. Say it out loud to yourself 3 times please. If you do not believe me look in any exercise physiology text book. Go ahead and look it up. Let’s go back to our calorie example. Let’s say that instead of burning 2000 calories you signed up for our BOOTCAMP and it really kicked your butt and caused you to burn off and extra 500 calories. Now you have eaten 2000 calories but burned off 2500 calories. That means you were short 500 calories. Where do you get those 500 calories from? That’s right; you get them from body fat storage (YAHOOO!!) Ladies and gentlemen, that is the ONLY way body fat leaves the body. There is no magic pill that makes body fat just disappear, remember the first law of thermodynamics. Energy (body fat) is never created or destroyed it is only transferred from one source to another. If you maintained that 500 calorie deficit for one week (500 calories a day times 7 days would equal 3500 total calories lost to energy expenditure) then you would lose 1 pound of body fat in a week.
The culprit of all this is a survival mechanism we all have called homeostasis. Homeostasis can be described as your body’s desire to be balanced. What this means is that when you were eating 2000 calories and burning 2000 calories there was a balance, homeostasis was achieved and the body was content. As soon as you began to increase physical activity you disrupted the balance and homeostasis was lost. The way the body responds to this imbalance of energy is quite often by increasing hunger to get you to eat more. If the body gets you to eat 500 more calories than you did yesterday you are now eating 2500 calories and burning 2500 calories and thus energy balance or homeostasis has been achieved and the body is content.
So what is the purpose of homeostasis? Why do we even need it since all it seems to do is sabotage my efforts to lose weight? You must realize the body could care less what you look like. Its number one priority is, and always has been energy. If we did not have homeostasis we would not have anything to regulate our energy expenditure to tell us we were hungry when we worked harder. If there was no homeostasis you could easily fall over and die from a hard day at work. We need this survival mechanism to trigger hunger when we increase our energy requirements. Homeostasis has only been an issue for about the last 50 to 60 years. Prior to refined sugar and salt, processed foods, and a sedentary lifestyle, homeostasis is what told the cavemen to get off their butt and go find some food. The problem is not homeostasis; it is the lives we choose to live. Although I refer to homeostasis as a villain in the title, it is easily a misunderstood survival mechanism that just gets a bad rap.
So what can you do to beat homeostasis? Did you know there are about 140 calories in a 3 ounce chicken breast? Do you know what 3 ounces of chicken breast looks like? Did you know there are about 210 calories in a cup of rice? Do you know what 1 cup of rice looks like? Chances are good that you answered “no” to all these questions. If you do not know how many calories you are eating and you don’t know how many you burn that you are just spinning your wheels. Although it is not easy to determine the number of calories you burn you can at least keep track of the number of calories you consume. Here is the thing; everyone has a different level of homeostasis. Some people do very well consuming 1500 calories a day and some just need more. The key is to do what you can to find your balance. You do this by guessing at the number of calories you burn off. You can look online and find thousands of calorie calculators to get a better idea. Then you have to write down everything you eat for a week. I mean you have to write down EVERYTHING you eat for a week. Eat a green M&M, write it down. Check your weight and body fat at the beginning of the week and then check it one week later. If you lost weight, you’re good. If you gained weight or stayed the same, shave off about 500 calories and go again. Eventually you will be able to bracket your way to where you need to be. In addition to documenting your calories, it is a good idea to stagger them throughout the week. If you determine that you get 1500 calories per day then mix it up. When you consistently eat the same amount of calories and it is a low amount, your body sends homeostasis into overdrive to fight that. We have found that by having 1-2 low days (1200-1300 calories) and then a high day (1500-1700 calories) it helps keep homeostasis from coming on too strong.
So now that you know what homeostasis is and how to fight it, what do you do with the hunger?
This is a very good question and there are several things you can do to help.
* You can chew gum or brush your teeth right after a meal. Those two things have been shown in studies to reduce the desire for food from a learned mechanism that you do not eat after chewing gum or brushing your teeth. I do not think it is that complicated, I just think food tastes terrible after doing those two things.
* You can plan your meals in advance and stop eating when you have reached your calorie allotment.
* Make a decision not to eat for 30 minutes after you have eaten your allotment for calories. It takes about 20 minutes for your satiety mechanisms to kick in and let you know you have eaten enough. This is another reason it is not a good idea to eat fast.
* You can take a safe appetite suppressant. Do not use anything like dexatrim or any other appetite suppressant that just tricks your body into not eating. Consult with Jenise or myself and we will recommend a safe supplement. Always remember the rule of supplements: you DO NOT ever take any supplement until you understand exactly what it does in your body, how it works, and why you should take it over another type of supplement. That goes for us as well. If we do not explain it well enough, do not take it.
