Weight Loss Benefit Fact Sheet: Fill & Download for Free

The secret is that there is no secret at all! Our bodies don’t need much, in fact, very little for us to win the weight loss game.I spend many years (more than 10 in fact) trying various diets, triumphing and then failing miserably again. It was a constant battle for me, and I was always willing to try it out. Something in me said daily that there had to be some way for me to be the shape I wanted.It didn’t help me much at all, coming from a competitive background. I knew that given the right diet and exercise, you have the capacity to change your body completely. That was quite easy for me when I began my journey. When you transition from a diet that’s riddled with refined carbs and sugars, then go cold turkey on those highly addictive substances, your body flips out! Literally!Why am I mentioning this situation in particular? It was the catalyst for my weight gain when I put my high heels and bikini back in the closet. The constant dieting and excessive training, coupled with the body scrutiny on stage, really got the better of me. I felt that I could never be good enough - and I didn’t want to be as muscular as the other ladies on stage. I actually thought that perhaps I was muscular enough for my liking.With extra padding on all my body parts once again, for the 35th time, and years after I finished competing, I finally came across a solution from a very dear friend. I will never forget the frustrating voices on end (me) and my friend who radiated fat loss beams from the other. She said to me “Ange, why not try fasting again? I know you said it wasn’t your cup of tea first time around, but why not give it one last try and change a few things?” I thought about it, and as we discussed some very sound solutions, I believed perhaps that maybe this might be the key. The science-backed it up, and many research papers were conducted on the matter. Even Dr Gundry (who I loved and admired for his endless work on immunology and dietary structures) was vouching for fasting continually. I was crazy not to give it a try. And indeed I did, and here I am telling you this.Five reasons why fasting is the best-kept weight loss secretPromotes blood sugar control by reducing insulin. This, in fact keeps your blood sugar steady during the day, so you will not experience those endless highs and lows you normally would. Those with diabetes will greatly benefit as you can, reverse diabetes if you choose to fast as a lifestyle. Please also note that blood sugar levels differ for men and woman that fast.It fights inflammation. Fasting helps to promote better health by keeping inflammation at bay. It’s a sound treatment for chronic inflammatory conditions and multiple sclerosis. You will also benefit from fasting if you suffer gastrointestinal challenges.Boosting brain function and prevents neurodegenerative disorders. Fasting actually increases the generation of nerve cells to help enhance cognitive function. This is why many experienced faster are known for mentioning the mental clarity that comes along with a fast. I experience this every day, and my focus and clearness of thought help me tackle complex tasks, not to mention protecting me against Alzheimer's and Parkinson's.Boosts metabolism and aids in weight loss. Fasting can boost metabolism by increasing levels of the neurotransmitter norepinephrine, that can enhance weight loss. Fasting for a whole day can reduce your body weight by up to 9% and decrease body fat over a 12–24 week period. It definitely pays to be patient with fasting and keep at it long term for the best results.And my favourite - the increase of growth hormone that’s vital for growth, metabolism, weight loss and muscle strength. Human growth hormone is the most sort after substance, that affects many aspects of our health. It’s the key hormone responsible for growth, metabolism, weight loss and muscle strength. Fasting naturally increases HGH levels. As you age, this is essential if you want to look, feel and be as young as possible. If you control your blood sugar and insulin levels throughout the day, you will further optimize HGH levels!I could go more in-depth with this, but fasting is in fact, the best-kept weight loss secret of all time! It’s also the cheapest and most natural way to increase and decrease the necessary hormones within the body naturally, to experience a multitude of results. Just think you don’t need any lotions, potions or advice. Fasting is intuitive, and anyone can do it! Best yet, it’s a great lifestyle alternative, that’s sustainable and realistic.If you would like an extra push to get you started, please contact me via the usual channels. I have a comprehensive cheat sheet that outlines the best fat loss strategy phases in more detail, including an option to download the ultimate fat burning menu pack, and structure with training and fat loss. You can also find me on social if you have any questions or would like to connect.

