An Evolutionary Perspective on Laziness

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“I just can’t muster the energy to get off the couch”

“It’s too much work”

“I don’t know where to start”

My Lazy Beard

These three excuses could be about anything.  It could be about shedding some fat, doing homework or fixing the light in the garage.  But they all point toward one thing: a propensity for laziness.

It’s hard to understand how we human beings can have a great capacity for both for work (think of what our caveman ancestors went through) and waste of energy (homeless people, you when you’re watching TV when we’re supposed to be doing a chore).  I think the general population believes some people are just born with a lot of energy and they could never have what it takes to do the same.

(I personally believe that’s foolish way to look at things but that’s a whole other can of worms)

Anyway, why can we be so damned lazy?  There is enough literature on the subject to fill the deepest ocean trenches, yet the problem still persists.

Here’s my little tiny ripple of perspective on the very vast and complex pool of a subject.

SHORT VS. LONG-TERM THINKING

Let’s step back and take a look at a possible evolutionary reason for laziness.

If you look at how a species can survive and evolve for such long periods of times rests on a wide variety of factors, but one fascinating variable is how efficiently it uses energy. An animal that is wasteful with it’s energy in an environment where food is not plentiful will find itself struggling to procreate and keep the species going (Think of a bird that just flys around for leisure as opposed to using it to search for food or to mate will eventually have it’s genes weeded out). In terms of the animal kingdom, wasting energy is just not a useful thing to do.

Humans are especially interesting because we have those same evolutionary drives which in some way dictate how we are going to spend our energy. Right now if you’re hungry and sitting at your computer desk and see a cookie across the room, odds are you’re going to be compelled to spend the energy to get up and go eat it (no matter how lazy you are feeling). That’s an easy one. It’s short-term motivation that keeps you alive and helps dictate what is worth your effort and what has value, second by second and minute by minute.

However, this really fucks you up when you want to go on the journey of shedding some fat and being lean as hell. It takes a whole bunch of long-term thinking and vision to light that fire under your ass.

Right now you may be sitting at your computer and the last thing you are going to want to go do is to go make a meal from scratch, plan out a lifting schedule for the week, humble yourself to learn something new (like how to properly deadlift or squat) or even just do anything than what you’re currently doing. Right now you are alive, probably not hungry, in some sort of shelter and are somewhat comfortable. So even if you’re morbidly obese and terribly unhappy, you are still ALIVE which is the whole goal of life. Life doesn’t care whether you’re happy or not, it cares whether you can keep the species going.

Therefore your acute and short-term motivations in life (eat, procreate and even to seek pleasure) lead you into trouble in modern society where it isn’t a struggle to find food or shelter or to live past the age of 15. These motivations, especially the whole pleasure-seeking one, often lead you to eat calorie-dense food (think sugar, fast-food, pizza, etc.) and to sit and watch TV. Less activity and more calories equals more fat. Multiply this by every single day of the year and you can see how obesity has become an epidemic. Even more than that, you can see how people struggle to go from an average body to a phenomenal one. It’s just one slice of the pie but an important slice indeed.

JUST ANOTHER EXCUSE?

I hesitate to even point out something like this because it’s just another idea for someone to use as an excuse as to why they can’t lose weight.

Don't end up like the Dodo bird

“My short-term motivations for survival outweigh my need to lose weight. So it’s not my fault, it’s all evolution’s fault! Yayyyyyy!”

Uh, no.

This is just an exercise to try and elevate your perspective. Knowing that you have these complicated mix of drives and motivations that range from simple survival stuff (eat and sexy time) to medium level stuff (seeking pleasure, engaging your brain), to higher level stuff (being a moral person, having a purpose in life) can help you recognize what is going on in your brain.

Your brain is a powerful thing and can trick you when you are looking to achieve some goal that doesn’t necessarily tickle your evolutionary drive to survive. Seriously, think about that. From a genetic perspective, your one goal in life is to live long enough to have kids. All those goals about getting into shape, being happier, richer, etc. don’t mean shit to the paramount goal of keeping the human species alive.

This is no special trick. You’re not going to read this and go “OH! I GET IT NOW!”. But you should understand that how you “feel” right now is a valid emotion, but it’s something you can blow through. Your brain can tell you that the chair you are sitting in is comfy and that you should just stay there because your fed and warm. But you can feel that emotion and still decide to get up and go put your energy into going after that goal of a sexy looking body.

It’s better than sitting here and reading this anyways. Am I right?

Thanks for reading. Feel free to leave some comments.

 

Is There Protein In That?

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“Ooh, I’ll take the Salmon salad, that has protein in it.”

That statement was uttered a few tables away.  I couldn’t help but notice.  It’s something I hear all the time and truly wonder “Is this how people decide what to eat?  Based on protein alone?”

What about all the stuff in the salad?  The dressing? How big is it?  How many calories is it?  Are there tons of calorie dense foods?  How much salmon is in there?

This is the sort of thing I hear quite often and have a hard time relating to or understanding.

Example of Generic Explanations

It’s not that I disagree about the idea of protein being healthy or being helpful in achieving an aesthetically pleasing body, it’s just that once again someone is taking a very narrow-minded view of what they are about to eat and stamp either “good” or “bad” onto it.

It shows a lack of understanding of how the food we eat affects how we look. But hey that makes sense because the fitness industry pushes these ideas and it is a multi-billion dollar industry that can’t really seem to solve our problem of getting into phenomenal shape. I’m here to try and help sort the mess.

So in that vein, I want to talk just a whee little bit about protein.  It’s actually quite an extensive topic and it’s impossible to condense everything into a short and interesting post.  So instead of giving you the normal explanation of why protein is just so dandy, I want to tell you a little background info and why it can be “helpful” beyond simple black and white thinking.

