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Do calories matter or do you simply need to eat certain foods and
that will guarantee you’ll lose weight? Should you count calories or can you
just count “portions?” Is it necessary to keep a food diary? Is it unrealistic
to count calories for the rest of your life or is that just part of the price
you pay for a better body?
You’re about to learn the answers to these questions and discover a simple
solution for keeping track of your food intake without having to crunch numbers
every day or become a fanatic about your food.
In many popular diet books, "Calories don’t count" is a frequently repeated
theme. Other popular programs, such as Bill Phillip's "Body For Life," allude to
the importance of energy intake versus energy output, but recommend that you
count “portions” rather than calories…
Phillips wrote,
"There aren't many people who can keep track of their calorie intake for an
extended period of time. As an alternative, I recommend counting 'portions.' A
portion of food is roughly equal to the size of your clenched fist or the palm
of your hand. Each portion of protein or carbohydrate typically contains between
100 and 150 calories. For example, one chicken breast is approximately one
portion of protein, and one medium-sized baked potato is approximately one
portion of carbohydrate."
Phillips makes a good point that trying to count every single calorie - in
the literal sense - can drive you crazy and is probably not realistic as a
lifestyle for the long term. It's one thing to count portions instead of
calories – that is at least acknowledging the importance of energy balance.
However, it's another altogether to deny that calories matter.
Yes, calories do count! Any diet program that tells you, "calories don't
count" or you can "eat all you want and still lose weight" is a diet you should
avoid. The truth is, that line is a bunch of baloney designed to make a diet
sound easier to follow. Anything that sounds like work – such as counting
calories, eating less or exercising, tends to scare away potential customers!
But the law of calorie balance is an unbreakable law of physics: Energy in
versus energy out dictates whether you will gain, lose or maintain your weight.
Period.
I believe that it's very important to develop an understanding of and a
respect for portion control and the law of calorie balance I also believe it's
an important part of nutrition education to learn how many calories are in the
foods you eat on a regular basis – including (and perhaps, especially) how many
calories are in the foods you eat when you dine at restaurants.
The law of calorie balance says:
To maintain your weight, you must consume the same number of calories you
burn. To gain weight, you must consume more calories than you burn. To lose
weight, you must consume fewer calories than you burn.
If you only count portions or if you haven't the slightest clue how many
calories you're eating, it's a lot more likely that you'll eat more than you
realize. (Or you might take in fewer calories than you should, which triggers
your body’s "starvation mode" and causes your metabolism to shut down).
So how do you balance practicality and realistic expectations with a
nutrition program that gets results? Here's a solution that’s a happy medium
between strict calorie counting and just guessing:
Create a menu using an EXCEL spreadsheet or your favorite nutrition software.
Crunch all the numbers including calories, protein, carbs and fats. Once you
have your daily menu, print it, stick it on your refrigerator (and/or in your
daily planner) and you now have an eating "goal" for the day, including a
caloric target.
That is my definition of "counting calories" -- creating a menu plan you can
use as a daily guide, not necessarily writing down every morsel of food you eat
for the rest of your life. If you’re really ambitious, keeping a nutrition
journal for at least 4-12 weeks is a great idea and an incredible learning
experience, but all you really need to get started on the road to a better body
is one good menu on paper. If you get bored eating the same thing every day, you
can create multiple menus, or just exchange foods using your one menu as a
template.
Using this method, you really only need to count calories once when you
create your menus. After you've got a knack for calories from this initial
discipline of menu planning, then you can estimate portions in the future and
get a pretty good (and more educated) ballpark figure.
So what’s the bottom line? Is it really necessary to count every calorie to
lose weight? No. But it IS necessary to eat fewer calories then you burn.
Whether you count calories and eat less than you burn, or you don’t count
calories and eat less than you burn, the end result is the same – you lose
weight. Which would you rather do: Take a wild guess, or increase your chance
for success with some simple menu planning? I think the right choice is obvious.
Tom Venuto is a certified personal trainer, natural bodybuilder and author of
the #1 best selling diet e-book, "Burn the Fat, Feed The Muscle. You can get
info on Tom's e-book at: http://www.burnthefat.com. To get Tom's
free monthly e-zine, visit http://www.fitren.com |
