A new episode of A Mind For Fitness Podcast is now available. In this episode we will talk about why I have been experimenting with re-introducing carbs back into my diet and what the results have been. Enjoy!
Tag Archives: Inches
True Confessions: How I Gained Weight Again (And How I lost It Audio)
A new A Mind For Fitness Podcast is now available. This is a good one. I come clean and talk about how I gained weight again but also how I lost it and am now more fit than ever. Enjoy!
What Not To Do About Your Weight-Loss Plateau
In the previous blog post I talked about why we hit plateaus in our weight loss. In that blog, I talked about the two main causes. The first was not appropriately sticking to your diet. And the second reason simply has to do with the fact that our body likes to adjust to what we are doing. In this post, I want to address what not to do when you stop losing weight.
Two Big Don’ts
In my experience, I see two major mistakes people make when they hit their plateau. The first is psychological, namely discouragement. The second mistake is attempting is to be supper strict with your diet or workout plan.
Discouragement
It is easy to get discouraged when you hit a plateau. Particularly when you are doing everything right. But the truth is stalling out in your weight-loss is, as far as I can tell, universal. It does not matter how good the diet is, or how strictly you are following it, at some point it will stop working. And by stop working, I mean that your weight-loss will either slow down or stop altogether. I do not mean that your plan will stop being healthy, rather what I mean is that your body will adjust and you will stop losing weight.
In light of this, there is no reason to get discouraged. Like I mentioned above, stalling out is universal. We all go though it.
Also, discouragement does not help. In fact, It leads to self destructive behavior. Those who stay discouraged for too long eventually fall back into old habits and gain back all the weight that they have lost. This is a story I have seen and heard too many times to recount. Don’t get discouraged. There are things you can do to get off of your plateau.
Super Strict
If the cause of your plateau is that you have not been following the diet correctly, then being more strict is the answer. However, like I wrote in the last post, even those who do a low-carb, paleo, ketogenic diet correctly, will still stall out. It’s easy to think that you just have not done the diet correctly enough. It’s easy to think that all you need to do is dial it down more on how many carbs you eat. As a result of this kind of thinking I see many people eating nearly no carbs at all. This is a big mistake.
Going supper strict is not the answer to your problems. In fact, you are just setting yourself up to prolong your plateau and more discouragement.
So now we know what not to do. This leads us then to ask: What can I do to re-start my fat-burning hormones? This will be the subject of our next blog.
Why We Hit Plateaus In Weight Loss
I recently did a podcast where I addressed the issue of hitting plateaus in weight loss. I talked about why we hit them and what we can do to get past them. This blog post will address the first half of the issue. Namely, why we hit them. In the next post, I will talk about what not to do and why. After that, I will talk about the active things you can do to get past them and get back on the road to burning fat.
Two Main Causes
The truth is there is only two reasons why your weight loss progress stops. The first is you are just not sticking to your diet correctly. The second is your body has simply adjusted to your dietary and/or workout regiment.
Not Sticking To Your Diet
Sometimes your not sticking to your diet simply because you are cheating too often. If this is the case, the truth is you need to do the diet correctly.
However, there are times when you really think you are sticking to your diet, but in reality you are unknowingly are consuming too many carbs and too many processed foods. For example that salad you had for lunch may have had many more carbs than you thought.
On one occasion I was happily eating a salad when I noticed that it was slightly sweeter than I thought it should be. The reason for this is that there were craisins in the salad. When I finally looked up the carb count in craisins, I realized that my salad contained my daily allotment of carbs. I was shocked.
If this kind of thing happens too often, you will certainly stop losing weight.
Body Adjustment
However, for many, you are sticking to your diet and you have still hit a plateau. The reason for this is that your body has adjusted to your diet and/or workout plan. One thing to keep in mind is that your body is always looking to establish an equal balance within itself. Losing wight is an imbalance within the body. And an imbalance is a shock and perceived as a treat to survival. Even though there are great benefits to losing excess fat, your body is still seeking to establish equilibrium as a survival tool.
Next Post
So there are your two reasons why you will stop losing weight. The next post will deal with what not to do about it.
If you liked this, please share this post on your favorite social media.
