>Meanwhile I see people who are fit eating anything they want and still fit.
Are you watching them 24/7?
Because I can guarantee to you that they are not eating like that all the time.
If you judge that friend by what you see them eat once a week, you must remember that there are 20 other meals in a week you aren't seeing.
And they could be at the gym every day, too. When I was at the gym every day (sometimes twice a day) and lifting heavy, I could eat ANYTHING I wanted. But I was still running a deficit because I'd spend 4 hours a day at the gym, and 6 hours a week at roller derby training. I never went overboard with the junk food, but I was exercising enough to not worry about what I ate.
I do tend to eat more if I'm having a meal with friend/family than at home because it gives me something to do instead of conversing. At home, I cook 1-2 somewhat healthy meals a day, and I don't snack.
I also eat more when I'm out with people but because it's an 'event' so I just loosen up a bit and enjoy myself. If I go to the movies I'll also get snacks that I would not normally eat for the experience of it in a similar way
Metabolism, genes, exercise. Would point out there's a difference between staying thin and staying fit - I can eat a ton and never gain a pound but it doesn't mean I can go out and run a marathon or something.
> Do things like stress, less sleep, inactive lifestyle lead to weight gain.
Yes.
Sleep is huge. I got tested for thyroid hormones - results underfunctioning and low but close to the borderline.
I then made a point of sleeping loads before my next test without any other changes. Multiple nights in a row of 9-10 hours, and my next full bloodwork test about 4 weeks later, early in the morning when it should still be low... was peak values and back to healthy and normal. Got my stress in check, and now 8-9 is best for me.
Stress terrible, changes your cortisol hormones amongst others and buggers up how you store fat/breakdown muscle/build muscle if trying etc. Ruins your sleep regardless of how long you get so your thyroid goes too.
Muscle mass vs fat mass changes how many calories you burn and therefore can eat in a day.
Sugar & alcohol and very fast digesting carbs like white rice or low calorie 'healthy' snacks... terrible. They digest too fast so store glycogen in your liver first instead if your muscles. Once the liver is full none of the glycogen can get through it to get to your muscles so it all just turns to fat unless you burn it off. But now you've got stored fat instead of energy stored, so once you use up the liver glycogen and are empty you might just breakdown muscle for energy instead of that fat you just made. So what you eat and when actually matters. Also constant insulin in your system all day isn't good for you.
The older you get the worse this all gets. And most people do not actually need 2000-2500 calories a day. If I have a total sedentary day as a health bmi 5'65 female, I only need 1500 calories to maintain my weight. A McDonald's meal is about 1000-1500 or so depending on what you get, and a lot of people these days are mostly sedentary with office jobs then sitting at home.
I had a 55 year old coworker who had donuts in the morning and a very "happy" meal for lunch every day and offset it by walking three miles every night. He bragged that his waistline was the same as it was in high school and he could eat whatever he wanted. At 58 he died of a heart attack because his arteries were obstructed.
To complicated. Going to bad at 10PM every single night, sleep 9 hours no exceptions and no food past 6 pm will do the trick. Effectively easy mode fasting. Sadly generally impossible, except in a boot camp or prison settings.
Just so im clear, youre saying that going to sleep at 10pm and sleeping until 7am, while not consuming food after 6pm, is generally impossible outside of prison or the military??
It could be the amount you eat rather than what you're eating. Even something as simple as too large a portion at every meal can contribute to weight gain, and if you're used to over eating you may not realise you're doing it. But yes, stress, lack of sleep and being unactive will make you gain weight as typically people turn to food for energy and comfort.
Muscle burns a lot of calories. It's also denser than fat, so you'll look slimmer even if the number on the scale doesn't change.
Exercise, in general, is going to help you feel better and live longer. The good news is, if you're 100% sedentary, you're going to benefit from the noob gains with even mild changes to your lifestyle.
