Do You Want to Lose Weight?
If you answered yes, you are wrong. Well, not wrong actually, but what you’re really wanting to do is lose fat. Anybody can lose weight. You just don’t eat. You will lose weight, unfortunately, the weight you lose will be both muscle and fat.
The goal to successful weight loss is to preserve as much muscle as possible, or possibly even gain some, while at the same time lose as much body fat as possible. Your body fat % is a key indicator of your success, not the scale. In fact, stay off the scale, as I mentioned in Weight Obsessed? Stop Looking At The Scale.
Muscle is vital to your success for losing fat. Muscles have these little fat burning powerhouses called mitochondria. Mitochondria are cellular power plants that are responsible for the production of energy. It’s in the mitochondria that fat is metabolized. There is a positive correlation between the amount of muscle you have and the number of mitochondria. And it stands to reason that the more mitochondria you have, the more the potential to burn fat.
Get More Mitochondria
How do you get more of these little cell powerhouses? You need to be giving your body a reason to create more of them. You do this by performing high intensity exercise. HIIT training is just one of these methods. Weight training is another. By creating a large demand for energy up and above what your body can already produce, your body is forced to create new mitochondria in order to be prepared for the next time your muscles call on that needed extra energy.
The great thing about muscle and mitochondria is that they are active tissue. Unlike fat, they need constant energy to maintain themselves – energy like fatty acids. What does this mean? It means that your body will be burning fat at all times of the day – even while you’re sleeping. Yes, it is possible to burn fat in your sleep, and that is how.
Don’t Worry About Your Weight
Telling people to ignore their weight is a very common theme for me, and for good reason. Too many times successful dieting is sabotaged because of a meaningless number on a scale. A scale does nothing other than measure the force of gravity on your body. Why should this matter at all? It can’t tell you if your clothes fit better, it can’t tell you if your body fat percentage has changed, and it definitely won’t tell you that you’re looking any better.
When you start dieting, it is imperative that you track your progress using methods other than the scale. You need progress measuring tools that are going to track fat loss – not weight loss. Body fat calipers, tape measures, pictures, clothes sizes, and people’s comments are all going to be more useful for you. Don’t worry about your weight – even if it goes up. If you’re looking better, you’re weight doesn’t matter. The only time it matters is when you tell your weight to someone who doesn’t understand the difference between weight loss and fat loss.
Preserve Muscle While Losing Fat
Alright then, if our goal is fat loss, we are going to need to focus on preserving muscle while we lose fat. People tend to sabotage their diets by eating too little food and too few nutrients resulting in muscle loss. Once you start losing muscle, you are fighting an uphill battle to lose fat. This is one of the main reasons why diets fail, just behind food addiction as I talked about in Food Is A Drug – Food Addiction 101.
To prevent muscle loss, make sure you are following these basic guidelines:
- Get in enough calories for your body size and activity level. See how many calories should I eat.
- Make sure those calories are nutrient dense by having them come from fruits, vegetables, meats, legumes, tubers, dairy, and whole grains.
- Aim for calories in the 10-12 times your body weight range.
- Try to get in 1-1.5 grams of protein per pound of body weight, and divide that evenly among 5 meals.
- Eat enough carbohydrates to support your activity level. You can start at 150 grams and adjust from there.
- Fill the rest of your calories with fat – healthy fats and EFAs (essential fatty acids).
- Make sure you exercise and give your muscles a reason to maintain themselves. If you don’t exercise, your body is going to shed that unneeded muscle. Force your body to preserve it and even grow it by giving it consistent stimulation.
Follow these guidelines and you will reach your true goal of not just losing weight, but losing that unsightly fat, and keeping your beautiful muscle.
About Coach Calorie
Twitter: sheisstrong
says:
It drives me nuts when the people around me obsess over weight on a scale. This is a very informative article, thank you for sharing your knowledge with the community. There is so much misinformation out there!
Thank you. Too many times I hear people have been working out but they complain because the scale hasn’t changed. They get too caught up in how much they weigh instead of looking at the change in body composition. After all, a 130lb female at 25% body fat looks a lot different than a 130lb female at 15% body fat. With one person you will see abs, the other you won’t, but they both weigh the same!