Hi,Trust you are doing well!I liked your question because you wanted natural process to lose weight but it hugely contradicts when you mentioned using supplements.There are couple of supplements i know and have used personally to great benefits and helped me losing weight. But the fact is- you cannot do natural weight loss with supplements. The natural way of weight loss is your food habits and life style because that is the root cause of your gain in the very first place. So if you don't address the root cause, the weight loss problem is never going to be solved.Even if you continued with any famous diet, supplements, pills, injection and the worst surgery, you will definitely get results and everything mentioned above works. But with only one rule - that you have to continue the diet, the supplement, pills, injections and even surgery to maintain your weight lifelong. The moment you stop the support, you gain back everything you lost and some more. Because you will fall back to your old food and life style habits which is the cause of your weight gain.But you can use the supplements or the aid smartly. For that you have to first change your existing food habits and life style and along with it take the help of these aids to gain bigger results or quick success. But you should always consider that aid being not there and focus on your food.For an example- If you are supplied or rely only on cheat sheet in exams, you will pass and score well, but you will always be dependent on cheat sheets and without that you are bound to fail. So you must decide whether you can go with the cheat sheet lifelong or not, before completely replying on it.So as a Health Coach, i coach people on how to score without cheat sheets, how to gain control over yourself lifelong. It is hard work but that is a learning and skill you gain. As health is your greatest possession, learning and investing in that skill is the best investment you will ever do. And after you are well prepared , if you get a cheat sheet, well, you gain massive results. But that is still real because you will be good without cheat sheet. So i do support supplements but as an aid not as a solution.Food changes everything. Food is critically important.It is what creates our cells, our tissues, our blood, our organs, our skin, our hair, our thoughts, our feelings, and our future. Taking a holistic approach to diet and lifestyle, and understanding how different foods affect your body and making the necessary changes is the key to long-term success in reaching all of your health goals.Get the feel of how you can lose weight and gain back the total control of your health. That is why I give one No-Fee Consultation help people explain where the gap is.This session allows you to understand the challenges in your current food habits and life style and how we can integrate healthier food habits and sustainable life style in your existing routine. This will also give you more insight into my coaching program, which is designed to transform lives. To Avail your free consultation session, please email me or call me directly. All my personal and social information is available on my eClinic updated over my profile bio.Warm regards,Pankaj JenaHolistic Health Coach(Weight Loss Expert)+91 08374751515Good health is not something we can buy. However, it can be an extremely valuable savings account.

Before I begin, I would never dispute that in order to lose weight you need to create an energy deficit.In order to gain weight, you need to create a surplus of energy.In order to maintain your weight, you need energy to be balanced.This is 100% necessary for weight loss*, maintenance or gain to occur. It’s basic physics and isn’t really disputed.*At least what isn’t water weight. And for the record a lot of people can lose 5–10 lbs in water weight easily, just by following a low carb diet even if they don’t achieve a deficit.I’m not arguing against that. I’m going to argue that there are often better, more practical methods than calorie counting if those objectives are what you seek.What I’m arguing against is the need to count calories. Calorie counting can be in the mix and it’s certainly in my toolbox, but there are a lot of pitfalls of the practice that prevent people from achieving what they want to achieve.Often times people count something on paper and it isn’t reflected in reality and that’s generally the biggest problem with the act. I think the first mistake people make when it comes to this whole question is that counting calories and weight loss, gain or maintenance are the same thing.They are not.One is a math-oriented behaviour done with a pen and paper or these days may be an app, based on estimates 99% of the time.The other is how your body actually responds to your real intakes of food, based on intakes and potentially outputs.Clear?You do need to track intake somehow and calorie counting is likely the most accurate method we have (outside of lab environments) for that. But there are other methods of tracking that can be similar in accuracy and much easier to adhere to.Now I’m going to summarize my blog article: Counting Calories Sucks. You can find references there.Here’s why counting calories can be a mistake and why most people do it wrong, despite occasional successes, often short-term successes. It’s hard to stick with this practice for years on end as a habit for every meal.Some people can and will have success doing it, especially high level, well-practiced individuals who understand how it works. Others may just get lucky using it too.