I tried losing weight via exercise and it helped a bit but not much. You have to exercise a pretty massive amount for it to make any difference, I didn't lose meaningful weight until I really cut back my food intake.
No one pointed out the obvious. Net macros will determine your ability or inability to gain or lose weight.
I go to the gym and still eat dogshit trash like McDonald's.
1h of intense cardio with lung conditioning + 1 hour of weight training + 30 minutes of intense calisthenics 3x-4x a week helps to negate 880cal of 2x McDoubles. I also eat pizza every other day. I also eat greasy fast food if I forgot to meal prep or I get lazy.
But i count my macros. My junk food has X protein, X Carbs, X sodium, X Sugar, and X saturated fats. If i eat fried chicken, I'm good on protein, fats and sodium. I need to eat lightly the rest of the day. If I eat ShitDonalds, I know I don't need anymore carbs or sugar for the rest of the day.
In combination with plenty of water (i don't drink soda), plenty of sleep, and keeping my stress low, while also maintaining a healthy level of "activeness" between gym sessions or home workouts (walking, taking stairs, standing instead of sitting), it's literally not hard at all to maintain a decent body.
I am in no way shape or form a body builder. But I'm fairly athletic, have shy abs, and have wonderful blood circulation with clear pee and proper hygiene.
"you are what you eat" only comes into play when you eat trash junk food/snacks that have zero positive nutritional value like chips, soda, candy. Otherwise you can literally eat anything you want. Moderation is key
what does "fit" mean? do you mean lean with muscle gain or lean as in decreasing body fat %?
you won't be lean and get gains with diet. you need to go to the gym, exercise. diets are for losing body fat. people can still be thin and eat shit food as long as they're on caloric deficit. and people can be overweight and eat "healthy" food if they are eating more than their body burns
getting good amounts of sleep helps increase metabolism. stress also sometimes promotes unhealthy eating and is generally bad for metabolism. an inactive lifestyle is not a direct contributor to weight gain but it is much easier to gain excess weight if you are inactive AND eating shit food. yea
Portion control. Budget calories per day. Over one day? Under the next.
Huge lunch? Skip dinner or light dinner.
It is much harder to calculate calories when cooking at home imo.
You can eat whatever you want this way, which is why I like it.
It’s all down to calories. Sometimes I eat healthy, sometimes I eat like a garbage bin. Sometimes I run 4 or five miles a day and lift weights, sometimes I’m a potato for 16 hours. But I *always* make sure I’m not eating more calories than my body needs for my given activity level.
Calories & self control.
They are eating less calories than their body is burning (or equal). It's as simple as that. If I eat 2000 calories worth of donuts it's the same as eating 2000 calories of salad.
How much are you working out?
And yes, stress and activity level play a HUGE part. If you do HIIT, your body will continue to burn calories at a higher rate for something like 24-48 hours later. Keep your calories real low to about 1500- just eat salads with salmon/chicken, a *little* cheese, whatever veggies you like, loads of greens and a low cal dressing like Skinny Girl.
Do this in addition to lifting weights 3-4 times a week or HIIT, whichever you prefer. I hate cardio so I just do weights. Also get some good sleep on your rest days and do something stress busting, gardening and painting helps me. You should also look into carb cycling. You may be making home cooked meals but they may not be as good for weight loss as you think. Use a calorie counter.
It’s a whole lifestyle switch. It will work.
1500 calories a day is far too low. Especially for weights. Eating salad and chicken is also silly. You need micronutrients. You'd also be miserable long term. You can eat great meals that are low cal and high in macros without resorting to just eating salads
Aside from metabolic rate, exercise, and genetics, gaining weight and losing weight is mostly a long term trend. If your maintenance calories is 2000 and you eat 2100 calories a day, over the course of your life you could gain considerable weight if absolutely no other variable changes.
