The Truth About Counting Calories

Do calories matter or do you simply need to eat certain foods
and that will guarantee you’ll lose weight? Should you count
calories or can you just count “portions?” Is it necessary to
keep a food diary? Is it unrealistic to count calories for the
rest of your life or is that just part of the price you pay for
a better body? You’re about to learn the answers to these
questions and discover a simple secret for keeping track of your
food intake without having to crunch numbers every day or become
a fanatic about it.

In many popular diet books, “Calories don’t count” is a
frequently repeated theme. Other popular programs, such as Bill
Phillip’s “Body For Life,” allude to the importance of energy
intake versus energy output, but recommend that you count
“portions” rather than calories…

Phillips wrote,

“There aren’t many people who can keep track of their calorie
intake for an extended period of time. As an alternative, I
recommend counting ‘portions.’ A portion of food is roughly
equal to the size of your clenched fist or the palm of your
hand. Each portion of protein or carbohydrate typically contains
between 100 and 150 calories. For example, one chicken breast is
approximately one portion of protein, and one medium-sized baked
potato is approximately one portion of carbohydrate.”

Phillips makes a good point that trying to count every single
calorie – in the literal sense – can drive you crazy and is
probably not realistic as a lifestyle for the long term.

It’s one thing to count portions instead of calories – that is
at least acknowledging the importance of portion control.
However, it’s another altogether to deny that calories matter.
Is it necessary to count every calorie to lose weight? No. But
it IS necessary to eat fewer calories then you burn. Whether you
count calories and eat less than you burn, or you don’t count
calories and eat less than you burn, the end result is the same.
Personally, I’d rather know exactly what I’m eating rather than
take chances by guessing.

I believe that it’s very important to develop an understanding
of and a respect for the law of calorie balance (and portion
control). I also believe that it’s an important part of
nutrition education to learn how many calories are in the foods
you eat on a regular basis – including (and perhaps, especially)
how many calories are in the foods you eat when you dine at
restaurants.

Yes, calories do count! Any diet program that tells you,
“calories don’t count” or you can “eat all you want and still
lose weight” is a diet you should avoid. The truth is, that line
is a bunch of baloney designed to make a diet program sound
easier to follow (anything that sounds like work – such as
counting calories or eating less – tends to scare away potential
customers!)

The law of calorie balance is an unbreakable law of physics:
Energy in versus energy out dictates whether you will gain, lose
or maintain your weight. Period.

To maintain your weight, you must consume the same number of
calories you burn. To gain weight (muscle), you must consume
more calories than you burn. To lose weight, you must consume
fewer calories than you burn.

If you eat more calories than your body can utilize, you’re
going to gain fat, period. If you only count portions and
haven’t the slightest clue how many calories you’re taking in,
it’s a lot more likely that you’ll eat more than you realize.
(Or you might take in fewer calories than you should and trigger
the dreaded “starvation mode” which causes your metabolism to
shut down).

So how do you balance practicality and realistic expectations
with a nutrition program that gets results? Here’s a solution
that’s a happy medium between strict calorie counting and just
guessing:

Create a menu using an EXCEL spreadsheet or your favorite
nutrition software. Crunch all the numbers including calories,
protein, carbs and fats. Once you have your daily menu, stick it
on your refrigerator (and/or in your daily planner) and you now
have an eating “goal” for the day, including a caloric target.

That is my definition of “counting calories” — creating a menu
plan you can use as a daily guide, not necessarily writing down
every morsel of food you eat for the rest of your life. If
you’re really ambitious, keeping a nutrition journal for at
least 4-12 weeks is a great idea and an incredible learning
experience, but all you really need to get started is one good
menu. If you get bored eating the same thing every day, you can
create multiple menus, or just exchange foods using your one
menu as a template.

Using this method, you really only have to count calories once
when you create your menus. After you’ve got a knack for
calories from this initial discipline of menu planning, then you
can estimate portions in the future and get a pretty good (and
educated) ballpark figure.

For more information on calories (including how calculate
exactly how many you should eat based on your age, activity and
personal goals, and for even more practical, proven fat loss
techniques that strip off body fat fast, check out my ebook,
Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle at www.burnthefat.com

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