#1 - Nutrition Labels are off and almost never accurate.Typically 8–18% or more off from the true calorie value of the food. Some restaurant items have been recorded at 200% more than their listed values.And most of the time, they are not over-reporting, they are under-reporting.10% off is a lot. I’d argue these slight variances are how people gain weight in the first place. You don’t just wake up one morning 50 lbs heavier, it creeps on and these are also some of the reasons why.#2 - Most formulas overestimate how many calories a person actually needs.Very few people are going into a lab to get a metabolic assessment. They aren’t drinking doubly labelled water. And they aren’t living in a metabolic chamber.They are relying on an estimation (or online calculator). A made-up formula (there are several out there) that might get you close, but even the best formulas need to be modified based on the real-world outcomes.Most people don’t or won’t modify them due to a lack of skill in their use. They just expect that counting the calories will yield the results. They never assume that their starting points could be wrong (and they can be, sometimes way off).The most well-known formula (Harris-Benedict) typically over-estimates need by 105–295 kcal a day. That could be 5–15% for some people depending on the circumstances.#3 - People overestimate how many calories they burn.If you’re counting calories, just stop accounting for your outputs already. Please.Cover the calorie readouts on any apps or fitness equipment you use, they are never accurate and they always include the number of calories you would have burned doing nothing.Going for an hour-long walk and burning 300 kcal, does not mean you can or should eat 300 more kcal that day. You may have only really burned about 150-200 kcal because those readouts give you total output. Remove that sort of behaviour from your calorie counting approach.Most people burn ~80 kcal an hour doing nothing, it’s their basal metabolic rate (sleep has lower requirements). It’s largely based on physical size.That estimated number is always included in these read-outs. They don’t give you an estimate of what you actually burned above and beyond doing nothing.Then add in the typical distortion of estimates. Not being hooked up to a metabolic cart when you train and well, you again see number off by a lot.If you’re off by 10-20% because nutrition labels and another 10-20% because exercise estimations, you can be off by quite a lot.Add further insult to injury, most people will estimate their energy outputs at 3–4x higher than they actually were in the absence of a readout. You’re off if you use them, and you’re way off if you guess on your own, so it’s best to just ignore them.#4 - Quality of food matters.Yes, someone losing weight eating McDonald's proves that energy balance is king. To a degree…In the case of one example listed in this question, that was an experiment. A mentality I encourage most people to adopt anyway.However, the man also had an entire class of kids motivating him with this objective. They stuck to a pretty strict 2000 kcal (for a 280 lbs man, this is a huge deficit to begin with, even at his final weight of 219, he could probably have kept going in a deficit).Unless he deviated (and his kids were holding him accountable, so that probably wouldn’t have happened) it would have been impossible for them NOT to lose weight. They didn’t estimate his caloric needs, they just stuck to 2000 kcal, and for a large male, this will almost always work as a number.Are you going to be so lucky? Do you have 30 students in your corner? A coach? Someone holding you accountable?If not, well let’s hold our horses shall we…It’s possible to lose weight eating foods people normally associated with ‘health’ or lack thereof, and that isn’t going to be my argument. Healthy or unhealthy food is a false dichotomy that gets most people into this trouble, to begin with.You certainly can do it, but that that doesn’t make it probable.Here’s why…Although a calorie is always a calorie (it’s a unit of measurement, you can’t change a unit of measurement), how your body interprets those calories on a biological level will change based on the quality of the food you ingest.There are plenty of papers showing this, but one of my favourites was one using white bread, with processed cheese vs whole wheat bread with real cheddar cheese. Both had the exact same number of calories on paper.However, the net effect in the body was substantially different. The whole wheat, real cheddar sandwich required double the amount of thermal energy to digest.Meaning the 600 kcal ‘more whole food’ option, required about 120 kcal to digest, while the more processed variant yielded only 60 kcal or so.480 true calories vs 540 kcal for the meal. Despite 600 kcal on paper.We call this the Thermic Effect of Food (TEF).Add that up over 4 meals for two different people in two different conditions, and although it looks like a 2400 kcal diet on paper, you would have one person actually ingesting 1920 kcal, while the other more processed diet is actually 2160.True calories are what I call the calories your body actually absorbs and utilizes, as opposed to the estimated number you see on a nutrition fact sheet.I’m willing to bet that the processed nature of McDonald’s is going to make this play harder, you’re going to absorb more of those calories that you see on paper vs more whole food options. It could certainly be a step in the right direction for some, but likely not all.It’s possible sometimes that these variances even out, but keep reading…#5 - The kcal recommendations per macronutrients are estimations themselves.The reason a lot of food labels are off is that I can simply estimate the number of grams of fat, protein and carbohydrates in a meal. Then