One of the things I’ve learned since I started working at Arena is that when someone learns you work at a gym, more often than not, they’re going to ask for advice. They want advice on what to eat, what to do, how to do it, how often to do it, what they should wear, whatever. I’ve found that people tend to be disappointed when I tell them, “Well, you should eat more fruits and vegetables and less processed foods, and make a habit of exercising every day.” Because, after all, losing weight is as easy burning more calories than you take in.
Thanks to programs like My Fitness Pal, it’s easier than ever to count your calories and make sure that you’re not completely ruining your efforts in your group training or personal training with your diet. Your diet is what will make or break this whole thing. But lately, I’ve been running across people who have become…a little bit screwy, shall we say, on the whole counting calories thing.
If you’re trying to eat healthy, you absolutely should be looking at the nutritional information of your food if it’s available. But if you’re looking at serving size and calorie amount and stopping there, you’re not doing yourself any favors. You see, not all calories are created equal. The word “calorie” simply indicates the amount of energy that is required to increase the temperature of one kilogram of water by 1 degree Celcius. It has nothing to do with how healthy the food is for you, how long it’s going to keep you feeling full, and how quickly your body is going to burn through it.
This why reading the rest of the nutritional information is important. If something is 150 calories but takes 90 of those calories from fat, that’s probably not the best choice you can make. If you are making a choice between two things that are calorically equal, take the food with more stuff: fiber, protein, vitamins, antioxidents. These things will not only help keep you healthy, but they’ll keep your body running, which is something I think people tend to forget.
Your body burns a certain amount of calories just existing, and you need to make sure that you fuel your body to be able to continue the laborious processes of mitosis, digestion, breathing, and pumping blood everywhere. If you go over your calorie count by a banana, your body will not go, “WELP, that was 90 calories extra, so I will now make 90 calories worth of fat. Enjoy taking doing stairs for 15 minutes to burn that off, sucka!” It will not say, “Oh no, I was avoiding sugar, WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?!”
No. No one was ever made worse off by eating a banana (unless they are allergic to bananas, in which case, don’t eat a banana). A banana is extremely high in potassium, which your body needs to lower blood pressure and promote good cardiovascular health, as well as fiber and a whole host of other awesome benefits and nutritious substances. This also goes for carbohydrates, which people have decided are the worst things ever, apparently. A banana, like most fruit, has carbohydrates, and this is a good thing, because remember how I was saying that your body burns calories to run itself? It primarily gets that energy from carbs. Now, when you eat too many carbs, that’s when you run into a problem. So instead of avoiding all carbs ever, just avoid the white bread or those chips served before your meal when you eat out.
All I’m saying is that when you eat less crap – fast-food, fatty cheeses like cheddar, processed food, and food with added preservatives and additives – you’ll be taking in better calories. The nutritional info above is for a serving of black eyed peas. It’s 200 calories, yes, but check out the information: only 8 of those calories are from fat, it has a whopping 13 grams of protein, and 11 grams of fiber! The protein and the fiber will ensure that you feel “full” for longer, which can limit the amount of calories you spend snacking. The same 200 calories, by the way, could get you half of a Jack in the Box cheeseburger, almost all of a donut, or an entire avocado, and I don’t think you’re going to be full for very long just eating that.
At the end of the day, you should be striving for your diet to be sustainable. You can count calories and work your tail off in the gym, but if you still get most of your calories from places like Del Taco (despite getting less calories), you’re probably not going to enjoy your hardwon weight loss success for very long. Switching crappy calories for good calories, though, will help ensure that your overall health and fitness level will stay high instead of crashing back down to earth when you decide that you can’t live off of grapefruit halves and ice cubes any longer.