WHAT PROTEIN IS

In terms of functionality, of being able to survive on this planet, the human body needs protein. Protein is required for a whole host of processes, from functioning as hormones and enzymes, to building /maintaining actin and myosin (aka your muscle) and also providing your body with the capability to defend yourself from disease through immunoprotection (aka a properly function immune system) [1]. These are just some of the well-known functions of protein; there are a whole host of other processes that require this essential nutrient.

Got it? Good.

So yes, protein is pretty damn important. It’s essential to life. No debate there.

As far as where protein comes from, most people tend to think in terms of animal meat; chicken, beef, fish. However, protein is in damn near everything (in varying amounts). Vegetables contain a bit of protein, while grains, nuts, dairy contain varying amounts as well. Basically, you’d be hard pressed to avoid getting any protein in your diet at all.

YOU GET IT

Ok, nothing new here. Protein is important. You’d have to be hiding under a rock to not know. The question of course is how much protein do we actually need?

The answer depends; are you trying to just survive or look good naked (you are reading my blog so I assume the latter).

In terms of healthy function, the RDA (recommended daily allowance) for protein is 0.66 grams of protein per kilogram of bodyweight [2]. This number is not the “official” or perfect number and you must always factor in the variables such as your age, activity level and body weight (for example active individuals need more). And I should stress that this recommendation is arbitrary (in my opinion) as you also need to factor in the types of protein (what types of food is it coming from?) and your end goal (health, body improvement, survival, etc.). This RDA is just what the acronym stands for, a recommendation. Keep that in mind.

SOURCE MATTERS

A very real challenge for vegans/vegetarians is adequate protein intake. There certainly are a myriad of sources from which this choice of diet can choose from for adequate protein but it is obviously easier for a meat-eating human who can easily down 50-100 grams of high-quality protein with a chicken dinner.

If you recall from earlier, I did say that vegetables (and other non-meat sources) have protein in it. So why can vegetarians still struggle to eat adequate protein?

Because not all protein is made the same.

Protein’s structure is that of a polypepetide chain of amino-acids, covalently bonded together. With roughly more than 20 different amino-acids out there, there is a ridiculous amount of combinations available.

So a gram of protein from say, a bell pepper, is vastly different from a gram of protein from an egg. Not to mention the bell pepper has a gram or two versus the egg which has roughly seven.

This doesn’t matter until you understand that different amino-acids are more essential than others. Leucine, for example, is an amino-acid considered essential because of it’s role in muscle synthesis (amongst many other things).

So when you look at the amount of leucine in 100 grams of soybeans (roughly 2.7 grams) versus 100 grams of rice (0.191), you can see that not all protein is the same.

So for the whole vegan/vegetarian crowd who might read this; you can easily achieve adequate protein intake with a focus on higher quality protein (soy as one example) and adequate intake. I am not saying anything negative about the lifestyle, simply that protein intake is something that must be kept in mind.

REMEMBER: KEEP IT SIMPLE

Now I can see someone reading this and get the spinny-head syndrome.

“Leucine? Polypeptide chains? Grams per kilogram? How do I know what to do!?!?”

I’m throwing a lot at you just for basic background information. You don’t necessarily need to track protein intake (although it could be beneficial if you are completely clueless) or completely understand which amino-acids are essential.

Dasalotta protein

Just keep it simple; I would say, as a complete generality, eating a diet that contains a majority of whole-foods and a decent amount of animal meat/milk/eggs, you shouldn’t have to truly worry about reaching an adequate level. As I said before, if you have a meatless lifestyle, your focus should be on high quality protein and whole-foods.

But there is another situation in which I recommend higher amounts of protein than normal; while dieting down.

More specifically, I’m talking about when you are trying to drop body fat to lower than normal levels. So when you are going from a smooth belly to a ripped six pack, it is in your best interest to up the protein to a high level.

How high?

There are a bunch of numbers thrown around, but my personal recommendation is 1 gram of protein for every 1 pound of bodyweight. I weigh 185 pounds, therefore I shoot for 185 grams. Again, not very difficult to understand or implement. It’s much easier to keep things simple.

The idea behind this is to preserve lean muscle mass.

You see, as you diet down to low levels of body fat, your body won’t have the abundance of fat stores available. Without adequate protein from the diet, your body’s next choice of fuel is muscle. This process (called gluconeogenesis) is a safety net; when you begin to starve your body will find an alternative source of fuel. The human body is a complex and ingenius little bugger.

Unfortunately, for those of us who want to have an exceptional body, this impedes our progress…..assuming there isn’t adequate protein intake.

My recommendation for adequate (again assuming you want to get to low body fat, which doesn’t pertain to everyone) is the 1 gram protein/1 pound body-weight. It might be adequate to get less but it’s hard to say, there are so many variables that you have to account for. It’s as much as I can say without making this post go way too long.

BADA BOOM!

PROOOOTEEEEIIIINNNNN

So now you know a little more about protein.

This roughly thousand word write-up is highly synthesized and books can be written about the subject far beyond this simplistic scope.

My hope is that you can see a little more of protein for what it is and what it is not. That way, when you make a decision about what to eat you can have a clearer sense of how this affects your body goals.

Thanks for reading and feel free to leave any comments below!

Continue reading →

Hello Again

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Whew….it’s been a while since I’ve written something up.

The last 2 or 3 months have been pretty crazy for me and I haven’t spent too much time on this website or writing (or anything productive really).  In that time I picked up and moved my large and goofy-looking self to Chicago and have had so many cool/random things happen.  It’s been consuming to say the least.

But that’s neither here nor there.  I’m back.  And I want to do it up real big.

To my 12 readers out there, my goal is to start taking new clients for nutritional consulting on May 1st.  If you’re interested please let me know (my email is available in the contact me section).

More than that though, I want to write even more valuable blog posts, stuff that has actual utility and application.  Part of my strength as a writer has been delving into the area of success, like sticking to habits, staying positive, etc and I will continue doing that.  But I have a wealth of information that is directly applicable (i.e. something you can apply immediately) to what you’re doing right now.

