If you watch the news or spend any amount of time on social media, you’ll likely see that obesity and diabetes are the biggest health problems our country is facing. It’s also a major problem in other countries. For years we’ve been told “Eat less, work out more,” and you’ll lose weight. It’s a simple calories in vs. calories out equation.
While this may be true, it fails to address one key aspect of how calories work in the body. Body fat requires little to no calories to sustain itself. A person with large amounts of body fat will tend to have a much lower basal metabolic rate than a person who weighs the same but is primarily composed of muscle. In other words, if two people weigh the exact same but one is 30-40% body fat and the other is 3-5% body fat, the person with less body fat is actually using more energy at rest, which is a good thing.
Muscle is a key part of tissue that gets ignored in mainstream media when discussing health. Muscle takes way more energy to sustain. This is why bodybuilders eat so much. They’re constantly trying to prevent caloric deficits which will eat into their muscle. This is also why they can eat so much because they need those calories to maintain all that mass. Of course, you have to work out a lot, too, in order to put on muscle to the levels they do.
The point being though that having more muscle can allow you some buffer room to indulge in a weekend treat. So, the key question then becomes – how do we get more muscle?
- MORE protein. The average American drastically undereats protein. If you’re going to overeat anything, you need to overeat protein. Animal protein is best. You should be aiming to consume at least 1gram per pound of bodyweight. So, if you weigh 150 pounds, you should consume 150 grams of protein in a day.
- The next most important thing to do is resistance training or just be in the gym CONSISTENTLY. It’s like building a house — you not only need all the material, you also need to do the work.
Muscle should be the primary focus of any person who wants to be healthy. Not weight loss. The more muscle you have, the more fat loss will occur, the healthier you will be.
To learn more about muscle and how to use yours and put it to work for the good of your body, set up a time to talk with us here.