How to Lose Weight and Keep It Off.

"How do I lose weight?"

I get asked this question hundreds of times, and by looking at the average American there is no wonder why. Over the years I have studied diet and nutrition. Have read hundreds of books and articles, and have taken advice, some good some bad, from thousands of people. I have taught hundreds this same system that has yielded some of the most impressive results I have ever seen. The system is very specific and strict. If you follow the guide lines and the program you will lose weight and keep it off.

Lets lay the foundation first. You need to decide you want to lose weight in the first place. You need to make up your mind that this is what you want.

1. How serious are you about losing weight? On a scale of 1 - 10 what is your seriousness about losing weight? If your a 8 or higher then your ready to lose weight. No one can make that choice for you, no one can make you want to, it's all your choice. When you have made the choice of losing weight and your serious level is 9 or 10, then your ready. If your sick and tired of being over weight, feel depressed, and feeling unhealthy all the time, and want to do something about it, want to change your ways to get better results, then your ready. That leads us to the next secret

2. Lifestyle Change. This can not be a fad diet, they don't work. It can't be "I'll do it for a month, and if I get tired I'll go back to eating the way I used to". It can't be hot one day and cold the next, or stick to it for a period of time and decide to slowly go back to the way I used to eat. No. If you want results, and your serious about it, and sick and tired of being sick and tired, then you need to change your way of life. You can't expect change by doing the same thing you currently do. Your going to need to make a lifestyle change. Once the program becomes a part of your everyday life, results will come. That's not to say, that you can't ever have the things you love ever again, I will encourage you to have a "Free Meal" once a week to help you stick to program. When this becomes your way of life, when your eating healthy food choices without even thinking about it, or when missing a meal or missing a workout, feels like you forgot to brush your teeth, or you forgot to go to work, then it has become a lifestyle. When it become your lifestyle, then you won't have to think about the results, they will just come and continue to come as long as this is your lifestyle.

Please consult with your physician before beginning this or any fitness program. I am not a doctor. Understand the ideas and suggestions in this document are not intended as a substitute for proper medical advice! The application of ideas and suggestions in this document is at the reader's sole discretion and risk. The author expressly disclaim responsibility for and adverse effects arising from following the diet without appropriate medical supervision. proceeding with the program, it is assumed that you have read and understand the above statement.

The Program

People who try to eat healthy by avoiding fat, are missing the boat. Americans and not fat because they are eating too much dietary fat, no it's a combination of a high saturated fat, and high carb. diet that is the cause of obesity in this country.

to lose fat, you need to cause a caloric deficit. In other words, you need to burn off more calories than you take in. You must also reduce the amount of food you are eating. You must strive to eat whole foods, which are low in sugar and contain plenty of fiber.

Program Rules

1. Eat Fewer Calories
in order for your body to use stored fat for fuel, you must lower what you eat in cals. When Your body doesn't get the cals it needs for diet, it will begin to break down fat stores to get it's energy.

2. Eat a High Protein, Moderate Fat, and Moderate Carb Diet
Your meals must consist of the correct amount of carbs, protein, and fat. I would recommend a ratio of 40% protein, 30% carbs, and 30% fat. Most of your diet will be of high quality protein. The increased protein will help in increasing your metabolism to about 30% within a hour of eating while high carb meals raise your metabolism only 4%. This is because protein digestion is more complex, thus taking longer, and requiring more energy to assimilate.

3. Eat Protein at Every Meal, and Eat Six Times a Day
Spreading your calories over more meals is an important factor in changing your biochemistry to burn fat. The human body adapts to unusual conditions to help it survive. So if we eat fewer meals or skip meals our bodies go into survival mode. It slows the metabolism and stores most of the meal calories in fat cells, because it is not sure when it will receive it's next meal. Now if you eat more often, at regular intervals, your body will not tend to store excess calories, because it knows that it will be eating again in a few hours. Eating small meals more often increases your metabolism.

4. Follow My Meal Timing and Meal Content Rules Below

• Don't eat before Cardio. You should do cardio first thing in the morning before eating. 30 - 60 minutes after your cardio session eat your first meal of the day to stop muscle catabolism, you must eat a high protein meal.
• Eat most of your simple and starchy carbs early in the day. Your metabolism is fastest in the early morning, so you have a good chance of using those cals. as energy and not storing them as fat. Fewer carbs at night mostly fibrous carbs like green veggies.
• Eat a low carb, high protein, moderate fat meal 30 - 60 minutes before bed. In order to help ease some of the muscle catabolism during sleep, you need to eat a high protein meal before you go to bed. Because fat storage is greatest at night, this meal should have little to no carbs at all.