* The final thing you can do is just realize that although you feel hungry, you will not die. I know I have personally felt like I would starve to death and die if I did not eat right away even though I had just eaten 3-4 hours ago. I promise you that you will not starve to death and die. People have been known to live for several weeks (4-5 in some documented cases) without food. You can surely live off 1500 to 2000 calories a day while you are attempting to lose some weight. In our selfish, self righteous, deserving society we have created environments where we refuse to be uncomfortable. This is what has led our society to having 71% of its people to be overweight or obese. We need to embrace the discomfort of making change like our ancestors did years ago. They obviously survived a lot of heartache and grief because here we are today.
What about diets?
ALL DIETS DO NOT WORK!! How is that for a bold statement? OK, let me rephrase that; “all diets do not work for all people.” Is that better? I can even say that all diets are the same. They are all “low-calorie” diets in disguise. They just take a fancy angle on the same concept; low calories. Let’s discuss why diets don’t work. On the first page we looked at a diagram of how the body loses body fat. Based on the diagram we learned that you can only lose weight by creating a deficit of calories consumed versus calories burned off. So to recap, if you burn 2000 calories in a day and consume 1500 calories, you will be in a 500 calorie deficit. There are 3500 calories in a pound of fat so if you maintain a 500 calorie deficit for 7 days you will lose 1 pound of body fat. That is the easy part. Where it gets tough is when your own body begins to fight you. We have already learned about homeostasis and how it affects hunger, but what about when you are able to overcome the hunger? Homeostasis does not quit. If homeostasis can not close the deficit by getting you to eat more then it will make you burn less. There are two ways it can do this. The first, is you will notice you become tired. Your body will slow down and bring down your body’s functions. As this happens you will begin to feel tired. As you get more tired you begin to move less. As you move less, you burn less calories. That is one thing that happens very often. The other thing that happens is that the body begins to shed unnecessary muscle because it can no longer afford to feed it. Since the person is moving less anyway, the body can justify letting it go. Why does the body let go of the muscle? It is because 1 pound of muscle burns 35-50 calories per day, sedentary. 1 pound of body fat only burns about 3 calories. If you are in a deficit, meaning you are feeding your body less than you are burning, it only makes sense that your body will the expensive stuff first. Another way to look at it is if you have kids. Muscle is like that greedy-needy child that will never leave you alone. They are always yelling “MINE, MINE, MINE.” “Will you stop touching me?!” “Mom, will you get me a snack?!” Then you have body fat who is like that child who lets you take a nap and plays with themselves in the corner, and doesn’t bother anyone. Who is your favorite? Come on, be honest. So your body looks at muscle and says “Sorry, I can’t afford to feed you, we don’t have enough calories.” “You demand 35-50 calories a day and we just don’t have it.” “Why can’t you be like your brother, he only needs 3-5 calories a day?” You will not be able to rebuild the muscle later because remember, you are in a calorie deficit. We know that a calorie deficit is good because that means you are burning fat, but there is more to the story. Calories are not the only thing we get from food. We also get nutrients from food. That means that if I am in a calorie deficit, then I will also be in a nutrient deficit. That is bad because a nutrient deficit will lead to more muscle loss and the inability to rebuild it later. It is safe to say that when a person goes on a diet, and loses weight, they may lose up to half the weight from muscle. If a person loses 20 pounds and half of it was from muscle then they are literally burning 300-500 calories less, then when they started the diet.
Follow along with the diagram in figure four as I recap the process. In step 1, a person begins a typical diet. In reality, all the diet did was put them in a caloric deficit and give them a very low amount of calories. So in step 1, the person was eating 2000 calories and has cut down to 1500 calories as a result of being on the diet. When homeostasis fails to get the person to eat more food it goes to the other side of the table and begins the process of down regulation. This is what I described earlier when the body begins to burn less calories by making a person feel tired and shedding muscle it can no longer afford to feed. This is step 2 in the diagram. A dieter will often begin to lose anywhere from 3-5 pounds a week when the diet starts. However, as the weeks go by, the dieter loses less weight per week until they hit a plateau, shown in step 3. You can see that although the dieter is still eating 1500 calories a day they have stopped losing weight due to the down regulation. This is where the frustration begins. The dieter is confused because they are still following diet perfectly they just are not seeing the results anymore. Eventually, after enough frustration, the dieter will stop the diet altogether. Since they are not “on a diet” they stop watching their portions and stop being consciously aware of what they are eating. In a short time, they go back to their old habits as seen in step 4. The problem is that their old habits were in the 2000 calorie a day range, so now they are in a surplus because the body has only been burning 1500 calories a day.