Knowing that much of my readership isn’t interested in long and complicated breakdowns of complex physiological systems makes writing extremely difficult. It is a real challenge to discuss how to get into phenomenal shape keeping it simple and in layman’s terms.  But that’s my goal; explain the complexity in a straight-forward and easier-to-understand manner.

Ya understand?

This may not make any sense but I imagine it will.

I'm back bitches!

 

 

Deprivation Diet Syndrome

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I’m sick of sad dieters.

I’m sick and tired of people telling me, with that glum look on their face, that they are on a diet. It’s the same glum look a child gives you when you don’t give in to their demands of buying a toy.

Must....Deprive....Myself....

“I can’t eat my favorite foods. But I have to lose some weight”

This is sad. It’s sad to me because the masses of people out there believe this crap. People are running around sad and deprived which ends up in failed attempts to reach a better looking body.

I would love to ask “Why can’t you eat your favorite foods while also losing weight?”

The answer lies in the fact that most people believe there is an ultimatum in eating. The perception is this: either you can eat delicious/unhealthy food, or you can eat non-delicious/healthy food.

It’s either the unhealthy pizza you love but makes you fat, or broccoli you hate but will make you lose weight.

This is a case of black and white thinking to the extreme. Don’t eat the bad foods. Only eat the good foods. Cut out cake. Finish your veggies. And everything will work out!

But does it?  No, not very much.

Why doesn’t it? As I said in my last post, between 78-88% of resolutions from the New Year fail. Is it because finishing your veggies aren’t the superpowerful food we all thought? Or is it because people are just inherently lazy? Or is there something else out there that you don’t know?

Before we even make an attempt to answer the question, let’s go back to the basics.

THE BASICS

If you go to the very basics of fat loss, without all the scientific babble, the simple equation to determine whether or not you’ll lose weight can be found in this equation:

INPUT (WHAT YOU EAT) – OUTPUT (HOW MUCH YOU MOVE/EXERCISE) = WEIGHT LOSS/GAIN

In other words, add what you eat in calories, subtract what you burn on a daily basis by breathing/living/digesting/exercising and it will accurately predict whether or not your body will burn up body fat or add to it.

Seriously, it’s stupid simple. Using this rather elementary equation, you can predict whether someone will either lose weight or gain weight.

If you’re eating less (in calories) than you need to maintain weight and exercise a bit then BAM! Weight loss! The opposite, eating more calories than you need and then add sitting around all day and you have weight gain. Really complicated stuff I know.

The point I am trying to prove is that you don’t need any special diet. You don’t need Atkins or Oprah or Dr. Oz. If all you had was this equation, you’d have enough to know what to do to reach the most goal of shedding some fat.

BEYOND SIMPLE EQUATIONS

Ah, if only the world were so simple as figuring out an equation.

Enter the real world; a place full of different variables that take that equation and throw it right out the window.

For example, many people could set their sights on meeting just a calorie goal. If they eat 500 calories less than they need, then weight loss will be smooth sailing, right?

Maybe. But if they’re diet is full of what the average westerner eats, you’re talking about food that simply don’t do a great job of keeping you feeling full by any means.

Processed foods and calorically dense food (cheesecake anyone?) contribute to higher totals in the input part of the equation without giving you much to show in terms of feeling like you ate a lot.

Want to see what I mean? Try eating your daily calorie allotment in ice cream. Seriously. If you aren’t completely starving within 24 hours then I want to study you. It simply does not fill you up like fibrous veggies and animal protein as just two examples.

SO WHY NOT JUST EAT FILLING FOOD?

Ah, again, if you simply look at the most filling foods out there, it’s easy to think that you can just cut calories and replace your food with the good, filling stuff.

But again, theory meets reality. Do you think you could totally switch your diet on the snap of a finger from what it is now to strictly vegetables and lean meat? I could probably but why would I? I enjoy the way I eat. And you probably do as well.

How long with this be appetizing for?

So my prediction is that maybe short-term motivation would keep you going for a couple days, maybe even a week, where you would joyfully stuff your face with the veggie/lean meat diet. Then while you stopped with a friend for coffee at Dunkin Donuts, your eyes would lock on to the pastries. All the willpower in the world won’t be able to hold you back. And when you finally do cave (don’t worry you will), instead of eating one, you’ll eat six. And then you’ll feel bad that you don’t have enough willpower.

Therefore, the chances of you adhering to your diet, of not gorging on desserts whenever you have the chance, will be rather low.

You see, while an equation is easy to understand, your deep psychological connection with food is a bit more complex. It throws a wrench into the whole thing. An equation may say A+B=C, but it doesn’t account for the fact that a pumpkin scone is irresistible to you every morning.

BACK TO DEPRIVATION DIETING

So weight loss is a simple equation.  You get that.

And while that’s easy to understand, you definitely know that applying that in real life is always more difficult because “life get’s in the way”.

But what does it have to do with deprivation dieting?

From my experience deprivation almost always entails a simple black/white view of food.  The idea: there are foods that make you lean and foods that make you fat.  Lean foods don’t taste good and fat foods taste amazing.

It ignores the basic equation above which, as I said before, is as accurate a measure as you can get into how to drop the fat.  Ignoring the equation is akin to taking a map of Chicago with you to Detroit and wondering why you can’t get where you want.  It doesn’t deal with the foundational issue of losing weight; FOLLOWING THE DAMN EQUATION!

So deprivers start on the wrong foot, lost in the jungle with the wrong map, and decide if they just “try harder”, if they focus on the wrong map more intently, that they will get to their destination.  It’s not a surprise when it doesn’t work.

Then you add into the fact that in reality, deprivation of your favorite foods basically ensures that you won’t stay on this eating regimen for the longterm (which is the key to success), and you see the thick quicksand of “dieting” from this perspective.