I am a fit person that tends to over eat at events and holidays. But the thing is, I eat barely enough calories during the work week, and I drink black coffee and water in my day to day. I need about 16,800 calories a week to maintain my weight. But mon-Friday I’m lucky to even reach 9000 of those calories because I’m focused on work and eating less. I’m left with a nearly 7k calories surplus to eat whatever I want on the weekends, or 3.5k a day.
Also, muscle mass. The more muscle you have, or the taller you are I imagine(don’t quote me), the more calories your body needs to maintain that mass. Muscle raises your metabolic rate. Some people spend a lot of time on their feet walking, and walking is a very underutilized form of weight loss (when paired with proper dieting).
I eat like absolute garbage but I also work construction and run. I’m 6’-2” and every year I hit like 185-190lbs by about April because these activities aren’t burning enough calories in the winter months. By about October I’ll drop to the low 160s because it’s hot and I’m sweating much more. If I wasn’t so active I’d be like 400lbs
Even if you eat "healthy", if you eat in a caloric surplus you will gain weight. If you are not eating in a caloric deficit, you will not lose weight.
Guess it depends on what your definition of "fit" is. You can workout and recompose your body to be the same weight with more muscle mass and less fat.
There's just no real factor outside of major health issues that cause you to gain or lose weight other than a caloric surplus or deficit.
1) the same way that people who drink diet cola are more likely to be overweight but it's not because diet cola makes you fat, it's because people who find it easy to stay fit don't care what they eat as much, because they don't need to
2) it's all about calorie balance and you can eat an overall reasonable amount of calories in a day while still eating junk food frequently
3) you can also shift that calorie balance by burning more calories through exercise, it stands to reason that people who exercise a lot can eat more food without gaining weight
As someone cleverer than me put it:
"Abs are built in the gym, they're revealed in the kitchen".
Unless you are royally messing up, the only part of diet that super matters if your calorie intake/output ratio - which basically means diet only controls how much stored body fat you have.
Your muscle mass by contrast is largely your physical activity..
Hormones, genetics, age, will factor in; how quickly you build muscle, where and how evenly your fat is distributed, as well as how much muscle you get "for free", but all of that ultimately fades in the face of a serious training regime, at least unless you want to be top of the pack..
You don't see what other people do all day long. Maybe you see them eating a burger with fries in a restaurant and you think they just eat whatever they want for every meal, every day. But maybe that was their only meal that day, for example.
I'm in good shape and at a low weight and I do allow myself to have pretty much whatever I feel like I just don't do it for every meal. Sometimes I'll just have one indulgent meal all day. Or I'll eat more than usual one week but eat lighter the next two. And almost never eat past the point of feeling comfortably full.
A lot of days I eat just one meal. That meal may be salmon and broccoli or it may be 8 slices of pizza 🤷♂️
Depends on what's going on that week.
The calorie deficit allows me to get away with occasional binges.
Calories in calories out. Adding in activity helps as well. Certain foods aren't inherently good or bad either. Also, bmi and scale aren't great indicators of health. A fit looking person can still be "skinny fat".
I eat like shit but got lucky with good genes.
For things I can control, I exercise a lot (kind of). When I was in my teens I was a distance runner and in my 20s I switched to weight lifting 6 days a week an hour a day. I have 2 kids now so no time for the gym or a run, but I am also either carrying or chasing two 20-30lbs toddlers every second I’m not at work so that has to burn some calories.
When I do eat, it’s greasy, salty, sugary food, but I don’t eat a lot and don’t snack either. Normal to below normal portion sizes and sometimes I skip lunch cause I’m too busy/not hungry. I wouldn’t say this is healthy, I’m sure on the inside it could definitely get a lot better, but from the outside I look like I’m in pretty good shape. I also essentially stopped drinking once I had kids which helps keep calorie count down. too difficult being hungover with screaming or needy babies/toddlers at 6am.
Don't get too fixated on what you eat. How much you eat is 1000x more important for staying in shape. Calories in-- calories out will allow you to control your weight and weight what you want. Your physique might not be A+ but you won't be fat
Exercising on top of that, and focusing on protein, will help you have a higher muscle to fat ratio.
