Bro #1: “Yeah bro, can’t you tell I lost weight? I put on like 10 pounds of muscle too.”

Bro #2: “Crazy how I weigh less, but I definitely put on some muscle.”

I could keep going, but you get the point. Lose fat, gain muscle – at the same time. How many supplements have you seen that claim they’ll let you do this? How many articles have you read that claim you can do this? Plenty, you know why? The consumer market works on fast results, and we all know how impatient we are as humans. We want it, and we want it now. We wouldn’t want it as much if it actually required hard work and dedication, right? So you can see how the fitness industry and media in general work in tandem to provide you with the fastest way to do whatever (six pack abs, big arms, beach body, etc.). However, getting back to reality, the truth is simple. Unless you are using steroids, thinking that you can lose fat and gain muscle at the same time is just not going to happen. Well, I shouldn’t be that harsh, let me explain.

The process of thermodynamics is absolute, that means there’s no workarounds. Whatever you’ve read about and been religiously pumped into believing through magazines or the media, you’ll have to let go. The reasoning for that is simple. Our bodies function in one specific way, based on calories (units of energy). Food is made up of calories, which in the end, are used as energy for our every day activities. What we eat per day, is what we take in (calorie wise) and every thing we do (including what happens inside of our bodies) requires energy (calories). Therefore, this translates into: Food (calories in) vs. Activity (calories out).

If we eat more food per day than we wind up burning through our total activity levels that day, we will wind up with excess calories. Over time, if we keep this up, we will put on weight. If we do the opposite and continually burn more than the amount of food we take in per day, over time, we will lose weight. At the same time, there is a maintenance amount of calories that we require (based on our weight/height/activity level) that we will burn automatically per day. For an extreme but simple example, if we remove the activity factor (what we do each day) and just go off of our body’s statistics, just the act of breathing and functioning (while laying still in bed for 24 hours without moving) is going to burn a certain amount of calories, that amount is your maintenance. Therefore, this whole process of calories in vs. calories out is based on whatever our maintenance is per day. If we wind up below our maintenance, we’ll lose weight. If we wind up above, we’ll gain weight (again, over time, unless you literally binge and eat some insane amount in one day). For more on this, read our maintenance calories article.

Now that I’ve effectively summarized the basics (which, in turn, summarizes both of the articles I linked to), let’s get to losing fat and gaining muscle. Understanding the above, you can clearly see that to lose fat, you need to do the opposite of what you do to gain muscle. Right there, you should see how doing both at once does not make sense. In order to illustrate this for you in the simplest of forms, I’m going to use a good old metaphor. So here it goes: Let’s say you are constructing a house -

If you need to build the first floor, but you only have enough materials to build the basement, can you accomplish your objective? On another note, if you’re attempting to remove the window in the basement, but don’t have enough tools to do so, can you accomplish your objective? Without being imaginative, we can clearly see the answer to both questions being a no. Now substitute your body for the house, and your actions for the tools. The end result is the same. If you’re attempting to gain muscle, but you’re not eating above maintenance, you are not giving your body the necessary amount of food needed for it to actually build muscle. If you’re attempting to lose fat, but you’re not giving your body enough of a reduction in calories, you’re not going to able to lose fat because you’re overfeeding your body and it can run off of the excess energy instead of focusing on taking away from your body fat.

In its most basic form, therefore, the concept of lose fat, gain muscle (at the same time) = an oxymoron. How are you supposed to be able to give your body enough nutrients to have enough to sustain itself (and THEN SOME to build new muscle), yet give it less nutrients than it needs so that it can effectively start to burn fat? It’s simple, you can’t. You either have to be eating a bit above to gain muscle, or a little below to lose fat. It sucks, but it’s better knowing this than trying something that’s physically impossible and wasting your time because you’re being lied to, right? I hope so!

Now, to spare ending the article on such a devastating note, there is technically a way to be able to do both. It’s not the optimal way to get things done, but if you don’t mind taking more time to achieve results then you might take a liking to this method. Think about it, if you have to be above to gain muscle, and below to lose fat, where can you theoretically average out to be able to do both? At maintenance! It’s rather widely understood that if you stick to eating right around maintenance for extended periods of time, you’ll be able to accomplish a successful body re-composition (change the way your body looks). Very often that involves losing fat, yet gaining muscle. If you understand how we’ve gotten to this point with all the calorie talk, you can hopefully see how hovering right around your maintenance can bring a mix of both.

