I’ve helped thousands of people build muscle and lose fat, and here are the simple reasons why some people struggle with counting calories or think it doesn’t work.
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hEy hatE thE idEa of having to plan and track what thEy Eat.
These people usually view meal planning or tracking intake with something like My Fitness Pal as a psychological burden or have a lifestyle that involves a lot of unplanned meals prepared by others, which are basically impossible to measure in terms of calories.
On the other hand, these people quickly change their minds when they see how effortless weight loss is when you use calorie counting properly, just as you’ve learned in this chapter — no hunger, no cravings, and no crossing your fingers, hoping that this is the diet that finally works.
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hEy hatE thEidEa of having to rEstrict thEir Eating in any way.
Some people just have a strange relationship with food and want to eat what they want when they want and don’t want to feel like a slave to the oppressive calorie count.
In my experience, these people are harder to change.
They will try anything before finally submitting to the master of energy balance — fad diets, cleanses, weight-loss pills, etc. — and often choose to stay fat and wait for the next “metabolic miracle” than count a calorie.
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hEy don’
t stick to thEplan and rEgularly ovErEat.
Of course, this is all too common. They have a few extra bites at breakfast. A double portion of dressing at lunch. A little unplanned dessert at dinner.
All these little portions of extra calories add up and can easily negate the moderate calorie deficit you’re trying to maintain on a daily basis.
The solution is simple: you plan or track every single thing that goes into your mouth every day.
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hEydon’
tmEasurEandwEighfoodcorrEctly.
This is the accidental version of the mistake above. Instead of knowingly overeating, many people unknowingly overeat through imprecise food measuring.
For example, according to the nutrition facts panel of my oatmeal, a dry cup contains 307 calories. I want to eat some, so I get out my measuring cup, fill it to the brim (a slightly heaping cup, if you will), and log 307 calories. But I’m wrong — it’s actually just over 360 calories of oatmeal.
What tripped me up here is simple human error. One cup is a vague measurement that can be easily over- or undershot. What I should have done instead is weighed by grams. Eighty grams of dry oatmeal is 80 grams — no more and no less — and is about 300 calories.
So I overeat by about 50 calories in that meal, and life goes on.
A few hours later, I want some peanut butter, so I decide to eat two tablespoons, which is 188 calories according to the label. Out comes the tablespoon, and I fill it with creamy nut butter...slightly above the rim...which I savor oh so sweetly.
The problem is that 188 calories of peanut butter weighs 32 grams, but my slightly overzealous scooping gave me 40 grams, which contains 235 calories.
I then repeat this same mistake a few more times...with my ketchup at dinner, my cream in my coffee, and my chocolate squares for dessert, and I’ve successfully erased my calorie deficit for the day without even realizing it.
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hEy chEat likE a compEtitivE EatEr.
I recommend having a moderate cheat meal every week when you’re dieting. It’s a nice psychological boost and, depending on where you’re at in terms of body fat percentage, it can help keep the weight loss going.
Notice I said cheat MEAL, though. And moderate — not a cheat DAY or an all-out binge meal, because either can undo some or all of a week’s worth of fat loss (super high-fat meals with alcohol are the absolute worst).
So, when you’re cheating, you can end the day a few hundred calories above your normal daily intake, but don’t go crazy. If you need to, you can even reduce your carbohydrate and fat intake throughout the day to “save up” calories for the larger meal and thus keep your overall intake for the day in a reasonable range.
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hEy calculatE thEir total daily EnErgy ExpEnditurE incorrEctly.
Unfortunately, this is easy to do, because the activity multipliers of scientific formulas commonly used to calculate TDEEs are just too high. This is something most bodybuilders know but most laymen don’t.
For instance, I lift weights five times per week for about an hour and do about 25 minutes of HIIT cardio three to four times per week, and according to the activity multipliers for the Katch McArdle, my TDEE should be around 3,300 calories.
That means that I should be able to eat that amount every day and stay exactly the same. But I can’t. If I eat 3,300 calories per day, I get a little fatter each week. My intake needs to be closer to 2,900 per day for me to not gain fat.
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hEir mEtabolisms nEEd to bE fixEd.
When many people want to lose weight, they dramatically reduce their calorie intake and dramatically increase their energy output (through many hours of exercise each week). And while this approach will induce weight loss for a bit, it will ultimately fail. Why?
Because your metabolism adapts to the amount of energy you feed your body. Its goal is to balance energy intake with output — to maintain homeostasis.
When you restrict your calories and feed your body less energy than it burns, your metabolism naturally begins slowing down (burning less energy).1 The more
Eventually, the metabolism slows down enough to match intake with output, and weight loss stalls despite the very low-calorie diet and large amount of exercise. This is usually met with further calorie reduction or more exercise, which only results in more metabolic slowdown, and thus a vicious cycle begins.
This process of dramatically and chronically slowing down the metabolic rate is often referred to as metabolic adaptation or even damage, and fortunately, it can be resolved through a simple process known as reverse dieting.
I discuss reverse dieting in more detail in my book Beyond Bigger Leaner Stronger, but the basic idea is that you gradually increase your total daily calorie intake with the purpose of raising your metabolic rate and improving your health.
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hEy arE impatiEnt.
Whenever people write me complaining about not losing weight, I always ask for the specifics. Are they not losing any weight? For how long? Are they looking leaner? Is their waist shrinking (a reliable sign of fat loss)? And the answers are almost always along these lines:
“Well, I’ve lost about one pound per week, but shouldn’t I be losing more?” or “I haven’t lost weight in the last four days,” or “I can’t see my abs yet,” etc.
They’re usually making good progress but have unrealistic standards as to what they want to achieve (often fueled by ridiculous, misleading two- and three-month transformations featured on big fitness websites).
The bottom line is that if you’re losing about one pound per seven to 10 days, you’re doing great. Keep it up. If your weight is more or less the same after seven to 10 days, however, you simply need to move more or eat less.
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hEy focus too much on thE scalE.
While the scale moving down is clearly a good indicator, it’s not the final word. Especially not if you’re weightlifting for the first time, because this alone will increase your body weight through muscle growth (yes, it’s possible to build muscle and lose fat simultaneously) and additional glycogen and water storage in the muscles.
If people don’t know this, however, they can be baffled as to why their pants are fitting more loosely or why they’re looking leaner yet their weight has remained exactly the same. All that’s happening is the additional muscle- related weight is replacing the weight of the lost fat.
Remember that body composition is the real key here — not just weight. We want to see your muscle mass going up and your body fat percentage going down, which is more accurately assessed by the mirror and a waist measurement than a scale.
If, however, the scale, mirror, and waist measurements are all staying the same for seven to 10 days, then it’s time to change something.
These are the most common reasons people fail or feel like they’re failing with counting calories. Avoid these pitfalls and follow the tips in this chapter, and you’ll have tremendous success with it and even find it enjoyable.