This is why it is common for someone to go on a diet and lose a little weight, then hit a plateau, come off the diet, and gain the weight back. Unfortunately, this is not the end of the bad news. Remember when we talked about how a person may lose up to half their weight from muscle? Look down at figure 5 below at a person who weighs 150
pounds. A typical ratio for that person can be 100 pounds of muscle and 50 pounds of fat. If they lose half their weight from muscle and half from fat you see that that the muscle drops from 100 pounds to 90 pounds and the fat drops from 50 to 40 pounds. Although they are in fact 130 pounds they are burning 300-500 calories LESS than when they started the diet. When they gain the weight back after they quit the diet, they will NOT get the 10 pounds of muscle back. This time when they get to 150 pounds the ratio may be more like 93 pounds of muscle and 57 pounds of fat. They are worse off than when they started. I could actually talk about diets for much longer but for the sake of keeping this short please come to my seminar called “Controlling your weight by controlling your life.”
What if I only eat like, 800 calories a day and still can not lose weight??!!!??!
A 150 pound person will usually burn around 600 calories in their sleep. In addition, the following activities require the use of calories: eating, talking, chewing, sleeping, burping, farting, picking your nose, rolling your eyes, making stink faces in boot camp class, flipping me off in boot camp class, pouting, whining, complaining, thinking up excuses for not turning in homework. Yes, every single action or thought that you commit requires the use of calories. You can not go through the day without using a significant amount of calories. Our bodies constantly require energy. We get energy from the food we consume or from the body fat we have stored. If someone says they eat very little food and still can not lose weight, what they are really saying is that somehow their body does not require energy. Somehow, I just believe that if that same person was stranded on a tropical island that they would lose weight like crazy.
So, what is the answer when someone says they only eat 800 calories a day and can not lose weight?
CHEATER, CHEATER CLOSET EATER!!!
That’s right, they are lying. The average American under reports their calories by 47%. The more overweight they are, the worse it is. We do not have internal calculators that tell us how many calories we are eating every meal, so if a person does not document the food they eat as they eat it, they will never be close in determining their daily intake. We also have a tendency to “forget” that little trip to the vending machine or the late night snacking that occurs.
When people truly do under eat the body responds with intense hunger the next time they are around food. The brain can literally withhold the release of Cholecystokinin which tells you that you are full. This allows us to overeat. I read an article one time that stated how the brain will make people “forget” the nibbling and snacking that they do all day, so they will justify eating more food later on. It went on to talk about how people sabotage themselves by not eating right all day, or eating too little while they are at work. By the time the day is over and they finally slow down they realize how hungry they are. When they get home they are surrounded by large amounts of their favorite foods and will just eat like crazy. I was intrigued by this article so I decided to test myself. I stopped eating at 10am. When I went home at 9pm I started nibbling and snacking. A couple of wheat thins here, a piece of toast there, maybe some pop tarts. I documented everything I ate and by the time I felt somewhat satisfied I had nibbled and snacked on 2110 calories. Let me also add that I was planning on still eating dinner a little later.
Some thing I have noticed is that people who are really thin, move a lot more than they think they do and they do not eat as much as they think they do. On the other side of the coin, people who are overweight do not move as much as they think and they eat more than they think they do. I am not attempting to make anyone feel bad or tell anyone they suck. I just understand science and I understand that there is a lot of prescription drug companies and advertising agencies trying to convince America that being overweight is not their fault. The bad news is, there is no fat gene or condition that dooms people to be overweight. The good news is that since it is our fault, then we can change it. Think about; if it really wasn’t a persons fault that they were overweight, then nothing they could do would make a difference. There is a strong sense of freedom that if you want to change the way you look and feel that there is no genetic dysfunction or mistake that will prevent you from reaching your true achievement and potential. It truly is up to you.
So, now what?
We are leading the charge against gym myths, marketing, and all the misinformation that will plague you for the rest of your life. If you truly want to change the way you look and feel then take charge and do something. Do not finish reading this article and “be inspired” but then do nothing. In fact, stop right now and do 10 push ups just so this article inspired at least “some” action. Seriously though, make sure you read our other articles and come to our free seminars. You will learn all the basics you need to make the changes you want to see. Do not just come in to the gym “once in awhile,” give it a half hearted effort and then quit when you do not see results. You have just become a victim of the “at least I did something” disease. Let me tell you now, YOU DID NOTHING. Instead, take action. DO not come to us and give us all the reasons you can’t be successful. I would rather you came to us with all of your circumstances and ask us “In spite of all these circumstances, how do I still be successful?” At that point we will be able to help you reach your true achievement and potential.
Remember to have fun, enjoy the process, and never, never, never, never, never, never, never QUIT.
See you on the wall of fame,
Victor
