Am I lying to you?? Pt. 1

Often times in a social setting somebody will come to me with their story of how they are struggling to lose weight, they still feel flabby, that they have no energy and are always tired, despite working out a few times (at least twice) a week. I can often see the frustration in their faces and towards me. With an education in exercise science, they look at me as if that whole "eat right and exercise to lose weight" idea is a lie and that they are just genetically programmed to be overweight for the rest of their lives.

The truth is there are two parts to that equation: Proper Nutrition + Proper Exercise = Change. It really is that simply. But it is not easy. Today let talk briefly about nutrition and eating habits.

Most people only eat between 2-3 meals a day. Many get less than that (which would be 1 per day). However new research shows that by spreading calorie needs out over the course of a day. The simplest way to put it is this - If you take in more calories than you use, you will gain weight. Even at individual meals this occurs.

For example, if you have a lunch of 900 calories but over the next 3 hours (the time it takes to digest food) you only require 500 calories of energy due to biological function and other work, your body will store those 400 calories as fat!! And who wants that??

1 pound of fat = 3500 calories. So if you have an excess of 200 calories per meal and eat 3 times a day, it will only take about a week for you to put on a pound of fat. After 5 weeks you will have in the neighborhood of 5 pound of fat.

The picture to the right is a woman holding a model of 5 pounds of fat. Imagine if that was off of your body? -->

Now to the change. To change the way you look, you have to change the way you work; Change the way you eat, the foods you eat and when you eat.

Earlier this week I sent you to a website to estimate how many calories you needed per day. If you need that again, click here.

Now take that number and divide it by 4 meals per day. This is how many calories you need per meal. Keep it in the ball park, it does not have to be exact.

But here is the where the hard work comes in: You need to measure how much food you are eating and journal what you eat and when you eat it. Open a free account at www.calorie-count.com and start to log what you are eating. You will be surprised at how many calories you are taking in that you don't need. And by eating more frequently, you will have a steady stream of energy in, instead of one huge amount of energy that only weighs you down.

Remember, we who say that changing the way you look through eating and exercise are not lying to you. It has, can and will be done.