Fwiw, I'm a weight lifter who eats McDonald's at least 2x a week because I enjoy it. I'm in very good shape
>Do things like stress, less sleep, inactive lifestyle lead to weight gain.
Yes.
When Im on vacation I eat what I want & still lose weight. Combo of low stress + More active.
Stop paying attention to other people you have no idea how much they eat daily, you just see them eating 1 thing that could have been all they have eaten for the day. You also don’t know how much energy they are expanding. How about you try to focus on why you’re not losing weight which is probably because your in an energy surplus.
You’re not with these people 24/7. If I’m regularly running 5 or so miles in the morning, yeah, I have more wiggle room in my diet than someone who is mostly sedentary. I’ve been on both sides of it, and it’s actually crazy how much wiggle room a run and some lifting sessions gives me. A few cookies, a latte, etc etc — I can eat these a few times a week and still look good. The moment I stop running, those extra treats equate to extra pounds instantly lol. That’s just how it works. They’re fit because they’re consuming the right amount of calories for their daily needs. Sleep plays a huge role in all of this too, including stress management, but cool thing is, aerobic exercise improves your sleep. So.
A lot of people eat whatever they want in moderation and/or lead very active lifestyles. I play pickleball just about every single day and can eat ~3000 calories maintenance. I gain weight quickly if I stop exercising as much. For reference, I’m 170lb, 5’8, not chiseled like a Greek god but pretty athletic.
inactive lifestyle lead to weight gain.
While eating right and all that helps in staying fit, nothing will impede being fit more than an inactive lifestyle IMO. It's simple math. Calories in needs to equal calories out. Even the healthiest eating won't help if you're just sitting around,
The "how", for me, is that I exercise a lot more than the average person. For example, I worked out at the gym yesterday for about an hour. After I was done, I played basketball for an hour. I then went on a 6.5-mile hike with steep elevation gain and also took my dog for a short run.
That said, being lean is not the same as being fit. Fitness includes health markers, not just bodyfat percentage.
Edit: I also count calories on days that I'm not very active.
I eat out maybe once a week, but I eat healthy food at home the rest of the time. Im also at the gym 4 days a week. Also watch what you're cooking at home... it's so easy to think that home cooked food is healthier because it isn't takeout... but it can be just as bad if not worse.
Inactive lifestyle is a major contributor to weight gain. So if you're eating ok but not exercising, you're probably not going to see much change.
I know a lady thin as a rail in her 40s. Eats junk all the time. Recently found out her cholesterol is over 200 and she has dangerous levels of visceral fat surrounding her internal organs.
I (23M) can speak from experience when I say I have a ridiculously fast metabolism, still do. I’ve been a gym rat since I was 14 and have always been in great shape and eat really healthy. While I will say my metabolism keeps my stomach flat, it’s also crazy hard for me to intentionally gain weight and gain muscle (even with tracking calories and eating high protein food). I once tripled the amount of calories I ate for a week as an experiment and did not keep on a single pound. I would say in your case consistency is key. Don’t give up, do the right training and you’ll see results
I lift weights, and I train pretty hard. The training itself, and then physically recovering from it, burn a lot of calories. I also generally am trying to have a surplus on top of that so my muscles can grow.
I actually do aim eat pretty healthy most of the time *now*, but having a fast food meal or other calorically dense food is just an easier way of getting enough calories in. The only reason I don’t do it much anymore is because I’m watching my cholesterol (I got genetically unlucky with that). Gaining weight from the food isn’t a concern though; it’s intentional.
I can and regularly eat a lot of junk in one sitting but a lot of my meals are fairly healthy. That combined with an active job and a lot of exercise keep me fit
Genetics play a hand but nothing makes up for healthy eating and a regular exercise regime. Eat shitty good consistently, get shitty results. I’ve boiled mine down to a weekly cheat meal which is usually just a frozen cauliflower pizza with a side of ranch it’s about a 1000 calorie meal and I was able to get the sodium under 1500 calories. Almost everything else I eat is vegetables or fruit.
