Four things to know when you want to lose weight
There is an old formula that says: If I want to lose weight, I need to eat fewer calories than I expend. If I take in more calories than I expend (through my regular daily activities) then I will gain weight, and if I take in less, I will lose weight.
This equation is not only old, it is outdated.
It is an old approach that we know today to be inaccurate.
This inaccuracy is due to a number of factors, including the understanding that consuming too few calories during the day can put the body into “starvation mode” – a state in which all the energy we take in is immediately stored in the form of fat, because this is what our body is programmed to do when hungry, for self-preservation. But that’s not all. There are a lot of factors that affect weight loss.
Evidence of this is provided in a fascinating study from 2007 conducted on chambermaids in a hotel. The chambermaids were asked about their exercise habits. Most of them said that they had no time for exercise, they returned from work exhausted. Half of the chambermaids were given an explanation that their level activity during their work day is above and beyond the recommendations for daily physical activity, and that in fact they are in excellent condition relative to the general population. The other half did not receive this explanation. A month later, the researchers returned to the maids, and found that among the chambermaids who were told that the physical nature of their work exceeded the recommendations for daily physical activity, almost all of them lost weight, and showed improvements in blood pressure, body fat percentage, BMI, and more – without making any change in their lives other than the change in perception!
If this interests you, you can read the full study here.
What am I trying to say here? That self-starvation diets do not work over time, and anyone who has tried them can attest to the fact that the weight returned with a bonus after a while; and that it’s not all about calories.
There are actually 4 things that are important in the weight loss process, and if we do not pay attention to them, no matter how well we think we are doing, the weight will stay on:
- 1. Nutrition: It matters less how many calories you eat, and more what these calories contain My point is that the real question is quality and not quantity. When I talk about food, what needs to be paid attention to is eating real food. What is real food?Processed food is considered to compress calories. This means that it contains large amounts of fat, sugar and salt. In a relatively small quantity of food, we get a relatively large quantity of calories. Most of these foods are not satisfying, and actually make us want more (let’s see you eat only 2 Pringles! It is not for nothing that their slogan is “once you pop you just can’t stop”).Real food is packed with nutrients. This means that it contains a wide variety of vitamins, minerals, fibre and more. In a relatively small amount of food, we get a wide range of good things.Here is an example: One medium banana (118 grams) has 105 calories.What else is in the banana? Vitamin A, vitamin C, vitamin E, vitamin K, thiamine, riboflavin, niacin, vitamin B6, folic acid, pantothenic acid, choline, betaine, calcium, iron, magnesium, potassium, phosphorus, sodium, zinc, copper, manganese, selenium and fluoride.Yesterday I heard a lecture in which the following statistics were given: Children aged 2-5 consume 30-35% of their diet from calorie-dense foods (i.e., processed foods!). What does this mean? It means they are not getting the variety and abundance of vitamins and minerals they are supposed to get, and instead they are getting large amounts of fat, sugar and salt. How much of the food you eat is processed? How much of it is packed with nutrients?Stop counting calories, start counting nutrients.
- 2. Physical exercise: The more you do the better you will feel Seriously, you know that. How good do you feel after a short walk on a Saturday morning, with the sunshine and the birds and the clean air? We all know that sport causes the secretion of endorphins, and makes us feel better.
However there may be something you do not yet know. Health and weight loss are also connected to what comes out, not just what goes in. And I don’t mean the calories that are burned during exercise.To keep ourselves healthy we need to make sure that what goes into our body is good, but we also need to make sure that we help with the cleansing activity of our body. You may have heard of all kinds of liver cleanses? So I’m talking about daily maintenance of the body’s excretory systems. There are three main ones: kidney, liver, and skin. If you eat less processed food, you are helping your liver. If you drink enough water you are helping your kidneys. If you exercise and sweat, you are helping your skin.Sweat a little every day. - 3. Screen time: The less time you spend in front of a screen the more time you will spend being creative Well, there are plenty of reasons for this.First of all, the more time we spend sitting in front of the TV, computer, tablet or phone, the less time we spend on the move. Movement is life. More than that, the more time we spend in front of screens the less time we spend interacting with friends and family, and doing things that really make us happy. And I haven’t said a word about the content we see, which is often violent, and stressful, and does not exactly encourage happiness or tranquillity.But it’s not just that! These screens all emit blue light. This light can cause hormonal disruption (note that the latest versions of the phones almost all have a red light app in order to reduce the damage), and cause sleep disturbances due to the disruption in melatonin activity.
- 4. Sleep: Good sleep leads to better decisions Seriously. Did you know that even one night without sleep will lead to a change in the decision-making process? How? When we don’t sleep enough, instead of a more developed part of the brain being responsible for making decisions, responsibility is transferred to a more primitive part of the brain. This does not happen consciously, we have no control over it, but that is what happens. So how do we feel? We’re more irritable, we’re more likely to lash out at someone who annoys us (the boss, or our partner, for example), and not only that, but when it comes to decision about food, we will probably make less good choices and go for things that are processed and high in sugar content. There are quite fascinating studies on this.In short, to really lose weight you need to think and plan a healthier lifestyle from the base up. There is no magic potion, no pills that work. Here we have talked about 4 factors that can help you to achieve a healthy weight loss, or impede you in this process. Do not forget to pay attention to all these factors when you embark on losing weight, or when you just want to start living a healthier life.
