I’ve been getting a lot of good question lately on my social media pages, so I wanted to take the time to answer them here – in more detail.
1) Can I eat cereal and still lose weight?
Yes.
Remember, there is so single food that will automatically make you fat/prevent weight loss when it touches your lips. Calories will always be king, and as long as you are in a deficit, you will lose weight.
The important thing is to be conscious of the serving size, as some cereals calories can add up quickly. This is where most people miss the boat on “clean” eating vs. IIFYM (If it fits your macros). Yes, eating sugary cereal all day is probably not the best idea, BUT if it fits your macros (you eat within a specific parameter of carbs to you) you CAN lose weight.
BUT the nutrient vs. caloric density of sugary cereal is highly skewed towards being calorie dense, so it’s much harder to limit portion sizes to what is truly appropriate, especially if you are not tracking or measuring them.
2) Do I need to eat protein at breakfast? Do I need to eat breakfast?
No and no.
Again, there is nothing you NEED to do to purely lose weight…besides be in a deficit.
NOTE: there are things that I recommend you TRY your hardest to do to optimize fat loss, minimize muscle loss, and preserve your metabolism, but from a purely objective point – the only thing you need to lose weight is a caloric deficit.
It is recommended that you do eat breakfast with some protein for a few reasons.
- Protein helps aid in fullness. Many people often feel hungry shortly after eating a traditional pure carb breakfast.
- If you skip breakfast, you may be more prone to overeating later in the day.
- You want to make sure you are eating enough food to preserve muscle mass, and breakfast is a good eating opportunity before your day gets crazy.
3) When I eat peanut butter with my apple, that counts as protein right?
I hear this one all the time, but NO – PEANUT BUTTER IS NOT A PROTEIN.
1 serving of peanut butter = 2 TBSP = 190 calories – 16g Fat – 8g Protein
Let us look at the equivalent calories from chicken, which we all know is a protein.
190 calories of chicken (6 oz.) – 4g Fat – 33g Protein
Yes, peanut butter has some protein in it, but it does not count as a good protein source for a few reasons:
- Only 8g per almost 200 calories is not worth it.
- 16g of fat is why the calories are so high
- It is a low-quality form of protein (peanut) vs. a more bioavailable animal source.
Do you need to stop eating peanut butter then? No (see #1), however, you will need to find something with more protein to have with your snack or meal.
4) Will protein powder make me fat/bulky?
NO. Just like the cereal.
Considering I have NEVER looked over a woman’s (and only had ONE guy) food journal and found that she ate enough protein in a day, I almost always recommend some type of protein supplement to help meet the goals of an active person.
High-quality whey protein isolates are the best, and I cannot say enough about the quality of Dymatize Iso-100 – click here to buy.
5) Is it really 80% diet and 20% exercise when it comes to getting results?
No, it’s as close to 100% commitment to BOTH to get results.
It becomes very hard to out train a bad diet.
And if you just diet, you often won’t look the way you want.
Do you need to be 100% committed to both? Yes, but this doesn’t mean 24/7.
This means that you need to shift your paradigm and stop viewing things as quick fixes, or all or nothing, or healthy and not healthy, or good and bad, or cheat meals and clean meals, etc.
This is a long process, and you need to be aware that everything you do will affect your results.
Will you get super shredded, and look like a fitness model on stage?
Probably not – the amount of effort and work that goes into looking that way doesn’t happen by accident or because you lift weights twice per week and eat a salad once in a while. To get extraordinary results, you need to do extraordinary things.
And that’s okay.
But to truly automate and make things the least stressful – they need to become a normal part of a routine, not just part of a 20-day challenge.
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Stay healthy my friends,