Getting Past Your Plateau (Podcast)
A new episode of A Mind For Fitness Podcast is now available. In this episode, Ean talks about why we hit plateaus. And what we should and should not do about it. Enjoy!
Dealing With Resoltioners (Audio)
In this episode of A Mind For Fitness Podcast, Ean Carlin talks about how to deal with those new years resolutioners who are at your gym.
Why Breaking Bad Habits is So Difficult
A new episode of A Mind For Fitness Podcast. In this episode, I talk about the difficulty of braking bad habits and creating new ones and what you can do about it. Enjoy!
Eating for Taste
A while back, I wrote a post on eating with your stomach. In that post, I talked about the importance of paying attention to how full you are while you are eating to avoid over consumption.
The way you monitor how full you are is by eating slowly. However, when you eat slowly there is also an added benefit–tasting your food. In other words, not only are you able to monitor how full you are, you also get to enjoy your food.
People are often supersized by how quickly they get full when they eat slowly and pay attention to their stomach. Likewise, it is shocking what you actually taste when you eat with the intention of enjoying your food.
What is the reason for the shock? It is due to the fact that often food you think you like turns out to taste gross.
When we eat too fast, not only do we overeat, but often times we only get the rush of salt and/or sugar (and other flavors) over our tongues. Because of this, we often do not recognize it when we do not like something.
This hit home for me some years ago when I decided to eat slowly and enjoy my food. At the time I was following the Paul McKenna diet. I went to one of my favorite restaurant and ordered the stake fries. But instead of gobbling them down I attempted to enjoy every bite. I did not succeed in that attempt. They were horrible. As a result, I have not eaten them since.
On the flip side, there are now many foods that I now enjoy that I did not before. For example, baby carrots are very sweet. By slowing down and enjoying the flavor, eating these items is a great way to curb your sweet tooth.
In closing, I encourage the reader to try it for themselves. You will be supersized and what you do and do not like.
All Or Nothing
I have seen many people fail on diets for a verity of reasons. However, recently I have noticed an attitude or belief that I have not recognized in the past. Since I have noticed this belief, I have come to see it in many. I have even come to recognize that I have fell into this trap from time to time.
So what is this belief? It is simply this: That adhering to part of a diet should give an individual part of the results of that diet. In practical terms it looks something like this. A person starts a low-carb diet. After a few weeks he notices that he is not losing anything. However, upon review, he realizes that he is really only adhering to about half or three quarters of the diet. He thinks to himself (and here is where the poor belief system comes into play), “I should be losing something. I know I’m not following the diet perfectly but I am following about 75% of it. I should be losing something–shouldn’t I?” Can you relate to this story? I know I can.
To complicate things, perhaps you have seen a friend who needs to lose a some weight and got results by cutting back just a bit on their carb intake. The question, then, needs to be asked: Why does following part of diet work for some and not others? The answer to this lies in what kind of body style one has and how much one needs to lose.
For example, someone with a bean-pole body style who has only 20 pounds to lose can see great results from only following part of a diet. But, even a bean-pole who has 50 pounds to lose is going to have to do better than 50 or even 70% of a diet.
However, for those of us who put on weight easily and have more than 25 pounds to lose, we need to be super strict on the low-carb protocol particularly at the beginning. Why is this? Simply put, doing 50% or even 75% of a diet is not enough to reset your fat burning hormones.
The truth is you need 10 days to 2 weeks in order to down regulate your fat storing hormones and up regulate your fat burning ones. So, if you are strict for three days, but on that forth day you eat a meal that spikes your insulin levels, you are not going to lose weight. If you repeat this process for a few weeks, you might get discouraged.
Fixing this is a matter of being honest with yourself. Are you the type of a person who puts on weight easily? Do you have more than 20 pounds to lose? Are you just starting out on a low-carb diet? If any or all three of these are true, then you need to be as strict as possible. The results will be worth it?
Reviewing Chris Powell’s Choose To Lose: The Seven Day Carb Cycle Solution (audio)
A new episode of A Mind For Fitness Podcast is now available. In this podcast I review Chris Powell’s book Choose to Lose The Seven Day Carb Cycle Solution.
Also, I talk about my experience in a one on one Yoga class!
Advanced Weight Loss Resources 