Here’s a quick-and-dirty breakdown of how to optimize your body for fat loss. By following these secrets, you will lose fat. Guaranteed. And I’m not charging you for it. How stupid can I be?
A misconception among many people is that our sedentary life is primarily to blame for our overweight culture. In truth, anthropologists suggest that our hunter-gatherer ancestors may have been as little or less active than we are on average. The simple truth is that the primary cause of our obesity is our food.
It has only been a relatively short time in human history that the human body has been without the constant threat of famine. Before the invention of farming and agriculture, your body had to prepare you to survive long periods without food. That is why you store fat.
The body has not had a chance to adapt to the modern world with its overabundance of food. Because of this, your body craves more food even when you’re overweight. There’s no off-switch, because your body is still preparing for a famine that most-likely isn’t coming.
Secret #1
Most people are aware of the hormone insulin and its role as the regulator of blood sugar, but few know that as long as there are high-levels of insulin in the blood your body cannot mobilize fat from your fat cells. It is simply impossible.
Insulin suppresses glucagon, norepinephrine, epinephrine, and hormone-sensitive lipase, which are key in the process of releasing fat and beginning the process of its metabolism. Without these hormones, fat-burning will be a painfully slow, if non-existent, process.
Insulin is released into the blood by the presence of blood sugar. It attaches to cells in the body–primarily muscle cells–to store the sugar for future use. This is all well and good.
The problem is that our modern diets are so full of carbohydrates that our muscle cells are typically over-saturated with sugars. This causes the cells to become “insulin-resistant,” refusing to listen to insulin and take up blood sugar. Excessive blood sugar is dangerous, so in response, the body puts more insulin into the blood to overcome the cell’s resistance.
The cells then respond by trying to get rid of the extra sugar they are being forced to absorb. They do this the only way they know how–they convert the sugar to triglycerides which are released back into the blood stream and converted to fat and stored in fat cells.
So you have a two-fold fattening action. High insulin levels are suppressing fat metabolism, and over-saturated cells are turning excess sugar into fat.
So, the secret is, if you want to lose fat you have to significantly reduce your carbohydrate intake. There is no way around this. That doesn’t necessarily mean you have to go on Atkins. What it does mean is that your diet should be primarily vegetables, organic meats (if you’re an omnivore), and good fats. Carbs to avoid should be anything processed (white bread, corn syrup, table sugar, etc.) Eat carbs like berries, and whole oatmeal.
Pick one of these rules-of-thumb to help you: Only eat one meal with carbs per day, and make it after your workout if you can. Or, eat low-carb during the week and eat whatever you want on Saturday. Either way, you will reduce your carbs enough that your muscles are no longer overloaded and insulin-resistant, and your body will use less insulin for a shorter period of time. Fat will be permitted to be mobilized, and you won’t have sugar overflowing into fat.
Secret #2
Often, the first exercise group that comes to mind whenever we think of losing weight is cardio. In fact, cardio is the least efficient way to lose weight, and it increases your risk of injury. Female or male, old or young, the best way to lose fat is to add muscle through strength training.
There are three important reasons for this.
First, muscle tissue is more metabolically active. This will increase your overall base metabolic rate, and you will burn more calories overall every day.
Second, strength training uses up the sugars stored in muscle cells. This helps reverse and prevent insulin resistance and keeps room in your cells for blood sugar storage.
Third, performing strength training tells your body that it requires muscle. This is important, because as we age, if we don’t use our muscles, the body says, “this extra muscle is a waste of energy. Let’s get rid of it.” If you are continually exercising that muscle, the body will assume it is needed and spare it, keeping that all-important metabolic boost that comes from keeping the muscle.
Ladies: strength training will not make you will look like a female bodybuilder. First, those bodybuilders train ferociously–much more than you would need to. Second, higher levels of testosterone than is normally present in the female body is required to bulk to that level. Your body will tone and tighten with some muscle growth, but you will not bulk-up. Don’t be afraid of strength training.
Do you have any tricks for losing fat? Let me know in the comments!
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[...] but always remember that fat loss is 70% nutrition and 30% training. Combine this with my Body Hacks for Guaranteed Fat Loss, and you’re well on your way to controlling your body’s shape for the rest of your [...]