It just doesn’t work.

I HAVE A THEORY

Deprivation tends to point to a deep lack of understanding of how to balance both eating nutritionally and keeping yourself rewarded.  It’s coming at the problem from the wrong angle.

Consider this: will a few cookies every couple days really mess up your diet?

Seriously...it's just a cookie

Really? Will it? How many calories are in 4 small chocolate chip cookies? Maybe 200? Out of 14,000 you may eat that week? It’s insignificant.

Yet I have a feeling that a few cookies to the deprivation crowd symbolizes something far more sinister than a few empty calories; it is a sign that they are weak. It’s a sign that they have no willpower. They are inferior and that’s why they aren’t in shape.

Why we choose to link our self-identity (or even more importantly, our self-esteem) to our will-power is beyond me.  I’m sure the underlying reason why people do this is the same reason why people attach their self-esteem to money or fame, etc.  It’s beyond the scope of this blog.

Will power is not something you can attain.  It constantly changes each day and isn’t important to keep track of.  Accepting that I have little to no will-power has helped me to reach my goals.  By recognizing where I fail, I can prepare for situations where I’m weak.

If you recognize that you can’t win the will-power game, you won’t try to play it. You’ll figure out a way to indulge without overindulging. The guilt and shame isn’t necessary.

WHAT I’M GETTING AT

Once upon a time I was a deprivation dieter. I think it’s par for the course when trying to navigate your way through the miles and miles of pure bullshit in the health community. So I am not trying to make anyone feel bad for doing it.

When I was deprivation dieting, I had a full-fledged belief that there were good and bad foods out there. If I avoided the bad ones I would be okay and I would get to my very coveted goal of a six pack.

But even with all the willpower in the world, as I began on the “good food” diet, I eventually crumbled. Because I wasn’t focusing on important stuff, such as calories for instance, I wasn’t on the right track. It didn’t matter how much depriving I did because I was still overeating with my small binges. No joke.

Fast forward to now and I eat a highly satisfying diet. I have learned the scant basics of cooking, learned the basic fundamentals of baking and incorporate that into a manner of eating which tastes awesome and helps me reach my goals of getting ripped silly.

And you know what I’m most proud of?

I don’t feel guilty anymore about over-indulging on alcohol or chocolate or cake or popcorn. While I don’t do it very often (because it’s not a forbidden fruit anymore), I must admit that sometimes I find myself binge-eating on “crap”. But I never feel like I’ve backtracked because I know that getting back on track nutritionally means eating foods I like anyway.

It’s no big deal.

I really want to dispel and decimate the idea that depriving yourself of pleasurable food is somehow a morally purifying concept. Seriously, let go of feeling bad. It might be one of the best decisions you ever make.

It’s Resolution Time Baby!

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It’s that time of year again!

It’s that time where everyone and their mother get’s excited to run out and buy a gym membership at the fancy gym with the swimming pool and endless treadmills.

It’s even more exciting when you buy brand new workout clothes and running shoes (because you need something good for the endless running on the treadmill) which is really going to help make you stick with this year’s New Year’s resolution.

The fancy gym, the nice clothes and the re-dedication is going to work this year, “I just know it”.

But odds are it won’t.

Apparently, anywhere between 78% to 88% of resolutions set by people end up in failure.  So really it’s not your fault.  The odds are just against you from the start.

WHAT IS YOUR ISSUE?

Do you need more information?

Will reading through the last 3 issues of Men’s Health really give you that next idea that will do the trick?  Probably not.  Chances are good you already have the basic knowledge to get started.

Do you need to be “more disciplined”?

People talk about discipline all the time.  ”If only I had more discipline” is useless to fret about.  Find a way to keep yourself motivated, then make things fun for yourself (yes this is possible) and discipline just happens.

Do you need to deprive yourself to feel like you are doing enough?

Sadly, there are good people out there who believe the only way to get themselves into shape is to deprive themselves of anything that could be labeled as pleasurable.  It’s very sad because this is unneccessary and even more important, not very helpful to reach your goal.  If you want to succeed, find ways to fit in your favorite aspects of food or exercise, and you will be more likely to adhere to whatever plan you have set for you.

MY ADVICE

I’m willing to bet that the only real piece of tangible advice you need is this: you just need to start.  Start doing something now.  Start planning or making your next delicious meal.  You just need to focus on the next thing you need to do.  And you need to have some patience enough to stick with that for a good long while.

Now is that so complicated?

 

Does Splenda Cause Cancer?

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“You know that causes cancer, right?”

As the last granules of Splenda trickled into my coffee I turned my head to see some guy staring at me with a smug grin on his face.

Splenda = Bad?

This isn’t normally a big deal but the fact that it was the 3 billionth time I’ve heard this type of thing, I felt an urge to correct the guy. I had a dilemma on my hands; should I bitch-slap his oft-repeated claim (that artificial sweeteners like Splenda are carcinogenic) into oblivion or just play dummy?

“Oh no, wow….” was my response. I played stupid. So stupid that I proceeded to grab more Splenda and shove it in my drink.  I guess I’ll take the cancer.

I hear this kind of thing a lot. If you ask the person where they heard it from, their response is usually somewhat vague. I can’t blame them because often it’s an article they read on CBSNEWS.com with a title such “Aspartame linked to cancer”. Although aspartame isn’t Splenda (it’s Equal), it might as well be interchangeable to most folks.  Artificial sweeteners seem to be tainted in general.

Anyways, that headline is pretty scary sounding, considering aspartame is in a boatload of diet pops.  It’s enough to lure you into taking it in as a fact without even clicking on the link.

However, if they even bothered to read the article (or quickly scan through it), they might have continued on to see that the article discusses a study done on rats. The “link” was increased cancer rates in female rats from aspartame ingestion. I guess that still sounds scary.

But it shouldn’t be.

