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Starting and Maintaining Weight Loss

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 The more I learn about pretty much anything and everything, the more it seems that the secret to happiness is through sustainability as it can oftentimes lead to simplicity.

 I think this is especially true with health and wanted to give a few examples that I hope you can incorporate in your daily life.

Weight Loss

Everybody has their opinions about what works and what doesn't which is because we're all different and so nothing works 100% for any of us.

 Being overweight is due to a number of issues, the main one being eating habits we've developed over decades that give us more than we need.  Most of the weight lost or gained is due to what you're eating.  Exercise contributes a little bit, but think of it more as something that's good for the heart, muscles, and mind, and less so something that's going to dramatically change your weight.

First a few myths that have been passed down for generations:

  • Breakfast is not necessarily the most important meal of the day, though there are some studies that show regular breakfast-eaters lose a little more weight and it is personally my favorite meal of the day.  But generally breakfast foods have very little health to them.  A muffin is basically a cupcake you have before lunch and all the breads and potatoes are rapidly digested processed carbohydrates that your body doesn't really need.
  • There is no right number of meals a day.  It's not 3, it's not 3 and 2 snacks, it's not 6 little meals.  If you go back to our ancestors, they probably ate in the morning and at night.  We've been conditioned to eat at certain times and like any animal, we've developed a reaction when it's our feeding time and there's no food.  This is usually a hunger pang and will go away in 10-15 minutes most of the time.

    The body can last about 3 weeks without food, so skipping lunch is not going to be detrimental.  People fast for days to a week or so at a time without any real detriment, so long as you're staying hydrated (a good dipstick test for how much fluid you need is your urine - it should look pretty much clear - if it's yellow, that's a sign to drink more water).

    I usually encourage people to try skipping a lunch and see how they feel.  Most of the time, they find they have more energy in the afternoon without the crash that usually comes 60-90 minutes after lunch when your body may be doing a lot of work digesting, especially if you had a lot of simple carbohydrates for lunch.
  • Forget everything you've heard about how much protein you need (I ended up writing about this later on).  Most of what we've always been told about how much meat and dairy we should have has been due to lobbyists for those industries.  In reality, most people need about 0.3 grams of protein daily for every kilogram of body mass.  The FDA recommends about twice that and most people eat even more in the US.  On top of which, most of the protein sources these days are far corrupted from what they used to be:  animals are mostly raised in terrible conditions for mass slaughter leading to all sorts of abnormal chemicals and bacteria and contribute to destruction of land and natural resources (food, water) and probably are leading to global warming.  Finally, too much dietary protein has also been linked with increased risks of cancer, heart disease, and a myriad of other conditions, enough to the point that meat is becoming the new tobacco.

    You can read a lot more about this here at the Nutrition Studies website
  • Diets don't work.  Period.  They will help people lose weight initially but almost universally, regardless of the diet, people regain the weight unless the diet is something they can do forever because at some point, you fall off the wagon.  So you're not looking for a diet - you're looking to change your eating habits, forever, in a way that works for you.  Something sustainable.

So what are some ways to get started?  There are a few resources I like

  1. Tim Ferriss wrote a good book called "The Four Hour Body".  It mostly advocates a lower carb diet for losing fat, which isn't a terrible idea, and has a couple of simple rules to follow and I think he has a lot of good ideas to mull over so it is a good place to start.  I don't agree with his recommendations on nutritional supplements or binge eating, but everything else seems pretty safe.  See if you can check the book out from your local library if you don't feel like buying it - it's pretty long but he's dissected down to pathways that zig-zag through the book depending on what you're trying to learn.
  2. Have a plan for what you're going to eat.  Meal planning can be helpful if you do it ahead of time, especially for a week or two.  You lose your will power as the day moves along so remember that most people don't like to do a lot of cooking when they get home so either making some meals ahead of time and freezing them or putting something in a slow cooker before work or using a meal delivery service are all good options.

    Here are some meal planners I've used:
  3. Switching mostly to a whole-food plant-based diet (WFPBD) is a great idea for a ton of different reasons and most people who do it do see a lot of improvements in their overall health.  I took a very long training course reviewing all the evidence behind this and it prompted me to basically cut meat out of my diet, which is tough for a Texan to do (I'm not a zealot - I still eat good BBQ when I can find it).  I wrote more about this later on

    Here are some places to find more information:
  4. Most of us work well on a rewards program and the most successful habit changes occur when there are stakes, i.e. weekly weigh-ins or wagers or something along those lines to help keep you accountable.  To that end, here are a few things I like


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