You’ve been changing a lot in your lifestyle now as an attempt to lose weight. You’ve been waking up early to jog for an hour every day, and you’ve been eliminating certain foods from your diet. You’ve been doing this for years, and unfortunately, you haven’t seen any results. You just end up depriving yourself of eating something which you really love. Because you’ve noticed that everything you’re doing is not working at all, you decided to approach your weight problems from a different angle. You’ve had friends who are as self-conscious as you and most of the time, they’ve been talking about calories – like how many calories are there in certain meals and how many calories can you lose with a weeks’ worth of gym sessions. You wondered what the fuss is all about and you’ve become curious about calories and how this knowledge could help you in your weight loss journey.
If you’ve been making your diets all by yourself, you might have left out one crucial detail in the process – calories and weight loss and how these two are related to each other. And this could probably be the reason why your attempts to change your lifestyle never worked in the past, too. If you want to finally attain weight loss by taking into consideration your calories, you can consider these questions below:
Are all calories bad?
Surprisingly for some, calories are not the only culprit for your weight gain. You should consume calories as your body need these to continually function every day. However, the problem begins once you over eat foods which are rich in calories or you’ve taken the “wrong” foods for your calorie requirements. For example, a bowl of broccoli can give you 100 calories, and this is nutritious for your body. But if you consume 100 calories from a box of doughnuts thinking that you’ll get the same amount of nutrition, you’ve got it all wrong. Sure, the amount may be the same but getting calories from junk foods will not do any good for your health as these are “empty” calories. It’s making you full, but it’s not giving the essential nutrients to your body.
How do calories make you gain weight?
There’s nothing really wrong if you’re consuming calories from different kinds of foods once in a while. But if you’ve been over-consuming calories way beyond how much your body requires, this will be stored as potential energy and in the form of body fat. Yes, calories can give your body energy needed for the day, but too much is no longer healthy. And this is basically how calories make you gain weight – eat it too many, and you’ll be storing all of these as body fat. To avoid going to towards this direction, you have to ensure that your calorie consumption is just enough based on how much your body needs. Calorie consumption can also be coupled with exercise. In this way, you’ll be following the principle of “calorie in, calorie out.”
Why can a larger person consume more calories?
You might have a 190-pound friend who often eats junk food and excess calories and doesn’t gain any weight. While on the other hand, you, a medium-built individual would gain 1-2 pounds if you frequently eat junk foods for a week. No, this isn’t unfair, but there’s a valid explanation for this. A larger person requires more calories in order for all bodily systems to function. That’s why whenever your friend can take in so many calories, his/her body immediately converts these into energy and no amount is left to be stored as fat anymore. Since you’re a medium-built individual, your calorie need isn’t as much as your friend. In short, your calorie need depends on how your body works – it’s never the same for two people.
How can you lose weight?
Instead of doing any crash diet to your lifestyle, slow and steady is the best way to go if you want to lose weight. You should be able to take this goal for the long-term and not just because you want to wear a bikini during an upcoming trip. The changes you inject into your lifestyle, with your diet and your exercise, are things which you should do consistently, and not only when you “feel” like doing so. Remember, consistency is key to achieving your weight loss goal.
Wanting to lose weight is not an easy road to take. There are a lot of temptations around – like munching on your favorite ice cream desserts and eating junk food for days – but if you’re really willing to make that change, it’ll be easy for you to overcome all of these. And by knowing how calories and weight loss are related to each other, your journey to achieve that weight loss goal will become easier now. Sure, adapting to all of the things presented in this article might be challenging, but everything can be learned over time. You just have to be patient to implement all of these in your life. The sacrifices now might be difficult, but you’ll be able to reap what you sow in the future – and in this case, it’s about moving the needle.
Author Bio:
Jessica is a professional health expert who works for some major health industry giants. She currently writes for Membersown and is dedicated to helping people learn more about health related topics along the journey. When she’s not a health advocate, she enjoys some down time traveling or talking with family.