RATS ARE NOT HUMANS

An important scientific fact to remember is that rats are not humans. Also, humans are not rats. A crucial yet simple idea that must be kept in mind.

Mice and rats are both great little animals to study. They are both mammals and both have some similarities to humans, physiologically speaking. These similarities can help researchers test a wide array of things before anything is ever done on humans. That’s a good thing.

Unfortunately, findings on rats and mice must be taken with a large grain of salt. For example, the carbohydrate metabolism of rats differ enough from humans that it’s difficult to accurately predict study findings from rats on humans in this area.

So when you look in depth at the claim that aspartame or sucralose has been shown as carcinogenic in studies, it warrants two things. First, it warrants a closer look at the information.

And secondly, it means that more research needs to be done. And it needs to be done on humans.

HUMAN RESEARCH ON ARTIFICIAL SWEETENERS

So if the findings on rats can be placed in the category of “interesting but needs more information to be conclusive”, we must move on to the area of human studies.

A well designed, 13 week study by Baird et al found no link whatsoever between different dosages of sucralose and adverse affects. And these doses were high enough to raise eyebrows.

Just how big were the doses? Increasing every four weeks, it went from 125mg to 250mg, all the way to 500mg.

This may sound like a random number but if you consider each pack of Splenda contains 11.9 mg of sucralose, you are talking about the equivalent of 11, 21 and 42 packets a day. That’s not even close to moderate amounts.

Yet there was no adverse effects recorded.

Another well designed study by Grotz and colleagues tested type 2 diabetics and the effect of Splenda on glucose homeostasis. It showed “no significant differences between the sucralose and placebo groups in HbA1c, fasting plasma glucose, or fasting serum C-peptide changes from baseline. There were no clinically meaningful differences between the groups in any safety measure.”

Hmm. Well, that is interesting.

BUT SPLENDA GIVES ME A STOMACH ACHE!

If you’ve ever consumed a good dose of sucralose in a sugar-free vanilla latte or low-sugar brownies, chances are you could have experienced some rather averse symptoms. An upset stomach, bloating and diarrhea are not uncommon side-effects that I have heard of from others and even experienced myself.

While this may seem to point to the logical conclusion that if your body doesn’t agree with an artificial sweetener, then artificial sweeteners are bad. It’s very enticing logic.

However, if you want to follow that line of thinking then what about alcohol? In a sense, alcohol is poisonous. When you drink it, your body’s number one priority is to metabolize it in the liver to get rid of it. I know people who get sick when they drink it. If you have too much liquor (just like a poison), you will die.

Yet, like Splenda, many studies have shown an increase in health from regular moderate drinking (on living longer) and moderate consumption of artificial sweeteners (on body weight).

So it’s really a silly argument and it neglects the notion of moderation. If artificial sweeteners don’t make you feel good then don’t use them or at least cut back on them. Just don’t use that as evidence that they are evil and cause cancer. Use scientific evidence for that.

THE WHOLE POINT

Splenda, Sweet N Low and Equal (and beyond) are kind of like cheating or a shortcut past the normal idea that dieting means deprivation. Anytime you can cut out the calories but still have the somewhat similar sweet taste of sugar, something just doesn’t seem right. It seems too good to be true.

So it almost fits into a reasonably logical narrative that these “chemically altered” artificial sweeteners are harmful to our health.

Splenda made pumpkin squares. Delicious!

It is an emotionally seductive story. Hell, I want to believe it. But the science just points to a different conclusion.

So if you are going to utilize artificial sweeteners, don’t let the alarmists out there fool you into thinking you’re giving yourself a tumor when you pour Splenda in your coffee.

Just reply to them with the dumb sounding “Oh no, wow…”

 

Did you like this article? Did you hate it? Please let me know in the comment section below

Exercise? Try Eating Better

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I’m biased when it comes to body improvement. My full-fledged belief is that the biggest change you can make is through nutrition, plain and simple.

As you can see, I'm really "focused" on my diet

To say it’s a belief is to pretend that I have come to this conclusion haphazardly. The fact is that the information out there points to a focus on nutrition being easier for just plain weight-loss and even if your looking to add muscle (where nutrition is equal or just slightly greater to the exercise part of the equation) or whatever other goal you might have.

What I mean is this: Your focus should be on what you eat. This gives you the most bang for your buck.

WHAT TYPICAL EXERCISE DOES

If we are talking about what typically denotes exercise, I would generalize that it’s running on the treadmill (or some other form of cardio).  We’re talking about exercise for the average person here.

Running is awesome in terms of it benefits, there is no denying that. But in terms of actual, tangible contributions to fat loss, it is rather inefficient.

While it is incredibly misleading to generalize how many calories one can burn while on a treadmill at a medium intensity, I’ll go with a number I find rather attractive, that being 5 calories a minute (Lyle McDonald has a great post on it here).

Exercise for the average person

So if you follow that for anywhere from 30-60 minutes (which is very doable for most people), you would only find 150-300 calories burnt for the workout. Do that for 5 days and you have 750-1500 calories burned off every week.

That’s a sizeable number, right?

THEN YOU GO AND EAT

It’s a sizeable number until after your workout you go and eat a ham and cheese sandwich which will run you maybe 200-300 calories.

I’m not saying you negated the entire workout, but for an hour’s worth of work you just spent as much energy as a dinky little sandwich. For an hour’s worth of work!

That is an hour you could have spent planning out a diet regimen where you build in a 500 calorie deficit every day, which turns out to be 3500 calories/week. That’s over two times the amount that an hour of exercise, five times a week did.

Five hundred less calories a day will (theoretically) leave you with one pound of lost weight per week. Slicing out that much food is relatively easy and leaves you with much more time to do more enjoyable things.

MY OPINION ON EXERCISE

The biggest bang for your buck in terms of exercise is resistance training.

And I’m not talking about going to the gym and doing a few reps of every machine there and calling it a day.