Keep in mind, however, that this process is much slower. Usually, if you really get practical, those AT maintenance are supposed to simply stay the same. However, with some heavy training and a strong diet (high protein), some positive body recomp. should be expected. Again, since you’re not focusing on one of the two goals specifically, and allowing your body to be performing at optimal levels by focusing on that goal solely, the results will be much slower. Just like with anything else, doing two things at once is not as productive as sticking to accomplishing one task at a time, this is no different. Nonetheless, it does not mean both can’t be done with time together (lose fat, gain muscle). If you don’t mind taking your time, or you’re not really into the whole bulking/cutting cycle, go ahead, give it a try. Good Luck!

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“Stay away from fats”, “Only low fat please”, “Fats are bad for you…”

You’ve heard these phrases, but is there a reason to really be that paranoid? The name itself will scare many folks, mostly because of the fact that for a while now fats have been the subject of health scare campaigns. Ever since there’s been a surge in advertisements claiming fats bring certain death (exaggeration), they’ve received a very bad reputation. Let’s dive into why that’s not the case. To start off, they cannot be defined by lumping them into one general category of “fats”. There are different categories that exist, and we’re here to examine them and show you why they don’t all spell doom.

Let’s begin our examination by taking a look at the fats that actually are, our enemy. The fats that, indeed, are bad for you. You might know them by another name…Saturated Fats. In the science world, Saturated Fats are characterized as carbon atoms which are saturated by hydrogen atoms. Not really important to know for you and me, right? So let’s skip past the actual definition and get straight to the point of why they’re harmful. Saturated Fats are the fats which give rise to cholesterol levels in your blood. Put simply, having high cholesterol increases your risk of heart diseases. Besides Saturated Fat, there’s also another harmful fat that should be avoided, and they’re called Trans Fats. Trans fats do the same amount of damage Saturated Fats do by increasing your bad cholestrol (LDL) and lowering your good cholesterol (HDL). This increases your chances of getting many heart diseases, such as Atherosclerosis, or, a heart attack.

Switching the page, we now turn to the fats that are good for you (yes, they do exist). Polyunsaturated Fats and Monounsaturated Fats are the good fats (don’t worry about the difference between the two, they’re both useful) which benefit your health if eaten in moderate proportions (as is the case with everything). They’re also good for another rather simple reason, eat more of these to replace more of the bad (Saturated Fats).  Unlike the Saturated Fats, Polyunsaturated Fats actually help reduce the cholesterol levels in your blood, which in turn, help decrease your chances of getting heart diseases.

Cholesterol levels are measured in HDL (high density lipoprotein) and LDL (low density lipoprotein). High HDL levels are a sign of good health while high levels of LPL increase chances of heart disease. Saturated and Trans Fats increase LPL levels, while the Polyunsaturated and Monounsaturated Fats increase your HDL levels (good to know, right?).

Now, armed with the basic understanding that there are indeed different types of fats that serve your body in different ways, let’s move on to the foods that are high in each. Examples of foods that contain Saturated Fats are fatty beef, lamb, pork, poultry with skin, beef fat, lard, cream, butter, cheese and other dairy products made from whole or reduced-fat (2 percent) milk. Now, now…just because they contain them doesn’t mean they need to be tossed into the trash bin or avoided. Just be sure that these aren’t the staple of your every day meals, as over time you risk problems if these are the basis of your diet.

In addition, there are many baked goods and fried foods that contain high levels of saturated fats.  Examples of Trans Fats include; french fries and doughnuts, baked goods including pastries, pie crusts, biscuits, pizza dough, cookies, crackers, and stick margarines. Again, doesn’t mean you can’t eat french fries or enjoy some cookies, but make sure they don’t make up a large portion of your daily food menu.

Returning to the fats that do play a positive role in enhancing our bodies, we move to examples of Polyunsaturated Fats. These foods include; vegetable oils (such as soybean oil), corn oil and safflower oil, as well as fatty fish such as salmon, mackerel, herring and trout.  Other sources include nuts (such as walnuts) and seeds (such as sunflower seeds). In other words, snacking on almonds or enjoying some peanut butter is a much better alternative than focusing on pastries. Who would’ve thought, right?

Just remember, there’s good and there’s bad. Enjoy the good, toss the bad (at least most of the time). Variety is key, so indulge but remember that when someone mentions “fats” you don’t have to go screaming for the door. They are not all bad for you, knowing the difference will come a long way in keeping you healthier and more fit. For a general discussion of some healthy foods you can eat, check out our Healthy Foods to Eat To Lose Weight article. Good Luck!

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To begin, the low fat foods campaign erupted out of a hardened position against having fat in your diet overall. Fats were portrayed in a very negative manner, and to learn the real truth about the importance of fats in your diet visit our Is Fat Bad For You? article to get the scoop. With that said, low fat foods became very popular not only because of the stigma of fats but because fats had a high amount of calories. With low fat, the goal was to kill 2 birds with one stone by making sure that the food had a small amount of fats in a serving and as a direct result of that, was a low calorie food. However, as great as it sounds on paper, low fat foods can be quite deceiving.

