If you were constantly told that all you gotta do is just "eat less" if you want to lose
weight, then it might explain your lack of any significant progress.
And what might work for you is actually doing the opposite of "eating less."
Let me explain exactly what I mean.
Now, to be perfectly clear, there is no doubt that THE fundamental, scientifically-supported
factor of weight loss is a negative balance of energy, or an energy deficit as measured
by calories.
As we've heard a thousand times, it comes down to calories in versus calories out.
Now, depending on which supposed health and fitness guru you've been listening to, your
feelings of calories might vary between "calories are the end all, be all" to "calories are
a conspiracy spread by the food industry."
Now, what I can say is that, although the most scientifically common weight loss factor
is in indeed calories, the types of food we eat also have a huge impact on weight loss
outside of its calorie content.
And, that's where "eating less" tends to fail a good portion of people because too often
do we confuse the "less" in "eating less" as meaning "less food" and not just "less
calories."
And when trying to eat less of the foods we enjoy, especially high-calorie, highly palatable
foods that we developed strong preferences for at a very young age, we run into major
issues with things like hunger and appetite.
Personally, I know exactly how this feels.
Growing up, I had a wonderful mom who unfortunately was also a single parent working very long
hours.
So, for many nights, me and my siblings were left figuring out dinner for ourselves, which
ended up being a lot of fast food burgers and chicken nuggets.
To this day, fast food cravings are still a biotch, but fortunately over the years,
I've learned to manage it quite well, and that's largely thanks to what I'm going to
share with you now.
Again, "eating less" is not enough.
We also have to manage hunger and appetite.
And one way we can do that, interestingly, is by "eating more."
Yea, it sounds a little strange, but it's actually fairly simple.
Again, the food we eat has an impact beyond just calories.
And, according to research, some foods are better than others in curbing our appetite
and increasing satiety, or our feeling of fullness.
These foods are usually one, high-volume, low-calorie foods, which also tend to be high
in fiber, like all of your delicious fruits and green vegatables
Except kale because kale is evil.
And two, they are foods that contain more of the profound, prolific, PictureFit-approved
macronutrient known as protein.
Voluminous foods can fill us up more quickly, which have shown to act on certain hunger-related
mechanisms like elevating levels of hunger-suppressing hormones and slowing down the process of digestion.
Eating more protein has shown to also improve feelings of hunger and even in one study,
more protein lead to a spontaneous reduction of 441 calories per day for 12 weeks.
Essentially, subjects ate fewer calories even though they had no intention of eating fewer
calories or to even lose weight.
So, if you feel like simply "eating less" just doesn't work for you, then instead, try
to eat more of things like proteins, fruits, and veggies first, minus kale.
Protein supplements can help too, especially before your meals, which has shown to reduce
overall food intake, but whole proteins are probably the best bet overall.
To summarize, the "eat more" approach focuses on managing appetite and hunger first.
And if we do that, we don't have to actively force ourselves to eat less of our favorite
high-calorie foods.
We'll just naturally feel like eating less of them.
And of course, that will lead to our main goal, and that is eating fewer calories overall.
Now if you do try this strategy, make sure you are indeed leaving room for the foods
you enjoy and not just entirely replacing your diet with foods good for hunger and appetite.
You want to avoid the same issue with "eating less," and that's making your diet very hard
to stick to.
Moderation, as always, is key.
Give it a shot, see what you think, and I hope it helps some of you as much as it helped
me.
If you enjoyed this video, please give it a voluminous thumbs up and share it with your
appetite-loving friends.
Subscribe for more and let me know what you think in the comments.
As always, thank you for watching and don't forget to GET YOUR PROTEIN!