Should Anything Other Than Hunger Be A Reason To Eat?

There's a lot of confusing information out there these days.  Especially when it comes to the subject of weight loss, dieting and getting slim.

Many who decide to get themselves on to the path to a better body find themselves snowed under with advice about meal timing, how much to eat, what kinds of foods to eat, when to eat which foods, and how much of each kind of food to eat.

Tell me you haven't heard one or all of these little gems of advice:

Don't skip breakfast or your metabolism will be slow all day.

Eat every 3 hours, to keep your metabolism racing.

Don't eat only two or three meals each day, eat five or six (also in order to keep your metabolism fast).

Don't eat right before bed or your body can't process it and it will just turn to fat overnight.

Don't eat for several hours before bed (for the same reason).

Make sure you eat before you work out so you have energy.

Eat (or drink) carbs after you work out to replace glycogen in your muscles.

Eat protein after you work out to help build muscle.

Don't drink your calories, you won't feel full enough.

Sigh…  No wonder everyone's so darned confused, right?

Then add to the mix these special ones that make me absolutely crazy:

Take this magic pill and your metabolism will be so high your fat will just melt right off with no working out and no dieting.

Try this magic contraption where you can just hook up to a bunch of electrodes or sit on our vibrating machine and watch TV while burning fat with NO EFFORT and no special calorie restrictions!!

ALRIGHT, WAIT!  STOP!

Isn't this getting just a little bit ridiculous?

Sure there might be a tiny nugget of truth behind each and every single one of these theories (except the last two, those are outright scams), but the absolute truth is that when trying to lose weight, it comes down to one thing and one thing only:

Your "Calories In" must be lower than your "Calories Out".

In other words, the calories you consume while eating must be less than your body needs in order to live, breathe, sleep, brush your teeth, work out and all the other things you do during your days.

The truth of the matter is, that it really doesn't matter when you eat, or what you eat or when you eat what, or what kinds of foods you combine or how many times of the day you eat, or if your meals are large or small.  All that really matters is that your body has less calories to burn on its daily functions than you are giving it.  Then it has no choice but to get its energy from your fat stores.

So, if you are eating when you aren't hungry based on one or more of the advices above, stop immediately.  Only eat when you are hungry.  Why add calories to your day that you don't even feel the need for?  That's completely counter-intuitive to the goal, right?

Eat when hungry and not otherwise, and keep your calories consumed lower than your calories burned.  End of story.

The best bet is to figure out what the caloric range is for your body type, age, fitness level and weight loss goals are and then eat approximately 300 - 500 calories less than that each day… or 2,100 - 3,500 less than that per week.

Therefore, as you go forward with your weight loss goals, go ahead and eat what you want, when you want.  But remember the magic formula:

Calories In < Calories Out = Weight Loss Success

A great way to keep your calories in check is to practice the art of Intermittent Fasting. Check out the great interview with Brad Pilon, author of Eat Stop Eat to learn how it can help you achieve your weight loss goals.

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