Now, why low fat food choices at the supermarket might be deceiving to the average consumer ties strongly into the whole concept of maintenance calories. If you burn off more calories in a day than you consume through food, you will lose weight, and if you consume more than you burn, you will put on weight (both happening over time). What often happens with low fat foods is that they really aren’t all that low calorie. They may have lower fat amounts, but many times they unfortunately have a heavy carbohydrate count that is not very noticeable. As a result, “okaying” low fat foods because you believe they’ll keep your calorie count lower can be based on a false premise. Sometimes it will not be wrong to think that, but other times the sugar in that low fat item will still keep the serving size far from a low calorie food. What is required on the part of the consumer is a little bit of diligence, by double checking the low fat food item against having a high carbohydrate count.

As an example, the fat content of a low fat food may say it has 1/3rd the amount of its regular variety. Using 6 grams for the low fat version, that would mean its regular serving has 18 grams of fat. That winds up being a little over 100 calories saved (each gram of fat is 9 calories). However, the carbohydrate amount is still 30 grams. As a result, you’ve shed off a chunk of calories relative to the food items original variety. However, the low fat food is still higher in calories than possible alternatives. This especially rings true for foods that are very high in calories, some people come to believe that eating the low fat variety of that same food item will mean that it is a low calorie food alternative and they can therefore enjoy that delicacy. This reasoning may run folks into trouble, because often that food is only lower in calories relative to its original counterpart, not a low calorie food in general. This distinction is imperative to understand. For healthy food choices, check out Healthy Foods to Lose Weight.

There is nothing wrong with going for low fat foods, but often times people have been lead to believe that as long as the food is low fat, it is going to seem healthier and lower in calories as well. Learning that this is often not the case, if you’re already conscious enough to scope out low fat foods, make sure you take the extra step and look at the overall calorie content (along with the carbohydrate content). You don’t want to be under the mistaken notion you’re consuming a low calorie food when it really winds up being the opposite.

Of course, if you’re stuck between buying something that’s really off the wall and going with the low fat version of the same or similar product, regardless of the carbohydrate amount the low fat version is better as it’ll have the lower calorie count out of available alternatives. However, when you’re dealing with only one type of food, it’s important to check the nutritional label to make sure you’re not buying the item on a false premise of it being healthier or lower in calories. Low fat definitely has its moments, but don’t count on it religiously to be an automatic low calorie food if you’re following any type of diet. Stay on alert at the supermarket. Good luck!

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Reaching aesthetics requires extreme diet make overs, as an aesthetically pleasing body is not created by playing around and not keeping serious about what you eat. The good news is that you certainly don’t need to be eating every 3 hours, the tougher news is that you will have to be counting calories, and well. What’s vital is figuring out your maintenance, and tailoring your calories per day to within proper limits. As someone working their way down by cutting to eliminate fat loss, it’s imperative that your calories are within around 500 calories under your maintenance to make sure muscle loss is kept to an absolute minimum. If you are an ectomorph attempting to put on size without adding too much extra fat, the same rules apply with regards to eating over maintenance. The calorie counts, however, are simple math. What many people forget is that as you drop weight, or gain it, you have to constantly be adjusting those numbers. Many make the mistake of working hard to find out their calorie counts, only to stick with that number as they make changes. You’ll quickly stagnate this way and realize your errors, but that’s a few weeks wasted. With the grind that’s necessary to become aesthetically pleasing, there can be no wasted weeks.

Although dedicated individuals will be able to stick to their numbers, a major obstacle often faced by people is the motivation to eat the same or similar foods constantly. Yes, it’s possible to go ahead and indulge in some fast food as long as you hit your calorie and macro-nutrient goals for the day, but you have to remember what you’re aiming to accomplish. If you want to be aesthetically pleasing, you have to adapt a boot camp mentality. See the goal in front of you any time you crave something unnecessary, and bring yourself back to the task. Although IIFYM is great, the warning with it is that it often makes people lax and prone to cheat on their calories more often. There’s a greater willingness to go over your limit based on the food choices you make, and when you tell yourself you’ll eat less later to make up the difference, it often doesn’t happen. Not only, but eating simple carbohydrates (found in many of our favorite fast food places and the like) makes you hungrier faster (partly explains the notion that you’re more prone to fail to eat less later). Now, we can never speak in absolutes. If you can pull off IIFYM without any of these psychological limitations that come with it, more power to you. Just be aware that they exist.