I simply multiply them by the appropriate number:Fat = 9 kcalCarbs = 4 kcalProtein = 4 kcalExcept that’s not exactly true. There are slight variances based on the type of fat, carbs, and protein. It could be 3.883 for one, but 3.9 for another.All things being equal, this shouldn’t be a big deal, but even 0.1 off 100 grams of food can add up sometimes.Fibre is counted as a carb. However, only one type is fermented and absorbed as energy in the form of a short-chain fatty acid. Not a carb.See how this is getting complicated?It becomes a big deal because people just look at the scale and they track calories. When they don’t see the results they expect on the scale, they don’t think they’re making errors in their calorie tracking. Nope. It couldn’t possibly be a human error! The majority of the time it is. Yet, most people in this situation will default to their baser instincts, call calorie counting stupid and quit doing it.Had they just stuck the course and made some tweaks assuming their math was wrong, they probably could have gotten back on track. Remember I said you have to track something.#6 - Energy Balance Isn’t StaticNot only are most calculations estimations, but they also aren’t of the ‘set-it-and-forget-it’ style. You can set huge deficits and it may take months for your metabolism to catch up to the deficit, or a smaller deficit could be only a few days or weeks before it does.You typically can’t get an estimate once and use it the whole time and a lot of people forget to update the estimation as they go. Especially if you have a lot of weight to lose or gain.This is why you see weight loss slow and/or stall.If you eat in a deficit for a while, your body adjusts so it burns less and/or moves less (Non-Exercise Activity Thermogenesis or NEAT is the technical term). You have to adjust for these countermeasures with countermeasures of your own.A lot of people don’t do this, when weight loss (or gain) stalls, instead of tweaking their intakes (like they should have been all along), they often quit instead.This is often why people who lose a lot of weight struggle to keep it off, and also why there is this pervasive myth that dieting “damages your metabolism.”Lowered metabolism ≠ damaged metabolism.Of course, your metabolism is lowered! You’re smaller now and your size is the determinant factor in your basal metabolism.You can’t “diet” or “count calories” and return to eating what you used to eat before.It doesn’t mean your metabolism is broken or damaged.#7 – Calories aren’t “burned” by your bodyWe use a bomb calorimeter to determine caloric loads of food. Basically we burn the food.It’s highly unlikely it goes down like this within your body. Your stomach has never combusted, has it?We’ve seen genes and gut flora impact absorption and thus energy in. Other things could possibly influence this.The effects are likely minor and this measurement is currently ‘the best we have.’ But, it doesn’t change the fact that there is likely a 1–5% deviation in how people absorb energy.On its own, it’s probably next to nothing but when you start adding the 1–5% differences that all of these points above can alter? Now you know why it’s so challenging to count calories sometimes. Only a handful of these things need to be in place to throw your numbers way off.#8 – They don’t provide a very good intervention.Most research has found that food labels and calorie counts don’t change eating behaviours.Behaviours are arguably the most important thing you want to be changing with any nutrition change. If you resort back to old behaviours, you end up back where you started (or slightly worse off, more often than not).Behaviour change should really be the name of the game. You have to take on a new identity, or as cliche as it is, “it's all about lifestyle changes.”I suspect that the people who have the most success with calorie counting are numbers-oriented people (and perhaps a bit anal-retentive) to begin with.However, 50% or so of your input capacity is visual. In other words, imagery is more powerful to more people than numbers are.#9 - Water Weight!Lastly, I want to highlight something that doesn’t get talked about enough.Water is weight. Muscle is weight. Bone is weight. Fat is weight.It wasn’t explicitly stated in the question, but I assume the OP was gearing the question more to weight loss than anything else. When talking about calories, that’s usually the case.Most of the time, we want to lose the right kind of weight, but we don’t track the one thing we need in addition to weight (because it’s not as easy as hopping on a scale). I’m talking about girth. Body fat % would be ideal, but it’s currently expensive to track with any accurate measurement tool.Girth + Weight gives you a pretty good indication of where the weight is actually coming off (or going on). If you’re losing weight, and most girth is being lost around your waist/hips (men) or thighs/hips (women), it’s a pretty good indication you’re losing the right kind of weight.Beyond calories, other things do seem to matter in this regard. For instance…People who go on low carb diets, lose a lot of it quickly because glycogen (the storage form of the sugar glucose in the body) is depleted and glycogen is bound to a lot of water. It’s not uncommon for people to shed 5–10 lbs that first week.Is this the weight people are really hoping to lose eating in a deficit?Not really. It masks the real goal: Fat loss.Women in particular have a similar issue. Due to their menstruation cycle, they experience significant shifts in water retention throughout that cycle, so you can really only compare weights within that cycle. A lot of women don’t necessarily do this, and