I admit I am obsessed with the scale, it helps me stay on top of any weight gain. I also know muscle weighs more than fat and muslcle is also more dense than fat so it takes up less space, I know all this but I still get on the scale every morning. When my clothes start to feel tight I know I need to be more aware of my eating and my exercise but it will be hard to let go of that scale….thanks for the article love it.
Hey Cathy, as long as you know and understand what the scale is meant for, there’s no reason to avoid it. Just don’t depend on it as a sole means of measuring your progress. I like to weight myself when I do body fat testing. That way I have a number to calculate body fat mass from. Thanks for the comment.
Thanks Coach.
Just finished some HIIT in my new gym I put together in my basement, love it!
That’s the great thing about HIIT – you can do it just about anywhere
I’m so glad I read this. I have heard this before but have not had it explained to me so well. I’ve lost 100 pounds twice but I always eventually gain it back. I usually eat about 700 calories a day when losing weight because I am so impatient. I’ve been “meaning to” start “dieting” for months and I don’t know why I have such a hard time putting into perspective that it’s okay if it takes a long time to lose weight. The time is going to pass anyway. I am going to be more patient this time around…and read your website when I need motivation!
Patience and consistency is key. 700 calories is definitely low. Raise them up and take it slow.
I am a 5″1 23 y/o female. For the last two years i have put on around 60lbs, all mainly in my tummy area. I was recently told i had PCOS which was caused due to me being so over weight. I have tried every diet pill and diet under the sun, all failed very badly. I spent years worrying about my weight on the scales and not focusing on much else. Now i am trying a new workout dvd and i am basing my results on the inches i lose, rather than the weight i lose. This is mainly because over the years i have learnt that whilst you are working out you are losing fat BUT you are also gaining muscle, hence why there might not be any change in your weight, however if you are tracking your changes by a tape measure you will see exterme differences which will make you happier then seeing the numbers go down on the scales. In the past 2weeks i have managed to lose 3inches around my waist and i am so happy about that. I do not plan to get on the scales until i get my waist down to my ideal size. Throw away weighing scales, they only get you down and take you off course to slimming down. This probably makes no sense, but i’m trying my best :S
sairah recently posted..5 Mistakes That Ruin Your Workout
Makes perfect sense Sairah, and congrats on the progress. I’m glad you figured out that the scale is meaningless. The force of gravity on the body (weight) means absolutely nothing. You body composition is what matters.
I do check my scale daily which i heard is counter productive so I will limit it to once a week
thanks for the tip
imnotarunner at gmail dot com
I’m not concerned about weight loss, but am concerned about the flab around my tummy and jiggly thighs and arms- I guess what I’m looking for is to build muscle (of which I have none) and tone up my problem areas. I just don’t want to bulk up.
You won’t bulk up if you are watching your diet. Putting on muscle is much harder than you think. Bulking up is a fear for most women, but it is a myth that will never die. You might want to read Top 5 Fitness Myths to Set You Straight
This article was very helpful. Thanks!
This makes a lot of sense, when I was younger and went on crash diets, I was losing a lot of muscle. I am going to try to ignore the scale and work on building up muscle.
Thanks for these guidelines. I like that it’s very common sense and the guidelines are easy to follow. I’m trying not to obsess too much with the number on the scale but it’s hard!
It’s definitely hard. Weight means everything in our society.
Twitter: Dovescry2000
says:
Thank you for this article, I think it’s my fave so far. I know I should ignore the scale and yet I find it very difficult. When I was much, much younger I lost 75 lbs. by working out and eating correctly. It stayed off for 15 years and sadly something tragic happened in my life and I put it all back on over 5 years. Now I am trying to take off the weight and because I’m older it is so much harder this time around..
Twitter: antjon
says:
I am with you on the scales issue all they tell you is the weight of whats on the scale it could be a person or a bag of spuds they don’t tell you what it is or what it looks like. Instead of lining up for the weigh ins at their slimming clubs they should line up to look in a mirror were the can see results
Good analogies. It only tells you the force of gravity an object has on the scale – worthless.
Twitter: antjon
says:
if you are wanting a 6 pack but have belly fat would you have to lose the fat before you worked on developing this area
antjon recently posted..24/7 Lose Fat
Hey antjon, there’s nothing wrong with developing your abs while you have fat covering them. However, you definitely won’t see your hard work until that layer of fat is gone.
Hey coach, thanks for all this. Love the point about the numbers and scale thing being useless and being ignored, never even thought of that approach. This really got the wheels spinning.
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