Often times, what people do instead is allow themselves one cheat meal a week to satisfy their cravings, this works well. The limitation here is that when people refer to a “cheat meal” what they really mean is a binge-session. If you’re truly serious, a happy medium is to incorporate an IIFYM-esque method on a particular day of the week (or however often you feel you’ll need to satisfy your cravings). You’re not having a binge session, but enjoying the food you like while still attempting to meet some form of your daily macro ratios and overall calorie intake. It’s worth it, remember that.

Although this should be common knowledge, basic foods you should be focused on include: eggs, chicken, red meat, fish, brown rice, whole wheat bread, potatoes. Plenty of variety can be found in our Healthy Foods to Eat to Lose Weight article. There’s also a diet tips and tweaks for aesthetics version by the name of Lose Body Fat: Tips for Aesthetics. A great way to mix things up is also to switch up how you tackle the different macro-nutrients. The fad lately is to go low-carb, but that’s only one way of doing things. You could also carb-cycle (eat carbs only on days you workout, for example) or go on a high carb/low fat split (as long as you understand the importance of good fats and still get an appropriate amount in per day).

What’s most important for developing an aesthetically pleasing physique, of course, is that you actually apply these principles and apply them well. Good physiques and aesthetically pleasing physiques are not one in the same, so how hard you grind will determine how great your physique becomes. Diet is key, and if you don’t know, it makes up about 70-80% of your results. The gym is the stimulant, but your body is made in the kitchen. What’s all that muscle going to do from those great gym sessions if it’s covered by a layer of fat? Always stay motivated, always play around with your eating options to keep from going crazy, but know that at the end of the day, the upper echelon of aesthetically pleasing physiques belongs only to the few. The question is, are you one of them? Good luck.

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The only way these diets differ, at least the traditionally popular diets out there, is in the way they shift the macro nutrient ratios that make up the daily calorie counts. Some will have you eat a low amount of carbohydrates, making up the caloric deficit with fat and protein. Others will provide you with a more even split of proteins, carbohydrates, and fats. Outside of this, however, their goals are identical: controlling your food intake in a way that meets your desired goals. If you wish to lose fat, eating slightly below your maintenance calories will do the trick. If you wish to gain muscle, eating slightly above your maintenance calories will do the same (assuming you’re stimulating muscle growth by weight lifting). It really is that simple. Now, does that mean that the buck stops there? Not necessarily. There is support out there for the belief that carb cycling may provide an additional boost to your results. Let’s digest the theory under which timing your carb intake may prove extra beneficial.

Although the basic principle of calories in vs. calories out governs, rarely do people mention the role insulin plays in shaping an individual’s results. Insulin is a hormone the pancreas releases after you eat a meal. It is, in essence, a traffic coordinator inside your body because it tells the body what to do with the calories you’ve just eaten. Instead of burning the stored fat in your body for energy, insulin tells your body to burn the food you just ate for energy. There is inherently nothing wrong with that. That’s how the body is supposed to function. However, carbohydrates have a somewhat greater effect on insulin than proteins or fats. When we eat a carbohydrate-rich meal, our blood sugar levels increase because the carbohydrates are broken down into sugar (glucose). Insulin moves this sugar from the blood into the muscles and fat cells for storage. The problem? Insulin levels peak later than our blood glucose levels. This draws two important conclusions. One, the fact insulin levels remain higher for a longer duration of time than is necessary potentially directly impacts our total caloric intake by making us crave more food not long after eating a high-carb meal (this is only a problem if you give in to the cravings). Two, there is a controversial belief that this insulin time-lag impedes how quickly the body returns to burning stored fat for energy.

Why does this latter point prove detrimental? This insulin spike time-lag deters the burning of stored fat in our bodies. This impedes fat burn, even in a caloric deficit. Keeping insulin low, therefore, diminishes the potential for this stubborn fat phenomenon. The problem with this theory, however, is what exactly is the body using for energy during this “lag” period? If it has burned all the energy available from your food intake, it should logically follow that it will move on to burning your stored fat for energy. Nonetheless, even if this second point is debatable, the first stands strong. That alone should be convincing enough to treat insulin-moderation seriously. If moderating insulin activity does have these benefits, the obvious question then, is why is keto not preferred? The mere fact carbohydrates have this potential impact on our insulin levels does not mean that they should not be included in our diets to a greater degree than the keto diet allows. There is a difference between having little to no carbohydrates, too much carbohydrates, and just the right amount. The first is unnecessary, the second is detrimental (due to increased cravings, at the very least).