it only adds to their frustration with the process.So plenty of people see this male had a super easy time losing 61 lbs eating nothing by Mickie Dees and many think well if they did it, I can too. Most of us should pause and critically think about how practical that situation is to our own.Calories don’t always impact weight specifically or weight as directly as some people think.It also isn’t permanent. The moment you start eating carbohydrates again, the water retention comes back.You likely can achieve this weight loss by eating at maintenance, just by choosing different foods. Especially if you introduce exercise into the equation. And I think you should because it preserves healthy lean mass.Eating a higher protein diet also preserves lean tissues better, even when comparing the same amount of calories to the same amount of calories, so you tend to end up with more fat loss specifically.My point being that the distribution of calories isn’t a non-factor in all of this.Calories matter most, but that doesn’t mean that everything else doesn’t matter.Again, none of this is to say that calorie counting can’t, doesn’t or won’t work.I’ve seen it work. I’ve made it work for myself. I run this as a mini-experiment in our coaching groups (but it’s one of many).I’m saying that there is more to this process than counting calories and if you’ve tried and failed with counting there may be other areas to focus your attention on.For one, I think tracking your progress (weight & girth) should be prioritized above and beyond counting calories.Less overall math, and it actually tells you what’s happening with the changes you’re making.Two I think developing eating skills that improve your adherence to an eating approach and gradually move you towards where you’d like to be should be more of a focal point for most people.Three, if you are going to count calories keep the following in mind:Make sure you track real-world progress, and not just calories. Ideally weight & girth measurements on a set schedule (same place, same time of day, same clothes [or lack thereof])Women should track based on their cycle (run a mini-experiment to determine how your water weight is influenced by different parts of your cycle, then always track to that specific time interval so that you minimize water weight fluctuation noise in the data)Men should track based on weekly, bi-weekly or even monthly schedulesWeigh yourself every waking hour of every day for one to three days (no more). Just to figure out how your weight naturally cycles in a given day, not to make yourself neurotic about weight. This is just an experiment to figure out how your body operates.Weigh yourself at the same time every day for a month. Again, just to figure out how your weight fluctuates (keep a journal) in a given month (more important for women due to their cycle). Not to make yourself neurotic, it’s just a mini-experiment to figure out how your weight fluctuates from day-to-day.These are mini-experiments, not everyday things. I recommend tracking weekly at most (the majority of the time) and more typically ask my clients to track every 2 weeks. These are the exceptions to that general rule.If you aren’t getting the results you seek there are two main issues:You’re not counting that accurately (Even RD’s are off about 200 kcal a day on average, so don’t be offended, human beings suck at this skill) and your counts are off/wrong so you need to count better or account for the fact that you’re off by changing your numbers (i.e. consider lowering all your tracking numbers by 10% automatically).Your estimates are wrong to begin with and you need to lower them (or make them higher) depending on the goal. Do not assume that either is correct and the results just aren’t coming, if they are correct, you see the results in the real world (i.e. weight & girth changes).Don’t count your exercise as energy output (ignore this, it’s a bonus). Instead, exercise because it preserves good lean tissues and provides a plethora of health benefits on its own (in the absence of weight loss)Every 2 or 4 weeks re-evaluate progress and make appropriate changes based on the results you get (as you get smaller needs to go down, as you get bigger, needs go up)Make a plan to also slowly transition towards higher-quality foods/ingredients.Consider counting a ‘minimum’ rather than a ‘maximum’ number of calories and give yourself a range to work within, rather than an absolute number. This just generally helps people frame the right mindset and get bonus benefits from the approach. For example: If you estimate that you need 2200 kcal to lose weight based on where you’re at at this moment in time; Take another 10% off that (1980 kcal) and use that as a minimum target so you have a range moving you in the right direction, rather than a very specific number to hit.Make a plan to take breaks (eat at maintenance) or be flexible in your approach a small percentage of the time (10% is my typical recommendation). Being 100% strict all the time is a recipe for disaster in the long-term.I recommend opting for a higher protein intake generally if you’re also counting macros. This preserves lean mass better, even if you’re not exercising. “High” in this context is really ‘moderate’ because rarely would my recommendations take anyone over 30% of their average intake. 1.6 or 1.8g/kg (female/male) of body weight is a nice minimum number to shoot for, since you’re counting calories anyway. Maybe up to 50% higher (2.7g/kg) than that if you’re a male in a big deficit (1000 kcal or more).Learn other skills along the way (not just counting). I have some ideas about that in my free online course: Skill Based Eating :-)