Key to Successful Weight Loss

Key to Successful Weight Loss

The key to successful weight loss is eating less and eating naturally.

Understanding the fundamentals of weight loss

Before you attempt any weight loss, understand the fundamentals of weight loss.

Do not become obsessed with your body weight. The bathroom scale does not tell you how much fat or muscle you may have; nor does it tell you if you are healthy or not, unless you are grossly overweight.

Remember, your body weight always fluctuates—which is a fact, and which is only normal.

Counting calories is irrelevant in weight loss, although calories are critically important to weight loss. Weight loss occurs only when the calories you consume are fewer than the calories you use up. Overweight is a result of consuming too many more calories than your body can expend.

Counting calories is not only difficult but also inaccurate for the following reasons:

Inability to accurately quantify the mathematic values of foods

Discrepancy in the biochemical differences in different foods

Differences in each individual’s biochemical and genetic makeup

Differences in metabolism rate due to age, sex, health, and energy output.

Counting calories will drive you crazy. Did your ancestors count calories? If they didn’t, then why should you? So, stop counting calories!

More muscle mass means more weight loss. Given that lean muscle mass requires calories even at time of rest, the amount of muscle mass you maintain affects your metabolism in a positive way: you burn calories while you sleep. Therefore, the more muscles you have, the higher your metabolism rate becomes, and the more calories you will burn. The converse is also true: as you lose your muscle mass, the metabolism rate decreases, and so does your weight-loss rate.

Water loss is not the same as weight loss. The maximum amount of weight loss (fat or muscle) in one day is about one half pound. Since your body is made up of 60 percent water, and one gallon of water weighs about eight pounds, any additional weight loss greater than one half pound may only be water, and not your body fat. Therefore, when your body replaces the water lost, weight gain will resume, and you may be right back to where you started at an unhealthy weight.

Why losing weight is so difficult

Many people wish to lose weight, but many of them become victims in the battle of the bulge. There are several reasons:

If you want to lose 10 pounds, consider this: 3,500 calories equal one pound of your body weight. To lose 10 pounds of body weight, you have to expend 35,000 more calories than you consume. Mathematically, to lose 10 pounds in two weeks, you need to burn 2,500 more calories a day. You know this is not a piece of cake!

If you want a quick-fix to your weight problem, forget it! There is no magic bullet to weight loss.

If you want to jump from one diet to another, your body weight only yo-yos more, creating more frustration (which often leads to binge eating), and many more health problems further down the road.

If you want to use low-calorie foods to lose weight, forget it! Low-calorie foods are generally disagreeable and unpleasant to the palate.

Good luck to your weight loss!

Stephen Lau

Copyright© by Stephen Lau