Carb cycling allows the type of moderation that avoids the energy shortage pitfalls of the keto diet, while taking advantage of the positive effects on insulin of lower daily carbohydrate intake. Furthermore, the insulin spike isn’t all that bad either. Insulin promotes the transport of sugar (from carbohydrates) and amino acids (from protein) into muscle. Carb cycling allows you to time that insulin spike at the appropriate moment, post-workout, for maximum repair and growth of your muscles. In addition, even eating complex carbohydrates lowers the insulin response to some extent (within the carbohydrate category), further eroding the need for jumping on keto.

Carb cycling is implemented in two main ways: either intra-day or inter-day. Intra-day carb cycling involves ingesting carbohydrates only around the pre-workout and post-workout timeframe. This is meant to provide quick energy for the higher level of activity, allow the increased energy to be used during the activity (not stored), and to take advantage of insulin’s transport of protein to damaged muscle. Inter-day carb cycling involves ingesting greater amounts of carbohydrates on workout/higher activity days and imitating a keto-style approach on off/low activity days. This means off days will have little to zero carb intake, and workout days will either follow the intra-day schedule or have continuous carbohydrate intake throughout the day. Which one you prefer doing is up to you, you can always mix and match as well. The one thing you need to understand is that carbs are not evil, there just may be some benefits to playing around with the amount and/or timing of their intake. For someone who has reached a plateau and has never tried carb cycling, doing so may serve as a breakthrough that can enable further progress. For another individual, carb cycling may make no difference as long as the maintenance calorie objectives are reached. Whether it may provide additional benefits is for you to test. It certainly won’t hurt you, but only by giving it a go can you find out whether it helps.

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The biggest component of those vouching for diet soda is the fact that it is indeed a calorie-free drink. On that basis alone, it can help many people avoid taking in extra calories throughout the day, possibly halting weight gain or even allowing for weight loss (depending on the rest of your diet, of course). Those who believe diet soda is bad for you have not taken this calorie-free advertisement as the truth, however. There is a widely popular rumor that diet soda isn’t actually calorie-free, and that the soda companies pay the Federal Drug Administration money to allow them to continue printing a bogus nutritional label. Fortunately, even though we’re highly aware as consumers of the fact that these companies aren’t angels, in regards to this particular rumor we can stick to being content with the fact it really is nothing more than a rumor. I’d imagine those who believe diet soda is bad for you would have come up with a better logical reason behind this secret pay-off that’s supposedly happening. I mean, let’s be real here. Imagine how the courts would be on fire if some diabetics were to enjoy diet soda on a regular basis and intake all that sugar that’s supposedly there. Not happening.

Diet soda is indeed calorie-free, and that is a huge plus for those who truly want to start getting away from regular soda and its sugars. Nonetheless, emerging studies point to quite a dilemma. Since diet soda is an artificial sweetener, there exists the possibility that it may cause bigger calorie issues in the future. To expand on that, imagine your body being tricked into believing that it’s about to ingest some sweet sugars, when in reality you feed it diet soda instead. Over time, research has indicated that there is a strong chance that this may raise sweet cravings. What good is cutting some calories initially, when there’s a high chance you won’t be able to quell the increased desire for sweet foods? 100+ calories now does not sound like the greatest trade-off with 400 calories later (example amounts, of course). This is particularly worrying to those who opt for diet soda as opposed to regular soda because they already have trouble completely removing such cravings, as witnessed by the switch to diet instead of water.

We know that in order to achieve your fitness goals, you must feed your body the nutrients it requires for it to do what you want it to. Diet soda does not provide any nutritional value whatsoever, and as shown above, actually tricks your body. At least regular soda gives you some energy in the form of simple carbohydrates (sugars). Since soda is clearly not a viable alternative we’re attempting to discuss here, the best thing to do would be to switch to something that actually has benefits. Green Tea benefits are plenty. Not only does it increase metabolism so you can burn more calories throughout the day (small, but helpful over time), but it also is antioxidant rich for anti-aging, anti-cancer, basically anti-anything bad. If you’re not interested in that alternative, stick to water. I’d opt for juices, but they’re just as sugary as soda even though they have vitamins and minerals. The topic is about limiting calories associated with diet soda, so let’s stick to that.

The topic that has garnered the most attention in regards to whether diet soda is bad for you revolves around the chemical compound aspartame. It is much sweeter than sugar, and gives diet soda its flavor without the calories. When it sounds too good to be true, it probably is, right? Well, research has demonstrated that when there is a high consumption of aspartame in animals, over time there is a correlation with the development of different diseases, ranging from brain tumors to memory loss. Of course, there’s two problems with this. First, it requires a high consumption; which means that you need to be a diet soda junkie. If you are, you have bigger fish to fry than worrying about whether diet soda is bad for you or not. There is no reason diet soda should be a staple of your diet, and if you indeed do consume it in high amounts, you should start tapering that habit off. Not necessarily because there is a correlation between aspartame and long term consumption, but because I stick to a very easy and important rule when it comes to the high consumption of liquids: if it’s not water or tea, it’s not meant for me. To add to this, the research has been done on animals. Last I checked, that’s not exactly human-oriented.