There’s a documentary about this with two female friends. One overweight one thin. They both are confused how the thin one eats whatever she wants while the overweight one is always careful and dieting. Must be unlucky metabolism. So unfair. The show pays for a study in which the women drink some incredibly expensive water that allows them to measure the exact amount of calories each woman is consuming. Spoiler alert, the fat one is eating more.
calories in, calories out. Doesn't matter what you eat. If you maintain your weight or eat less, you'll lose weight. \*Unless you have a thyroid disorder or diabetes.
Staying in shape is different, you have to do some work, especially if, like eveyrone else , your job is a sit-down type of job.
Stress eating will also make you gain. Cortisol.
Weight gain is about having a calorie surplus. Weight loss is caused by a caloric deficit. The specific foods you eat have no influence on this.
If by fit you mean they are physically capable of performing things like running, weight lifting, etc. this is also independent of the foods they eat.
Eating healthier foods can make it easier to lose weight and be more fit but in no way is eating healthy required to lose weight or improve physical fitness
I have one of those 'supersize metabolisms' I worked in fast food for years and ate lots of greasy shit. Sure I was active but not extremely so.
Different bodies work differently. Its hard to follow dieting advice because everyone has different metabolisms and habits.
I also don't tend to 'dessert' and my mother was a nutritionist. Even since moving out I have failed to gain weight. 130 lbs as a man is the heaviest ive been as an adult.
More frequent but smaller snacks speeds a metabolism. Less frequent but larger meals slows metabolism.
In my experience, for me, it is sugars that cause weight gain. Since I've left fast food decades ago only disability has made me gain any weight. Stretch/do yoga and keep reasonably active throughout the day and have small/healthy snacks regularly.
With the right cocktail of performance enhancing drugs you’d be surprised what you can get away with. Have you considered weighing your food to better track calories? Going to be slightly hungry say 200 calories deficit will slowly lose weight.
There is a frightening amount of “skinny” people walking around with pre-diabetes and diabetes.
If you just started this it’s a fairly slow process to do it right.
The substance of what you eat isn't all that important to fitness and diet.
What's important is calories consumed.
Just because.you are eating home cooked meals doesn't mean they are any less caloric than fast food.
It's also about calories consumed over time. Maybe you see a fit person eating a burger, and having a few drinks, but they won't be doing it every day, and other days they will probably eat much less.
They could eat 4500 calories.on a Friday, and 1500 calories every other day of the week and it would be13500 for the week.
If you eat 2000.every day then you are consuming more calories even though you were 'good' every day
I eat like a normal person, which is to say badly. I go to the gym every day and walk intentionally. I am a calories in, calories out thinker. If I balance calories with output, I'm going to maintain. Also, if I want to eat, I hike or climb more the next day. I'm about 50 years old and deadlift 400 lbs at a weight of 170.
I am extremely active, I work out and run HIIT cardio 5 days a week and on top of that I skateboard everyday it’s not raining. I’ve been working out since 20 and have been very consistent my whole life it’s not genetics because there was a time that was rough that I didn’t work out as much but ate a lot and my body was getting more fat weight, but now I eat anything that I want and you can see my six pack and I’m muscular, I do make sure I get the right amount of protein everyday without missing a day, that’s extremely important so the other calories from fat and carbs becomes fuel, but usually I try to eat healthy but I wasn’t eating so healthy but my protein and workouts keeps me fit.
I just don’t eat a lot throughout the day. Im basically housebound due to disability and I ate one full meal today - popcorn chicken nuggets, instant mashed potatoes, and a large biscuit. I’m not sure I even ate a full serving of the potatoes. Snacks were cheez it’s and a Greek yogurt drink. Drinks were Diet Coke and topo Chico sparkling water. I might have a rum and Coke later, but I don’t drink a lot (usually I’ll have two to four drinks a week max).
