If you’ve spent any time around our office, you will inevitably hear some amazing weight loss stories. Whether it’s someone losing 15 lbs on a five-day bone broth fast, or someone celebrating that 50th pound coming off after six months of ketone fasting, we certainly do seem to know a thing or two about weight loss.
For many Americans, weight loss can be a struggle. Perhaps even you have been plagued with cravings or habits that have stunted your progress and kept you from your ideal weight? There is a real condition called “Weight Loss Resistance,” which is exactly what it sounds like – weight that is resistant to exercise, fasting, diet changes, prayer, mediation and just about anything else.
But we’re slump-busters around here, and if you are experiencing even the most stubborn resistance to losing weight, take a look at some of the common mistakes people make when attempting to gain control of their metabolism and burn fat all day and night.
Calorie Counting
If you still believe weight loss is an equation, you may need to go back to math class. If calories in vs. calories out worked, any restriction diet with exercise would give perfect weight loss results, and we know this isn’t true. We now know that weight loss is more about hormones and immune system coordination. Leptin is a hormone that signals your brain to burn fat. When elevated, it can damage the brain just like elevated insulin leads to insulin resistance, which ultimately becomes diabetes.
So, focus more on how you can enable weight loss hormones and suppress weight gain hormones. (Hint: burst training, intermittent fasting and healthy fats.)
Low Fat & Low Cholesterol
The only way to achieve this classification is for a food to be processed, thereby removing all natural fibers, antioxidants, enzymes and minerals. Low fat foods often have added sugars and chemicals to enhance the flavor (after-all, fat tastes great!). Low calorie foods usually have processed carbohydrates or artificial sweeteners, which themselves can increase weight gain!
In addition, processed foods low in fat and calories are often largely inflammatory, creating damage to cell membranes (hormone disruption) and accumulation of toxins – which are stored in fat cells.
Low fat = poor hormone function = inflammation = weight gain (weight loss resistance)
High carb = poor sugar balance = inflammation = weight gain (weight loss resistance)
Tip: Eat whole, fresh foods. Cook your meals at home from scratch and stop avoiding fat because you think fat makes you fat. That’s just a trick of language that has gripped our society in misinformation and disease for far too long.
Consuming Chemicals
Processed, man made foods contain added flavoring agents, preservatives, pesticides and other chemicals in addition to genetically modified ingredients. Most “fortified” foods also have synthetic vitamins and minerals added simply because the precursor has zero nutritional value. This cocktail of unnatural nutrients promotes inflammation, toxin storage in fat cells, and chronic inflammation in the body.
Some foods are available on the market today that are 80-90% man made ingredients. Have you seen the ingredient list of Kellogg’s Nutragrain snack bars? These babies have 56 individual ingredients, sugar has been added 11 times in 7 different forms along with various flavoring agents, hydrogenated vegetable oils and chemical preservatives and colors. To date, this food item has the highest ingredient count of any OTC boxed food (and some people consider them to be “healthy”!).
Tip: Again, stick to whole, fresh foods and cook more at home.
Incorrect Exercise, i.e. crossfit, bootcamps, extreme exertion, long jogging sessions
Chances are you once thought that working out helped you to lose weight. Sadly the research speaks otherwise. Low intensity, long duration workouts (ie spending 30-45 min moving on one piece of equipment) does nothing to stimulate fat burning hormones. If anything, it actually stimulates fat storing hormones as stress hormones rise from the unnatural amount of movement! Yes, you heard that right – it’s unnatural for a human to move at 3.0mph for 45 min! Instead we were designed for burst movements – short and fast, with a break in-between.
When you do high-intensity, short duration exercise such as burst training you stimulate fat-burning hormones like human growth hormone (HGH).The more HGH your body produces, the more amplified the fat burning effect will be throughout the day.
What we’ve learned
- In regards to calories, forget they exist and focus more on what and when you eat rather than how much.
- Forget the notion that nutritional fats equate to body fat. Good fats (Omega-3s) actually help you lose weight. The real weight gain culprit is sugar (in its many forms).
- Forget the treadmill or the extreme exercise. Short bursts of high-intensity movement stimulate fat-burning hormones and work more naturally with your physio-evolutionary makeup
Now get out there, eat a bunch of fats, start sprinting and lose that weight!