So when it comes to the question of whether diet soda is bad for you or not, it’s actually up to you to decide. Like I mentioned, if you’re a diet soda junkie, you need to start lowering the amounts you drink per day/week. Nothing is good for you in high doses all the time, moderation is key. However, if you enjoy a diet soda here and there to satisfy a small craving, I see no problem with it. Diet soda in and of itself is not going to kill you (as far as we know so far), so its not necessary to avoid it like the plague. Nonetheless, that doesn’t mean you should treat it like liquid candy either. Good Luck!

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Fats are a hidden gem that can also provide you with the energy you need to hit the gym at maximum intensity. If they’re in charge of testosterone, they have to be good for something, right? They’re hardly discussed, however, mainly due to the wars waged by the media on fats over the past decades (which are largely untrue). Then again, things tend to be overshadowed when they’re made to be the scapegoat for a powerful conglomerate, but to brush up on some of the important facts about fats, check out Good Fats – Bad Fats .

Some people already use them as a great source of energy [Keto]. Those who follow the fat loss diet that tries to lower carbohydrate intake next to zero rely on fats as their primary energy source. Since they’re lowering their total caloric intakes in hopes of losing fat, their energy levels may not be an ideal way to test the true validity of fats as a pre-workout meal, but it certainly helps prove the point. There is no better way to know, however, than to try it yourself.

Even if you only give it a go for a workout or two, it’s worth a shot because you never know what the results may be. Perhaps you respond better to fats than carbohydrates as an energy source, but you’ve been using the latter without acknowledging the former? That’s the possibility this article is attempting to test! As they say, different strokes for different folks. You may be a fat-responder, you may be a carbohydrate-responder (in terms of which one is most effective), it’s up to you to find out what works best for a pre-workout meal. Good Luck!

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To start, I’d like to mention that it is imperative that we focus on burning fat, and not weight. Lose Weight vs. Lose Fat demonstrates the significant purpose of this, but in a flash summary what’s important is that you’d ideally like to retain the muscle mass on your body and burn the fat, as opposed to losing both combined. The end result is a lean physique that is appealing to the eye instead of just a smaller version of the previous you. If we’re going to engage in getting in shape, we might as well make sure that it is fat that is being burned off our bodies.

For most, the experience of “cutting” (losing weight/burning fat/etc.) is a long-winded journey that focuses on eating healthy and restricting the overall intake of food in the first place. This is a good start, but quickly leads to people faltering for a variety of reasons. You see, when you’re doing something that you don’t want to do it is easy to find reasons to cut corners, cheat, or give up altogether and rationalize why that is. It is natural, and I’ll go as far as to say, expected. It’s no fun, it doesn’t give you room to breathe and enjoy what you want, and you often wind up cracking. Let’s change this.

To understand how to burn fat we need to understand that the most important factor is making sure that you are below your maintenance calories each day. The fact that you burn more calories in a day than you intake through food is imperative through simple math. Needing 2,000 and eating only 1,600 will, over time, lead to fat loss. A safe amount to stick to below maintenance is anywhere from 200-600 calories. Now, what we’re looking for is to maximize how we look with the comfort of enjoying more types of food than we thought. How do we do this?

Low carb diets could be your answer. Many people have been led to believe that they work, but for the wrong reasons. Ad magazines want to scare you into thinking that carbs turn to fat, that you can’t eat them before bed, and that they make you gain weight. Maybe they could attack you while you sleep as well, no? The great misconception here is that it is not the carbohydrate that does any of this, it is the overall caloric count you manage to rack up each day. Too much of any macro-nutrient can lead to this result, whether it be fat, carb, or protein. All of them are made up of calories, and in the end, the amount of calories you consume through food will be the determining result (bringing us back to the maintenance calories concept mentioned above). However, lowering carbs in exchange for fats can be your key towards burning that fat. Again, it’s not because one is more magical than the other, but lowering carbs in exchange for fats might be the ticket to success for many for a variety of reasons.

Carbohydrates make you retain water, while proteins dehydrate you. Increasing the amount of protein you eat at the expense of carbs will ensure that you look the leanest possible, regardless of body weight, throughout this whole process. Carbohydrates give you that dreaded “bloated” look, so often you’re left looking bigger than you are because your cells are storing a ton of extra water. The combination of fat and protein will help avoid this, making you look leaner than you are based on the scale itself. However, these are just the minor bonus factors.