I’m talking about focused, high-intensity, low-volume training that involves heavy compound movements.

The only book on resistance training that you will ever need

Yes, ladies you should be doing this. No, you won’t “get huge and bulky”, you don’t have the testosterone for that. And yes guys and gals, you should be doing it even if you want to “get toned”.

While I’d love to elaborate on what I mean, I cannot possibly delve into the subject without making this a 10,000 word post. If you are serious about doing resistance training that actual makes a difference, pick up a copy of Starting Strength and read it until you memorize it. Then you will know more than 95% of most people out there, including some personal training professionals.

(Side note: I will re-visit the idea behind resistance training in the future.)

THE POINT

I like working out. I even like running. I like being active. I even use the treadmill from time to time (hypocrite!).

So I would never say that you shouldn’t exercise. Or that you should avoid exercising. Exercising or doing anything where your body (and mind) isn’t wasting away on a couch is a good thing.

But if you neglect to make the major changes in the diet that need to be need and just do the “Hours on the Treadmill” thing, then you are effectively wasting your time. And your money.

The biggest bang for your buck is through what type of food you put in your mouth. Then you can tailor what to do for exercise.

So, unless you have the time and motivation to train like an Olympian for 6-8 hours a day, just focus on what you eat.

Patience and Body Improvement

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If you really would like to know the secret to reaching your goal, whether it be losing some weight or getting into elite shape, there is one thing you must master.

You must master the long, slow march of time.

The ugly, dirty secret about exercise and nutrition is that it actually doesn’t need to be complicated. You don’t have to get a gym membership. You don’t have to eat your veggies. You don’t have to eat low-carb. You don’t have to do anything out of the ordinary.

The fact is you need to follow the simple rules for your goals. And then let time do it’s thing.

But if they are so simple, as I have said many times before, then why can’t people break through their stagnant results and get where they want to go?

It’s because they can’t deal with time. There is no patience. Most people want it now. They want immediate gratification. They want to “deal with it” and move on.

But that’s not how this stuff works.

If you are overweight (even moderately so), chances are good that it piled up slowly over a period of time. Chances are good that it probably “felt” like it was quick, but that’s because you weren’t paying attention and suddenly 6 months rolled by.

To suddenly decide that you want that six month’s accumulation of stored up fat to come off in two weeks is utterly insane. It is the epitome of quick-fix, band-aid type solutions that drive me mad.

IT AIN’T DISCIPLINE

At this point, you might expect for me to tout the benefits of discipline and being properly motivated. Both will help, but they are not the source of the problem.

The source of the problem is proper expectations and then understanding how to be patient.

PROPER EXPECTATIONS

Ok, so I am going to throw out some numbers here. They are from my own personal observations and are highly variable from person to person. So take this with a large grain of salt.

Anyway, if you are very overweight (50-100 pounds), reasonable expectations to lose this amount of weight is 6 months to 1 year or more. Sure, maybe this seems like a long time but the nice part is that the weight will come off fast as hell at first and then taper off and become more gradual.

If you are slightly overweight and just have only 10-20 pounds to lose, chances are good that you need anywhere from1-3 months depending on how much effort you put into reaching the goal.

If you are in good shape but want to be in the best shape of your life, there is really no good number to put on this type of goal. I can say for me, going from 230 pounds to 200 pounds took me 3 months. Then from 200 pounds and roughly 18-20% body fat to 180 pounds to 10-12% body fat, took me 4 months. Now I am in the process of adding muscle (without adding fat) to my frame, which in my best guess will be another 6 months. You can do it faster but my case holds that it will be a total of 13 months from overweight to my personal goal of elite shape.

11 Months of Fat Loss

Remember, these are all guesses! With proper motivation and adherence you can prove me drastically wrong and then come leave comments on my blog publicly humiliating me. Seriously, do it.

The point of all this is that reasonable expectations aren’t generally understood by the average person. By understanding them, you start from a better position than someone who doesn’t.

HERE’S THE GOOD NEWS

For some people, 6 months isn’t a big deal. For others, it’s completely demoralizing.

“A year? Six months? I can’t do that. How can you expect me to diet for a year? I can barely diet for a week, much less a year. I can’t deprive myself like that”

6 Months? Are you serious, brah?

The honest to goodness truth is that you can do this for a year but you have a completely altered perspective of the situation.

Instead of thinking of an entire year, all you need to think about is taking one day at a time.

All you need to think about is how to eat a little bit better, or maybe fit in some exercise for the next day or two.

“But I have a wedding to go to next month, how am I going to eat better then?”

You’ll figure it out. Just worry about today. Worry about the next meal. When the time comes, you’ll figure it out.

DON’T THINK ABOUT THE FUTURE

Most people are so stuck in their heads, “thinking” about the problems they have in the future that they will actually decide that it isn’t worth the effort to continue going after their goals.

When I was younger I had terrible grades in high school, mostly because I would never do my homework. To say I was lazy wasn’t completely accurate as I did enjoy learning, but I honestly believe that my biggest problem was that of perfectionism. If I couldn’t do it 100% perfectly right on the first try I didn’t want to do it.

Math...

So when I would get home and get to the time when I should have been doing my homework, I never did. When that time came, I would sit there and begin to think about doing the set of math problems and could imagine what it would be like. I would imagine all the time it would take, how hard it would be and how I would generally hate it. It was easy to skip homework time with daydreams like that.

But sometimes, just sometimes, I would just pull out the math worksheets and start working on them. I wouldn’t daydream about it beforehand, I would just get right to it.

And can you imagine what happened?

Doing the homework was easy as pie. I would actually enjoy it. The “challenging” parts of the homework weren’t as hard as I imagined and even if they were, I still enjoyed trying to tackle them. The reality of the situation wasn’t like the scenario in my head.

This idea is directly related to what I am talking about today.

