How To Lose Weight Without Starving

The Quick Cut

• Many people believe that if you want to lose weight you have to starve yourself.

• While you do have to cut calories to some degree, starving is not only painful but also can result in you actually GAINING weight.

• To lose weight quickly, and keep it off permanently, you have to abide by the law of energy balance.

• Energy balance plays a big role in the amount of fat you store or shed.

• If you burn more calories than you ingest, you will lose weight and vice versa.

• While monitoring calories in vs. out is important, it’s NOT the whole picture.

• Do cut calories but not by too much to avoid a slow-down of your metabolism.

• Keep on the right side of this equation and maintain a controlled deficit of around 500 calories/day.

The Long Slice

According to Ryan Andrews of Precision Nutrition, "Energy balance is the relationship between ‘energy in’ (food calories taken into the body through food and drink) and ‘energy out’ (calories being used in the body for our daily energy requirements)."

In this context, energy and calories are interchangeable terms. What this law says then, is that when there is a surplus of calories ingested vs. what is used by the body, the excess calories are stored as fat for future use.

Conversely, when there is a deficit of calories ingested vs. what is used, stored body fat is tapped to make up this deficit. 

In simpler terms, if you eat more than you burn, you will gain weight, and if you burn more than you eat, you will lose weight.

CALORIES ARE NOT THE WHOLE STORY

While the law of energy balance plays a big role in weight loss, it’s NOT the whole story. Especially when you’re looking to lose weight quickly or cut fat to low levels. 

First, because calories are not all created equal. Ingesting 200 calories from ice cream vs. 200 calories from lean meat or salad will have a different overall impact on your fitness & fat loss goals. (No, I'm not saying to never have ice cream).

Second, things like meal timing, insulin, inflammation, cortisol, testosterone, estrogen, metabolic rate, etc. all play a role in weight loss, particularly fat loss.

When I do a custom meal plan for my clients, the effect of these factors are considered in order to optimize your hormones, naturally, for maximum fat burning.

Without getting into the deep scientific explanations of what role these other factors besides calories play, suffice it to say that:

The number of calories you consume vs. burn is a big part of the weight loss equation.

Especially because, when you’re just starting a weight loss program, eating less (i.e. reducing calories in) and exercising more (i.e increasing calories out) will show immediate results as the body pulls from fat stores to make up the deficit in energy. 

DON'T STARVE. CUT AROUND 500 CALORIES (ONLY!).

How much less should you eat? A good rule of thumb is to eat 500 fewer calories than the amount your body burns per day, known as your Total Daily Energy Expenditure. 

A pound of fat is made up of 3,500 calories so, everything else being equal, eating 500 fewer calories per day will help you drop one pound of fat per week (a caloric deficit of 500 calories per day x 7 days = 3,500 fewer calories).

The good news is exercise helps you compound this effect and helps you lose even more weight per week (and allows you to starve LESS).

NOTE: Cutting more than 500 per day - a.k.a starving yourself - can actually result in weight GAIN because dieting too much slows your metabolism (this also means don't hate on carbs or fat; more about that in future posts). But if you stay around a 500 calorie deficit per day, that should be optimal for weight loss for most people.

Again, calories in vs. out are not the whole picture but abiding by the law of energy balance plays an essential role in determining how much weight you lose, especially when you first start on a weight loss goal.

So, make sure you cut, but don’t cut/starve too much, so you don’t fall out of ‘balance’.