5. Reduce your intake of Simple Carbs: Sugar and Fructose.

As you may have guessed, your diet on this program is very restrictive. You must get control of what you put in your body. First you must decrease your intake of simple carbs, (candies, syrups, sugar, alcohol, milk and milk products, and processed white flour products.) Concentrate on eating complex, starchy carbs like brown rice, whole grains, beans, sweet potatoes and yams. Fruit concentrate on green apples with the peel. They contain more fiber than most other fruits especially tropical fruits. We will also be avoiding milk and milk products on this diet. Not only does milk have a very large amount of saturated fat and sugar, but it also has high levels of sodium, which leads to water retention and a smooth bloated look.

6. Decrease your Intake of Processed Foods

This is for overall general health. This includes all refined foods like white flour, table sugar, sweets, and pastries. These products contain empty cals. no nutritional value. They all have plenty of cals. but not nutritional value. Most refined baked goods also contain large amounts of trans fatty acids or trans-fat. Remember, trans-fat should be avoided as much as possible. It actually increases your bad cholesterol levels (LDL) faster then saturated fats!

7. Eat more Fiber

Concentrate on eating more fibrous carbs. (vegetables)

8. Drink More Water

You should aim to drink at least (.60 x body weight) oz. per day

9. Eliminate Alcohol Consumption

Alcohol stops the body's use of fat for fuel.

Diet math

Calculating Your Daily Food Intake

first you need to find out what your body fat % is. There are several ways, the most accurate is the skin fold method which pinches your fat in 7 to 9 sites to determine your body fat %. Once you find out what your % is you can find your lean body mass.

for example: if you weigh 184lbs. and your 18% body fat that would be 184 x 0.18 = 33.12 that means you have 33.12lbs. of fat. If you subtract 33.12 from 184 that equals 150.88lbs. or for this sake 150lbs. of lean body mass or muscle.

once you find your lean body mass we can now find out the total number of calories you should be eating. For this diet we will use a multiplier of 12. If we take 150 (which is your lean body mass in lbs.) and multiply it by 12 we get 1800 calories. Now divide that number by the number of meals you will be eating each day (6) and you get 300 cals. So you should be eating 300 cals. at each meal.

Total Daily Calories

1. (LBM x 12) = total daily calories
2. (total calories / number of meals per day) = calorie amount for each meal

Calculating your total nutrient breakdown is a little more complex. It will consist of 40% protein, 30% carbs., and 30% fat cals.

first lets calculate your total amount of protein in calories. Simply multiply 1,800 by 0.40 (40%). this gives us 720 total daily calories of protein. Next we need to determine how many grams these 720 cals. contains. Since protein has 4 calories per gram, we divide 720 by 4. This gives us 180. Now we know we will need to eat about 180 grams of protein each day. To find out how much we need to each each meal, we divide that number by 6 (number of meals). this equals 30 grams of protein each meal. here it is again:

1. total daily protein intake in cals. (1800 x 0.40) = 720 cals.
2. total daily protein intake in grams (720 / 4) = 180 grams
3. Amount of protein needed at each meal (180 / 6) = 30 grams

Now lets do the same for carbohydrates and fats.

(remember carbs have 4 calories per gram, and fats have 9 calories per gram)

Carbs

1. total daily carb intake in cals. (1800 x 0.30) = 540 cals.
2. total daily carb intake in grams (540 / 4) = 135 grams
3. amount of carbs needed at each meal (135 / 6) = 23 grams

Fat

1. total daily fat intake in cals. (1800 x 0.30) = 540 cals.
2. total daily fat intake in grams (540 / 9) = 60 grams
3. amount of fat needed at each meal (60 / 6) = 10 grams

So if we equally divided our cals. throughout the day, we would need to eat 30g of protein, 23g of carbs, and 10g of fat at each meal. This is a overview to help you understand how to spread your cals. throughout the day, I would never want you to divide your cals equally.

So what can I eat?

