photo: woodleywonderworks

There are 4 ways to lose fat:

1. Reduce calories
2. Increase exercise
3. Reduce calories AND increase exercise
4. Liposuction

While #4 certainly seems the easiest and fastest, there are a few obvious problems with it. First, it’s expensive. Second, it’s invasive, and finally, without changing your lifestyle, you will still be fatty and soft and no fitter than you were.

The best tried and true method is #3, reduce your calorie intake while increasing exercise. I think at this point, most people know that. The real problem, in this one trainer’s humble opinion, is that people are too busy. Our lives are stuffed chock full of diversions that serve to disconnect us with our bodies and the natural world around us. As an example, what do you do at the end of a long day’s work? Do you go for a walk outside and then come back in to prepare a meal from fresh, whole ingredients? Or do you shove something in the microwave and plop in front of the TV or computer for a few hours before going to bed? See what I mean?

Having recently left the corporate world behind, I know good and well the level of exhaustion that comes upon you at the end of the day. I understand that you have a busy lifestyle – kids’ sports practice, the long work commute, staying at work late, bringing your work home… I really do get it.

Therefore, let me introduce you to three ways that I personally use to jumpstart my weight loss during those times where I might “fall off the wagon” for a few weeks (months?).  You can choose to try one, two or all three at once. I use all three methods, plus incorporate exercise. If you’re just getting started, “incorporating exercise” might mean taking 3-ten minute walks during the day. Thirty minutes of exercise, five times per week is currently the industry standard for maintaining a baseline fitness level. More is better, but if you’re just getting started, this is a great place to begin!

Without further ado, I present to you 3 Ways To Use Your Diet To Lose Weight:

1. Intermittent fasting

If you get freaked out, as I did, about missing a few meals, I can promise you that you will live, and even thrive. Many cultures and religions include fasting in their rituals. Besides the obvious route of reducing calories (you’re not eating, right?), fasting causing a myriad of chemical changes to take place in your body, all of which are supportive of fat loss. I don’t want to bore you with technicalities, but you can find a good article about fasting on Mark’s Daily Apple site. He also includes links to many research articles and papers so that if you really are interested in the details you can find out the hows and whys. Basically it can be summed up like this: fasting causes your body to secrete more hormones which “like” to metabolize fat for energy; fasting reduces your insulin levels (excess insulin causes you to store body fat); fasting reduces insulin sensitivity; and finally, fasting helps to improve overall dietary adherence. 

How to do it: I hate to wake up with out my morning coffee and coconut milk mix, so I have my coffee, have my breakfast (consisting of a protein, veggie, and a fat), and then I don’t eat again until the next day. Drink plenty of water or green tea. I personally like the Yogi brand Healthy Fasting Tea. But nothing else – no sweetener, nothing with calories. Important: do not use your fasting day as permission to binge the next day! Eat as you normally would, else it’s all for naught. I choose Thursday as my fasting day, just because it makes Friday that much sweeter. 

2. Smoothie Day

Homemade smoothies are a fantastic way to sneak in healthy food to your diet – and your kids’ diet! With each smoothie, you should always always ALWAYS dump in a handful of clean, fresh, leafy greens like spinach, kale, turnip greens – whatever you have on hand! I promise that you won’t taste it over the other flavors. The key to existing on 3 smoothies a day is to ensure you’re including fat into your smoothie: a half an avocado, or a half banana, coconut milk, raw almond butter, etc. Drinking smoothies will still give you calories – this isn’t exactly a “liquid diet”, but that’s what I call it (because I still drink my coffee in the morning!). You can Google literally hundreds or thousands of smoothie recipes. You can use a tiny Magic Bullet for single-sized smoothie options (hint: I used to keep a Magic Bullet at work, it’s about $30), or a larger blender if you’re making them for mutiple people. Keep in mind that smoothies don’t keep for more than about 4 hours. 

I do Smoothie Tuesdays… because… why not?

Recipe ideas:

Strawberry-Banana Smoothie – 1 serving
* 5-6 organic strawberries
* handful of greens
* half a banana
* half cup coconut milk
* cold water

Almond Butter-Banana-Chocolate Smoothie – 1 serving
* 1-2 Tbsp almond butter (raw is best)
* half a banana
* handful of greens
— Blend until smoothe –
* add 1 scoop chocolate protein powder (I buy Jay Robb brand in a bag from Kroger’s natural section)
—Blend until mixed– (protein powder expands, so I add it after the rest of the ingredients are mixed).

 3. Nix the Grains & Starches

I won’t lie, at first it’s difficult to think outside of sandwiches, cereal, oatmeal and meals with rice, pasta, and potato bases. What do you snack on if not Wheat Thins, Cheese-Its, and granola bars? It takes time and a whole lot of Google searches to really integrate this food lifestyle. But it’s worth it. You’ll learn to focus not on the foods that you’re missing, but all of the wonderful new flavor combinations that you’re discovering and underscoring it all, you will begin to enjoy the slimming down that will inevitably happen when you stop bloating your gut and stunting your metabolism with enough carbs to fuel an ultra-marathoner (that’s someone who runs more than 26.2 miles, btw). Unless you are an ultra runner, in which case, ignore this entire post. 

However, most of us do not live the type of highly active lifestyles that require high carb intake. Most of us live relatively sedentary lifestyles, with indoor jobs that keep us in front of a computer all day. Or even just being on your feet standing in one spot doesn’t require the amount of carbohydrates we take in daily.  Most of us will get PLENTY of carbs from eating fruits and veggies. It’s a lifestyle change. That’s true. And not everyone can go cold turkey off the grains. It might help to ween yourself off: cut back to eating 1 serving, 3 times a day. Then twice a day, then once a day until you’re relying on good fats and carbs from fruits and veggies for fuel. Even cutting back drastically on grains and starches will cause you to see results on the scale. For meal and snack ideas, look up Paleo recipes. You don’t have to subscribe to the Paleo philosophy, but Paleo food sites will have amazing recipes for non-grain and starch foods. 

I hope that whatever path you choose, you also choose to improve your health all over – and stick with it. Don’t be a statistic: 95% of people who lose weight put it back on. That’s because just “going on a diet” isn’t enough. You really do have to change the way you live, and change your relationship with food and the God-given gift of physical activity.

Yours in good health and happiness,

April