My best weight-loss advice: don’t focus on weight-loss.
Most people believe weight-loss requires them to exercise more and eat less. Not only is this ineffective long term, but it will absolutely destroy your health in the process, which eventually leads to even more weight gain.
What so many don’t understand is that the metabolism is a big “stress barometer”, and when it detects stress (eating less + exercising more) is SLOWS METABOLISM!
The most effective way to lose weight is to take inventory of every area of your health and work to improve it. Improve your ability to detox. Improve your deep, quality sleep. Improve your nutrition, balance your blood sugar, and lower inflammation. Improve your mental and emotional health. Improve the health of your sex hormones, thyroid, and adrenal function. Improve the health of your nervous system, etc.
A healthy body is one that has a healthy metabolism, and once you restore metabolic health, you also restore your ability to burn fat for fuel and to easily release extra weight. You also significantly increase metabolic flexibility, which allows you to eat more calories without storing them.
So many women that I’ve worked with have absolutely destroyed their metabolisms mostly by doing the following:
1. Chronic caloric restriction & meal skipping. When you lower your calories (too low for too long), it slows down your metabolism, and the only way to lose weight is to decrease them even more, further compromising your health and digging a deeper metabolic hole.
2. Too much fasting – ladies, fasting can be a powerful tool, but it’s also one that I see do more harm than good in most female bodies. The frequency and duration in which you should be fasting is significantly different than your friend who told you she was benefiting from daily fasting. We are all unique and you need to take into YOUR stress levels, hormone levels, adrenal health, thyroid health, hormone health, etc. As stress goes up, metabolic function eventually goes down.
3. Inflammatory diet – inflammation damages mitochondrial function, and if your mitochondria aren’t working well, your metabolism isn’t either.
4. Not prioritizing detoxification – our main detoxing organ, the liver, regulates our metabolic rate, and if it’s not working well, your metabolism will be sluggish. I see this often!
5. Over or under exercising – with exercise it’s all about the sweet spot. And this is different for every woman at every age and stage of her life. If you’re looking to restore the health of your metabolism, over-exercising, doing too much cardio, or not lifting heavy enough is absolutely sabotaging your ability to achieve your goals.
6. Not consuming enough protein – ladies, when it comes to metabolic health, protein is king, and research shows that most women are consuming under half of what they need. Once I figured this out and started eating more protein, I lost weight even though I was consuming more calories.
If anyone ever tells you that weight loss is a simple equation like this: “calories in = calories out,” and that calories are all that matter, run! This couldn’t be farther from the truth. It is your hormones that tell your body how much you’re going to burn and how much you’re going to store, and when your hormones are compromised due to chronic stress and poor metabolic health, you’re going to store more! PERIOD! I’ve lived this for years, witnessed it numerous times, and studied it extensively!
I know weight-loss can be confusing, and I know everyone seems to think they have the answer, and I also know the majority of what you’re learning is wrong because the sole focus is weight-loss, not health. When you’re focused on weight-loss, you’re going to do things that compromise your health, and whatever compromises your health is going to compromise your metabolism! PERIOD!
This month in my inner circle, we are talking all things metabolism! In fact, I’ll be putting on a “How to Restore Your Metabolism” workshop this Thursday that is going to be absolutely life-changing! Improving metabolic health is one of the most effective ways to prevent disease, and yes, a bonus, you’ll lose weight too! 😊