If I tell you that it will take six months to reach your goals, you will immediately go into your head and try to imagine what six months will be like. You’ll take your ideas of what dieting and exercising will be like and try to decide whether it will be worth it or not.

Six months in your head is an impossible amount of time to try to understand. Because of that fact, many people get demoralized. The more dreadful it seems in your head will result as being dreadful in reality. It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy.

But the fact of the matter is that six months will always be taken one day at a time. So why worry about the amount of time it takes?

A month isn’t a month when you approach it this way. Sure, it is thirty separate days that are taken one day at a time but you aren’t worried about anything beyond the scope of the next 24-48 hours.

What begins to happen when you approach it this way is little tiny changes become solid habits. Solid habits become routines and suddenly days begin to fly off the calendar. What seemed like an imposing six months has already seen two months fly by. On top of that, the results you are getting should be keeping you motivated.

THIS ISN’T A GIMMICK

From my experience, most people want the next little gimmick, the next funky exercise, the next fad diet that will get them the results they want. They don’t want to read a post like this one telling them to “be patient” and take it one day at a time.

But until people can understand this idea, success will be elusive.

If at any time you are beginning to get demoralized about the amount of time it’s going to take then cut that thread off in your brain. Immediately switch your focus to something useful and think about how to plan your next meal or maybe how you are going to organize food for the next day.

This single idea could be more helpful than any other gimmick or exercise trick you come across.

As always, feel free to let me know what you think in the comment section.

What Does Low-Fat Mean To You?

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Most of the rather annoying things from the 1980′s and early 90′s have meandered their way out of our collective brains.

You don’t see the frizzy hair and bright colors outside of 80′s college-themed parties (Thank god).  Short basketball shorts have been replaced by baggy ones.

It wasn't all bad. Rick-rolling did come out of the 80's.

One thing I wish would go away is the still largely prevalent idea that “fats are bad and should be avoided” myth.

You see, back in the day (the 80′s, really before I was born) everybody caught on to the idea that by eating low-fat foods you could eat whatever you want and get into good shape. There were a few interesting reasons as to why this happened but the point is that it caught on like wildfire.

Food manufacturers must have loved this because it meant that they now had a whole new area of food to focus on; low-fat products. People loved it because it wasn’t complicated. The first real fad diet was born.

But it didn’t work.

THE IRONY OF IT ALL

The sad irony of this whole entire thing is that while the low-fat craze was going on, Americans were actually starting to gain weight all across the board. And I mean dramatically.

Just check out the picture below.  It doesn’t take much to see that right around the late 1970′s and on through 2008, the trend has been upward for the obese (it has doubled since 1976).

Source: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/overwt.htm

What is abundantly clear from this period (and generous amounts of research) is that fat alone isn’t the culprit in the fat epidemic.  This should be obvious.

But here we are in 2011 and there are still lots and lots of people who see low-fat yogurt in the store and think “ooh, healthy!”.

PART OF AN EXPLANATION

So how does the low-fat craze still out there? I have two theories as two why this is possible:

  • Fat Sounds Bad
    • As simple as it sounds, I am convinced that the name “fat” has convinced many people that when you eat fat, it literally makes you fat. This is a complete misunderstanding of the complex way your body handles what you eat. If we renamed “fats” to “lipids”, people wouldn’t be swayed by “low-lipid cheese cake”. Which would mean more cheesecake for me!
  • Fat Contains the Highest Energy Content
    • This idea actually makes the most sense. One gram of fat contains 9 calories of energy. Compare this to carbohydrates and protein (four and four, respectively) and it’s not even close. It’s why a mere tablespoon of olive oil has the equivalent amount of calories as 4 oz. of chicken breast.  But that is still taking one snapshot of the grand canyon and assuming you’ve seen it all. By taking the fat out of a cookie let say, you can replace it by adding more sugar. Thus, you have more calories. Which brings you back to the fact that you are still eating something that probably is pretty energy dense.

WHEN LOW FAT DOES WORK

As I am always saying, I don’t come from an all or nothing perspective with anything.

While I think low-fat is an utterly useless way of deciding whether or not something is worth eating, I consume plenty of low-fat products. For example, whenever I drink milk  with proten shakes or even a latte, I tend to substitute nonfat milk.

“But didn’t you just say low-fat is useless?!?”

Yes, I did.

I will drink it because it’s less calories. The less calories I spend on drinking lattes, the more I can spend on actual food that fills me. Or I can spend it on beer. Or eggs.  Or on cottage cheese. Who wants to use all their calories on liquids anyways?

So obviously there is a flip-side and low or no fat isn’t completely useless altogether, it is useless in basing your decisions on what to eat.

THE BEST THING TO DO

The next time you are looking at a food item in the store or at a coffee shop and deciding what to eat, ask other questions:

But it's low fat!

Is it highly processed?

Does it contain a lot of sugar?

How calorie dense is it?

This is just somewhere to start. And even then you still have to look at your overall diet to give you the best idea.

I know that is a far cry from the simplicity of looking at a low-fat label and having that magical feeling that you can finally eat a forbidden food once thought to be evil.

But at least you’ll know what is actually contributing to your lack of progress of getting into better shape.

The Gas Mileage/Diet Analogy

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Today’s post is a doozy.  So I’ll just say this: stick with it.  It’s worth it.

Anywhow, times are hard. You need to save money. What is a good citizen to do?

Instead of robbing a bank, one of the areas you might look to save money is through your automobile costs.   It’s relatively easy to shave off a little bit of money on the monthly bill by optimizing your car’s gas mileage. There are a wide array of changes you can make, most of them small, that can end up saving you a little bit each month.

Some of the changes you can make are very simple. You can inflate your tires fully. You can drive right around 55 mph on the highway. Some cut back on the A/C.  Others never let their car idle.

You could also make some really big, possibly more difficult changes. You could change out the engine in your car for a more powerful and efficient one. You could change to a lightweight chassis. You could change the color of paint on the car (I’m just saying, you technically could).