Healthy Food Choices

Acceptable protein sources

(1 oz. ) food values calories (g) protein (g) Carbs (g) fat (g)

Lean poultry 35/ 8 / 0 / 1

fish and seafood 35 / 6 / 0 / 5

lean beef 75 / 7 / 0 / 5

egg whites 16 / 3 / 0 / 0

cottage cheese (1/2 cup) 80 / 18/ 3 / 1

whey protein isolate 100 / 25 / 0 / 0

whey protein concentrate 100 / 20 / 2 / 1

soy protein isolate 90 / 18 / 0 / 1

unacceptable protein sources

deli meats

fatty meats like duck and ham

processed meats (hot dogs, bologna, etc.)

milk

hard cheesees

Acceptable Carb Sources

Fibrous carbs (Green leafy vegetables) should be the main source 30/ 1/ 6 / 0

brown rice 1/2 cup cooked 109 / 2 / 23 / 1

sweet potatoes 220 / 4 / 53 / 0

beans 1 cup cooked 208 / 13 / 38 / 1

whole oats 1/2 cup cooked 73 / 3 / 13 / 1

fruit (in moderation) 81 / 0 / 21 / 0

Unacceptable carb sources

milk

junk food

sweets

potato chips

candies

cookies

alcohol

breads and pasta (OK in moderation)

recommended Fat Sources

cold pressed oils, extra virgin olive oil 1 tbsp. 119 / 0 / 0 / 14

flaxseed oil 1 tbsp. 132 / 0 / 0 / 14

safflower and sunflower oils 1 tbsp. 120 / 0 / 0 / 14

raw nuts 1 oz. dry 164 / 7 / 6 / 1

unacceptable fat sources

peanut butter

whole milk

butter

margarine

heated oils

canola oil

Example of a diet

Cals,/protein(g)/Crabs(g)/Fat(g)

1st meal

1 soy protein 60/15/0/0

1/2 designer protein 45/9/0/1

1 tbsp flax seed oil 132/0/0/14

1.5 banana 158/1/41/0

2nd meal

4 egg whites 64/12/0/0

1 green apple 81/0/21/0

3rd meal

4 oz. chicken breast 140/32/0/4

1 cup green beans 44/2/10/0

4th meal

1 soy protein 60/15/0/0

1/2 designer protein 45/9/0/1

1 tbsp flax seed oil 132/0/0/14

1.5 banana 158/1/41/0

5th meal

4 oz. chicken breast 140/32/0/4

1 cup green beans 44/2/10/0

6th meal

1 soy protein 60/15/0/0

1/2 designer protein 45/9/0/1

1 tbsp flax seed oil 132/0/0/14

Daily Totals 1,585 Cals. / 163 g Protein / 123 g Carbs / 55 g Fat

The reason for the protein shakes are convenience. They are there as meal replacements. For many of us, it is too difficult to prepare 6 full meals a day. This is where the protein shakes, or meal replacements come in. There are other benefits of soy protein. Soy Protein Isolate has been shown to help support the body's calorie burning capabilities during low-calorie dieting. In other words, it helps prevent your body from slowing your metabolism when you reduce your caloric intake. This increase in thyroid activity means more fat loss for you. In addition, soy protein isolate contains isoflavones, which have shown to lower bad cholesterol levels (LDL), protect against cancer, and help prevent osteoporosis.

This is just an example of a diet. As you can see the recommended foods are restricted. By using these food choices you can come up with different food choices different days of the week. In other words, you could have made up different "menus" for different days of the week. Please stick to the recommended food choices.

I like to keep my nutrients as pure as possible.. What I mean is, I don't like to pre-mix. It makes it difficult to plan and monitor when protein and carbs and fats are all mixed together. If you need to make substitutions to any item, all you have to do is replace it with a item that is close to equal. Proteins are easily interchangeable. The numbers may not be exact, but they are very close.

Once you come up with a diet plan with your food choices for all 6 meals, you need to stick to the program for at least three weeks, and monitor your progress. You have to be consistent for the three weeks. Not three weeks of sort of following the program, the saying "it's not working". Don't change the program before the first three weeks. If after three weeks you have made progress and lost fat at a average of 2lbs. per week, then the program is working. If after the first three weeks you have not lost weight, or have gained weight, then changes can be made.

Not losing fat, decrease cals. by 200. if after three more weeks, (6 weeks total) still no change, change your nutrient levels to 50% protein 20% carbs, and 30% fat.

Next we will talk about exercise, what you should do on fat loss diet.

God Bless