One thing I really want to avoid with Scaling Fitness is giving you the false impression that I’m the only source of information you need.
I draw my own personal opinions and conclusions from looking at a constant, endless number of sources. This is a lesson learned after spending the majority of my life inside echo chambers, not really challenging my own perspectives. Don’t make the same mistake I did.
To this end, in addition to my own original content, I also want to show you sources that I have read, listened to, or watched. These may be sources I agree with, or sources I disagree with. Or a mix of both!
I will always link to the source I’m referencing FIRST, in case you’d like to read it BEFORE hearing my thoughts.
I stumbled across this article a few days ago:
Is Calorie Counting Dead?
https://tuftsmagazine.com/issues/magazine/finally-end-counting-calories
First, let me say that I agree that calorie counting should be a relic of the past. “Calories” are simply a unit of measure of energy in a food, but they don’t tell you SQUAT about how your body USES that energy.
It should make sense that eating 200 calories of lettuce is VERY different for your body than eating 200 calories of candy, right? And this article discusses the pitfalls of the calories in / calories out (CICO) method of nutrition.
From the article:
Calorie for calorie, different foods have varying effects on important pathways throughout our body, including those related to our brain, liver, insulin and other hormone responses, fat cells, and gut microbiome. Growing research indicates that different foods even influence our metabolic rate—the amount of energy we expend. From these effects, the various foods we eat, even if they have similar caloric values, can in the long term make it easier or harder for our body to regulate our hunger, fullness, unconscious cravings, and metabolism and maintain a healthy weight.
This is absolutely true. And notice they slipped “insulin” in that list, almost as a side note. Personally, that’s item #1 for me.
Faced with that kind of complexity, it’s hard to come up with a single “golden rule” for reaching a healthy weight. For instance, for decades, all fats as a group were viewed as the villain of the American diet. But research by Mozaffarian and others has shown that characterization was a mistake. Meanwhile, many of today’s popular catchphrases—“low-carb,” “plant-based,” “vegetarian”—all have a tendency to be misleading because they can be too simple and narrowly interpreted. “One of the unfortunate truths,” Mozaffarian said, “is that there is no easy, one-word description of a healthy diet.”
It’s all going so well, until they decide to get a little trendy, and start to attack the newcomers to the nutrition scene as “crazes”:
Some ostensibly successful diet programs may also lead to confusion over cause and effect. Look at the low-carb, high-fat Atkins diet, which periodically sees a burst of popularity, and is the forerunner of today’s “keto” and “paleo” crazes. Robert Atkins hypothesized that putting the body into ketogenesis, the process of breaking down stored fat molecules for energy, produced sustainable weight loss. “Atkins was right about the importance of avoiding refined starch and sugar,” Mozaffarian said. “But, all carbs are not harmful. It’s now pretty clear that low doses of slowly digesting carbs, like in fruit, beans, and nonstarchy vegetables, are not a problem. And, simply avoiding refined starch and sugar can lead to substantial weight loss, without activating ketogenesis.” (The Atkins diet has been revised to at least partly incorporate this newest science.)
Now, do I think all carbs are harmful? Not necessarily. Especially if they’re offset by fiber, meaning your body uses the carbs present in the food you’re eating in order to break down the fiber in that same food. (I discussed the concept of net carbs in my post about Glycemic Index.) It’s not great, in my opinion, but it helps your body keep from turning those nasty carbs into inferior body cells, which SHOULD be made of fat and cholesterol.
What the participants in those study [sic] did do was eat healthy foods. The kind of diet that, as Mozaffarian puts it, “is rich in foods that give rise to life”—foods that grow when you plant them. That means lots of fruits, nuts, seeds, beans, nonstarchy vegetables, and minimally processed whole grains, as well as plant oils extracted from these foods. Fermented foods like yogurt and cheese also appear to provide benefits, he emphasized. And a healthy diet avoids foods rich in refined starch and added sugar, which lead to spikes in blood sugar and insulin.
So they’ve ALMOST got a grasp on the core concept here. They acknowledge that a healthy diet AVOIDS foods that spike blood sugar and insulin. This is the Glycemic Index at work! But then they recommend whole grains.
And they also don’t understand the inflammatory effects of “plant oils”. If you haven’t already, read “Healthy” Oils are Making You Sick. You need to be avoiding these things like they’re killing you. Because they ARE.
So close…
She’s published more than two hundred papers on weight loss and developed an online weight-loss program, The “I” Diet, based on the evidence-based idea that people can retrain their brains and adapt their behavior to avoid cravings and overeating.
This is literally how I lost my first 80 pounds. I read the book The “I” Diet, and it recommended eating “healthy” low fat foods, 5-6 times a day, and “retraining” your body to “avoid cravings”.
What this translates to is constantly eating, because the foods you’re consuming don’t satiate your hunger, and you fill in the gaps with discipline.
And if you have the discipline, you WILL lose weight. I’m proof of that. But you’ll likely be on and off the wagon, because you’re not giving your body what it WANTS. What it NEEDS.
“The proof is in the pudding,” she said. “It all comes down to finding ways to help people reduce what they eat.”
I could NOT disagree more.
When your body eats fat, it get satiated. When I eat (which is only once a day, which I’ll discuss soon…), I eat foods that are high in fat, and have little or ZERO carbohydrates. And I eat until my body tells me to stop. I eat until I’m “full”.
If you’re eating lots of fat, you really CAN’T overeat. Your body will TELL YOU to stop.
If you don’t believe me, try this delicious experiment:
Go to the store and buy one pound of bacon. Go home, cook it all up. (I like to drizzle butter on my bacon, along with salt and pepper, and cook it in the oven until it’s nice and crispy. Yum!)
Now try to eat it ALL.
I guarantee your body will tell you to stop before you finish. You’ll understand what it means to be satiated.
Have you ever sat down and plowed through an entire bag of chips? I know I have! That’s because carbs don’t satiate you!
Have you ever eaten a big salad with chicken breasts and then been hungry an hour later? I know I have! That’s because there’s NO FAT in that salad.
Take that same salad, replace the chicken breasts with thigh meat, drizzle the entire thing in olive oil, add avocado, and try the experiment again. I bet you’ll feel much more satisfied.
Because of all the fat.
And they end the article with this little gem:
Following the new WW program, Kozlov is eating plenty of chicken, fruits, and vegetables. She’s aware of the calories she’s consuming, but she’s more focused on cultivating new habits that feed into her health. “Today for lunch I had 650 calories, cedar-planked salmon and succotash,” she said. “Sure, I could have eaten something for 300 or 400 calories, but would I have been as full and would it have been as nutritious?”
So… she’s still counting calories… 🙄
A representative meal for me over the past year looks something like this:
- Ribeye Steak (18-24 oz, 1.25-1.5 lb) pan cooked in about 2 tbsp of grass-fed butter and 2 tbsp of olive oil
- Brussels Sprouts, Chopped Onion, and Bacon Pieces cooked in the same measure of butter and olive oil
- Water or Tea
I eat the entire steak, and I eat the veggies until I feel satiated.
I have NO IDEA how many calories are in all of that. I bet it’s a lot.
And in case you haven’t seen it, here’s what has happened to me.
You can choose which “healthy” way you’d like to eat. I’ve tried them both. This is what works for me. I think it will work for you too.
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