The Reality of Health and Weight Loss

Okay so I’m putting all of my recent questions into a post because some people said they wanted reblog them. Also, I don’t want to spam anybody’s dash with all of these answers.

A: I LOVE P90x, so I’m trying to decide whether or not to get P90X version 2 or try insanity. I’ve heard so many good things about insanity, and the major difference seems to be that Insanity incorporates more cardio whereas P90x is more focused around strength training. If any of you guys have tried both, let me know which one you’d recommend!

A: I get this question a lot! Here’s an article series that may help you:

• Protein Amounts in Vegetables
• How Plant-Based Dieters Can Get More Protein in their Diet
• Protein: How Much? What Kinds?
• Why Protein is Important

Thank you so much! Messages like this make my day :)

The “ABC” diet is a pro-anorexia diet where people attempt to lose weight via starving themselves. I do NOT recommend this diet because it brings people down a dark path. There are two outcomes from this diet: you either starve yourself until you die, or you stop the diet and you gain all the weight back. Being healthy is ALWAYS the better, more rewarding route, and I promise you if you do it the healthy way, it WILL be worth it.

Be pro-health!

I’m pretty sure this is a fitness myth!

What you don’t want to do is exercise on an empty stomach. Working out while your starving will make you lose muscle mass!

It’s fantastic that you want to get healthy the right way! Anybody who’s been working at this healthy lifestyle thing for any amount of time will tell you that it is not easy.

We all fall off the wagon, we all slip up, we all get frustrated. You just have to keep trying, find what works for you, and do your best!

Here are some tips:

• Abide by the 80/20 rule: Nobody’s perfect. So don’t think your diet will be! Eliminating ALL of the unhealthy in the world cold turkey from your diet is unreasonable. If you can make sure at least 80% of the foods you eat on a daily basis are healthy, you’re doing great! As time progresses, try to make the foods in the 20% category healthier and healthier (i.e. things like dark chocolate covered pomegranates instead of ice cream) and keep finding new healthy foods you love! You cannot out-exercise a bad diet.
• Don’t force it: not everybody can be a vegetarian. Not everyone can be a vegan. But I know people who swear by the paleo diet, and instead of going completely vegetarian I opted for the pescetarian diet because I wanted to get protein the easy way. If one lifestyle doesn’t work for you, don’t do it!
• Troubleshoot why you’re not losing weight: Is it because you aren’t aware of how many calories you eat per day? Is it because you’re eating too many artificial sweeteners or processed foods? Figure out your Achilles heel and then make a plan to defeat it!
• Don’t diet— change your mindset: I hate diets because they have a start and an end point. Instead, try thinking in terms of changing your lifestyle and becoming nutritious. Instead of focusing on eating things just for weight loss, find other reasons to stay healthy. For example, I love running because I have so much more energy and I’m more productive on the days I work out. I think kiwis are the best thing ever because they’re delicious. The fact that kiwis are great for weight loss is just an added bonus!

I’m going to answer more questions tomorrow.

Peace out! :)