In the end, you really have to figure out which changes are worth making. It goes without saying that changing the color of paint on your car is a rather useless change to make. It won’t save you any money on gas and you will have just wasted a bunch of time and precious greenbacks.

The point is, if you were going to sit down and think about how to get better gas mileage, you would no doubt make an effort to decide what tweaks will make the biggest changes. Otherwise, you could be wasting a lot of time and effort by doing things that make no difference at all.

WHAT I’M GETTING AT

Why am I writing about this on my blog (which has nothing to do with cars)?

Because this is a perfect metaphor for how many people approach a diet and workout regimen. When you sit down and decide on a goal, you then have to figure out how to attack it. You will obviously have to make either some small tweaks to your lifestyle (similar to inflating the tires on the car) or maybe even a complete overhaul (kind of like changing the engine on the car).

And, just like in the car example, you should calculate which changes make the biggest impact on getting you to your goal. Otherwise, you might be making a lot of effort with very little to show for it.

THE STORY OF AVERAGE JOE

So let’s see how this typically plays out with a random dude we’ll call Average Joe.

Average Joe decides he needs to get into shape. Looking at himself in the mirror, he figures it’d be nice to lose 20 pounds. He checks out a few books from the library on losing weight. He plans to start “eating better”, which in his mind means no fast food. He gets a subscription to Men’s Health and combs through every issue. He even goes out and gets a gym membership at the real nice gym (that way all the money he is spending will force him to go).

Sounds like he is going in the right direction.

Let’s take it a step further. A month later he is actually still sticking to eating better and going to the gym (a really positive step). His results are decent but improvement is beginning to stagnate. Looking at some of the things he’s doing it isn’t hard to see why:

These are just some examples of what an Average Joe might do.

Here’s the thing though…if Joe is trying to lose weight, much of the effort exerted is giving him almost no actual results. Most of the habit changes he has made are equivalent to changing the paint on the car to get better gas mileage.

Which leads me to the big idea. There are basically three levels of “habit change significance” (that I’ve completely made up) that better illustrates what I’m talking about:

LEVEL 1: Changing the Color of Paint

Obviously this category belongs to all the tweaks that make little to no difference.

And of course, much of the nutrition and exercise advice in the mainstream fits into this category. Drinking green tea has been shown to help improve fat burning, but it equates to such a small percentage that it doesn’t contribute in any meaningful way.

So if you are obsessively drinking green tea to lose weight, you are wasting your time. Now on the other hand, if you enjoy drinking green tea and consume it for the health benefits then all the power to you. Just don’t mistake it for some magical potion that drops off love handles.

No Joke: This is me eating 6-8 small meals. I was being an idiot.

Same goes with the drinking cold water idea and eating every three hours. Each have been shown to be rather insignificant in terms of the actual scientific data supporting them, but if you prefer either then it doesn’t matter.

Even saturated fat, which has been vilified as some sort of axe wielding, blood hungry macronutrient, is not a useful variable to target in your diet if (and that’s a big if) you are not at risk for heart disease or can change your diet to less processed foods. For an in-depth look at the subject, look no further than this blog post.

LEVEL 2: Inflating the Tires

The next step up from insignificant is somewhat significant.

Inflating the tires fully on your vehicle will definitely lead to money saved, but this still isn’t where the biggest bang for your buck is. In dieting, things like cutting back on fast food, running on the treadmill, limiting drinking all basically fit here (to some degree).

Andy "Cutting Back" on Alcohol Intake

Cutting back on fast food is helpful because you are eating less process foods, but this doesn’t guarantee weight loss. Running on the treadmill can definitely be great exercise but if it’s something you grudgingly do or even worse, do too much of, then it will only have a small return for you. Limiting the drinking of alcohol can lead to less calories consumed and better food choices but it can also lead to the feeling of “missing out” which ends up in bad food choices. You see how it can go either way on this one?

Basically, these aren’t the big underlying factors of diet and exercise. They can make a difference but it is usually long term at best.

LEVEL 3: Switching out the Engine

The most drastic (and no doubt expensive) change you could make in your vehicle to get better gas mileage is to replace the engine with a better one. Instead of getting 1-2 mpg increase, hopefully it could be in the 10-20 mpg range or more (we’re talking about expensive engines here). That is a huge increase that will provide for the biggest impact.

And just like changing your engine, there are some really powerful ways to change your physique. Making sure you are eating less calories than your body needs provides for the biggest return on investment. To massively oversimplify the process; when you are eating less than you need your body will begin to use stored up energy. Yeah it’s not as sexy as the acai berry but it is simple to understand.

Unprocessed deliciousness: Sirloin tip steak with mushrooms.

If you are really overweight, just switching to whole and minimally processed foods could be an alternative to counting calories (and can be just as effective). I challenge anybody to overeat veggies, fruit, animal meat, etc. It’s very hard. Following this protocol could make more of a difference than cutting carbs or anything like that.

Resistance training, done correctly, will provide the most bang for your buck in terms of using your time in the gym efficiently. If you find yourself in the gym doing circuit training with little to no results (or have plateaued), I highly suggest you check out Starting Strength. I thought I knew something about weight lifting until I read this book. It’s a good reminder that more is less when it comes to lifting weights.

These are just some overly simplified terms I’m throwing out here. The whole point is that some habit changes provide the most results for the least amount of effort. It’s not about drinking 8 gallons of ice cold water a day. It’s about focusing on the things that make an actual difference.

THE OVERALL POINT

The main goal everybody should be after is efficiently reaching their goals with as little excess energy as possible. I’m not talking about avoiding the hard work of creating some sort of diet and sticking to an exercise regimen.

What should be avoided is spending too much time in the gym and too much time obsessing over food. Spend enough time getting to know what gives you the most return and you can live a normal life and be in pretty good damn shape.

I’d love to hear your thoughts and comments below. Join the discussion.