It is also the easiest to cut carbs, something many people may disagree with. Yes, we all have sugar cravings, we all want carbs, and that’s part of the larger picture keeping people from losing weight. However, the reason we have these cravings is because that is what we put in our bodies. Fat substitutes can crush that sugar crave, keeping you from over-eating. Fat is essential to our bodies (Good Fat vs. Bad Fat) and it can be a great substitute for energy. Many people know that carbohydrates give us energy, but fat can do it too, and often times even better. Fat digests slower, giving you more sustained energy.

By focusing on eating higher fats and protein at the expense of carbohydrates, you can get more out of cutting (less bloat/water weight) as you’re dieting, make sure that you have a wider variety of foods available to fill your caloric needs for the day (keeping you satiated, keeping you more rooted to the cause and not cheating), and give you energy without the possible crashes (which often accompany certain carbohydrates – particularly in higher amounts). Low carb diet foods are plenty, let’s go over some options.

Diet Possibilities:

Some of these may seem a little unconventional, but they’ll help achieve your goals. You might question how you could eat these things when trying to lose fat, but like explained above, high fat + high protein works for many precisely because of the foods available. Clean Food Bad Food might give you some more perspective.

Sausage/hot dogs – yeah, add some ketchup or mustard and eat this solo without bread/buns. Perfect pre-workout meal. High fat, but relatively low protein, so add some protein source if you feel you’re low for the day.

Bacon – it’s allowed. Everything in moderation, of course. Add some to your scrambled eggs and you have a great breakfast option.

Grilled Beef Patties – 300 calories, 30 grams of protein. Fat/Protein greatness. Available in the freezer at your local market, check out Salmon/Turkey patties too, same protein without the fat. You can gauge what you need for that particular meal based on how much of what you have had for the day so far. Delicious.

Boiled Eggs w/Yolk – bad cholesterol from egg yolks? Yeah, right. That’s a myth (unless you’re already suffering from extremely high cholesterol, cause then of course it wouldn’t help either). Fat/Protein, with the protein being the best protein source available.

Steak – I don’t think this one needs any explanation.

A) Herring Fillets in sauce – come in a can like tuna, except they’re rich in Omega 3s and have a high fat/protein ratio. Basically, a meal on its own considered they’re dipped in sauces like tomato, for example.

B) Herring Fillets – slices of herring, can add them to another meal or eat a couple on their own. Once again, high Omega 3s same benefits as option A.

You want a different idea for a salad? Chop up some sausage and mix it with other types of vegetables, such as peppers and onions, add some low calorie sauce and mix it all in a bowl. Preferably as a warm meal that you can make in a pot. Same end result, without “fat-free” or “sugar-free” dressings necessary that you know don’t taste nearly as good.

Almonds are your snack of choice throughout this journey. Unsalted. (Any nuts will do, in fact)

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Of course, as long as you are below your overall maintenance each day you will wind up losing fat (if your protein intake stays high so we avoid muscle loss as well – hitting the gym to make sure this is the case won’t hurt). However, this is a great separate road you can take to achieve the results you are looking for that’s outside of the regular mundane brown rice and grilled chicken routine. Furthermore, having a meal or two with carbs throughout the day is not the end of the world. If you require it to switch things up, or need it for the calories, it’s fine. Just make sure you stick to complex carbs because they increase your satiety greatly (whole wheat, brown rice, etc.).

Burning fat doesn’t have to be mundane, it doesn’t have to be routine and tasteless. Keep those calories under maintenance (not too much!) and you’ll wind up achieving your goals whether you use a low carb diet or any other diet. The key points are: keep protein high, exercise can only help. The reason I say the latter is because you technically do not require exercising, it can certainly help if you want the best results. For those of you weight lifting, hitting the gym is obviously imperative, however, a low carb diet can work for anybody. It is up to you to get creative, find low carb foods, and come up with ideas in the kitchen. What matters is that it is possible, so if you’re up for it try it out and see where it takes you. For a relevant topic on weight loss, check out our Easy Ways to Lose Weight article. Good luck!

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Protein is an essential macro-nutrient that is absolutely vital to muscle recovery and growth. This is uncontested. It comes as no surprise, therefore, that it is almost inevitable that people will wind up buying protein powder if they are avid gym goers. It just feels like the right thing to do. Hit the gym, train hard, come home and down a protein shake. That’s perfectly fine, but many people misunderstand the role protein powder plays in helping them achieve their results. They believe the labels on the tubs, and think by drinking protein shakes they will “get big”, “lean”, or “muscular.” However, although a very common misconception, it is indeed a misconception. Let’s clear it up.

Whether you are trying to put on size, or you’re trying to lose some fat, caloric intake is your #1 priority. There are a certain amount of calories that, at your particular weight, make you hold that weight. Meaning, if you eat that amount of calories, you will stay at your weight because that is the amount of calories your body burns each day. Therefore, to make up for those burned calories, you must eat that same amount. Sounds simple, no? If you eat less, over time you’ll lose weight. If you eat more, over time you’ll put on weight. This is the concept of maintenance calories. Remember it!

With that said, there’s a certain amount of protein that you need per day. As a gym goer, that amount is higher than your average individual. Nonetheless, it is usually anywhere from 30-40% of your daily calories. How do you reach that amount? You usually eat foods that are high in protein (grilled chicken, steak, eggs, salmon, etc.). Many people, however, supplement with protein shakes. This is literally, the extent of a protein shake’s worth. Unlike the advertisements on the protein powder labels, or in fitness magazines, the only benefit they confer on an individual is provide them with added protein for the day. They are a supplement.

In other words, they don’t magically make you grow muscle. Well, they can certainly help. However, the mere act of drinking a protein shake will not magically make you grow muscle. There’s nothing in the protein powder you’ve chosen that makes it do anything other than give you a dose of protein (usually anywhere from 20-30 grams – or about 15-20% of what an average gym goer needs for the day). Protein shakes will not make you put on size, they will not make you tone, they will not make you lose fat. Protein powder is simply protein, the same protein that is in grilled chicken (let’s ignore the food vs. powder debate). Whatever grilled chicken does to you, that’s what protein powder does for you. It’s really that simple.

Now, can you drink 4 shakes a day if you want? Sure, is it required? Not at all. Many people don’t even use protein powder, because they get enough protein from eating their daily foods. If you focus on foods that have high protein counts, and are consistent, protein powder isn’t even necessary. However, for most people it is advantageous to have a shake or two throughout the day to meet their protein quota. To supplement their protein intake. Whether they grow or not is not based on those protein shakes, but on the amount of calories they eat per day. This is the key distinction, don’t forget it.

To get results, focus on figuring out how many calories you need to eat to achieve your goals. Once you’ve figured that out, if you need to, supplement your diet with protein shakes in order to get the required amount of protein each day. If you’re eating a ton of protein-rich foods, you won’t even have to. Protein shakes are in no way essential, but they are often helpful. Next time you’re at the store, don’t count on those pesky labels that tell you the protein will do magic, and give you great results. You might as well slap those labels on that steak in the supermarket, how far will that get you? Well, to the same place. Protein is protein! For a very related topic that covers this and other similar concepts, visit our Supplements Surely Produce Results, Right? article. Good Luck!

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Moving on, when it comes to actual protein sources, whey usually takes the cake. It is the most popular protein to buy when it comes to supplements like protein shakes, and we can’t blame it for its status. It is a complete protein and has a great biological value (how much of it is used by the body compared to how much you ingest). However, there’s an overlooked contender on the market who matches those stats, and more. Not only is protein from egg whites praised for both its biological value and its “completeness”, but it also scores the absolute highest when it comes to the Protein Efficiency Ratio (ability of that protein to assist in growth) – which is a 3.9, compared to whey which sits at 3.2.

The reason I mention egg “white” protein instead of egg protein, is not because the yolk protein is any different, but simply for the fact that the egg yolk does not provide statistically the same dose of protein as the egg white portion in relation to the calories consumed. As you can tell from the description of this article, we’re talking about quality protein intake “while staying lean” (what I really mean by this is, low calorie). Egg whites have a bit more protein per egg (3.5g) than egg yolks (2.5g) and they range from 15-20 calories, whereas egg yolks range from 50-65 calories because of the fat content (mostly good fats though! – Fats Good, Fats Bad?). To note, if you have no problem consuming a larger portion of calories, eat the whole egg. It’s all about what you are attempting to achieve. If you’re looking for a great but low calorie protein source, eat some egg whites. If you’re looking for an overall great protein source, eat the whole egg. The choice is yours.

Egg protein is often called the “gold standard” protein source because it is the standard by which all other proteins are measured. If that doesn’t give it great credibility, I really don’t know what will! They are not digested as quickly as whey (if you want an order based on speed, it’d go: whey/egg/casein), but they are the perfect source of protein for those who are lactose intolerant or those avoiding dairy (whey/casein) for other reasons (ex. acne). Although they aren’t up to par with casein when it comes to slow digestibility, they are still a good source to have before bed as they are no whey either! Being right smack in the middle, you can get the best of both worlds. Good Luck!

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