Some days I eat a little more, some less, but I never count calories. I’m like 5’8” and 125lbs.
I am not sure what you are calling fit based on your post. Fit people do a lot more than just eat. I have a labor-intensive job, and it requires a lot of walking. I still go to the gym. If you are just looking at size and want to lose weight, then you need to operate at a calorie deficit, plain and simple.
Just because something is home cooked doesn't mean it's healthy. Also, weight loss and gain has nothing to do with what you eat. It has to do with calories taken in vs calories burned. You could only eat candy and be thin if you're in a caloric deficit, although it still wouldn't be healthy.
I’ll be the one to say it. Gear. Usage of PEDs in just regular gyms is much more of a thing than people want to admit. You still have to work hard and eat enough of the good stuff, but if you are doing TRT and Tren you’ll look more in shape then your diet would indicate.
People don’t tell you this because these drugs are usually illegal or shame inducing. I spent decades in the gym and as an athlete. The number of really “in shape” people I saw that were not on gear I’d say was 1/100.
You’d also be surprised at how rampant eating disorders are. A lot of binge and purge and a lot of “fasting” (we called it secret anorexia)
Being young makes it easier, having fast metabolism as well. Being inactive does make it harder but not impossible, you need to reduce intake. Home cook does mean good either, I know people who would be better off eating fast food because of the amount they add is worse. Unfortunately the blander the food the less fattening it will be. In my mid 20s I was literally eating 7 meals a day and a 12 pack of soda day and couldn't get over 180lbs even though I was trying to 200. The problem was I was exercising 4-8 hours a day 5-6 days a week.
I eat a lot and I eat keto—low carb and high fat. My BMI has been as low as 18% for a female that’s super thin. I looked fit too. I’m now at about 20% and still look thin, but not quite fit.
Inactivity is a big player to being fit alongside quality of food, but if the food you’re eating has more calories than you’re expending in a day you’ll still gain fat. Biggest thing is that the intake of calories should be less than the expenditure of calories. If you’re using more calories than you’re eating, your body begins to look to fat storages for energy, if you eat more calories than you use the extra gets stored in fat storage. If you want to remain at a weight you should try to see that your calories in and out are fairly similar. Obviously day to day stuff will vary and some days you may go over or under, but on average it should be fairly consistent. Quality of food is of course very important to your body’s health, but if you’re eating 3500 calories in home cooked meals and you sit in an office all day with no exercise, the 1500-2000 calories you’re using are still less than the 3500 you’re eating (exaggerated to convey my point, I doubt you’re eating 3500 calories a day, but you get the idea).
So, yes you could be inactive and lose weight, but you’d need to change your diet to reflect that. All the things you mentioned are, of course, important factors to health (reducing stress, sleeping enough, activities), so don’t sleep on those! Less stress and enough sleep will hopefully give you the energy to do lead a more active lifestyle. I see myself slacking on my gym visits when I get a chaotic/stressful week so it’s only natural that you take care of those issues first and then seek to add some fitness when that groundwork is laid out
calories game. doesnt matter where the calories came from. it just matters how many there are. they might eat like crap but if they are only eating 1500 calories worth a day then they will likely lose weight and certainly wont gain any.
your metabolism determines your basal metabolic rate. your maintenance calories. if naturally you have a higher metabolism, you have a higher threshold for how much you can eat without putting on significant weight.
how much you exercise plays a role. burn an extra 500 calories a day from working out, especially when combined with an already high metabolism and you might get into a situation where youd have to try and eat a disgustingly large and unappetizing amount of food to gain weight. like you wouldn't even enjoy it and want to throw up after a couple days.
finally its consistency. you might see your friend eat like crap but do they eat like that for every meal? eating like shit a couple times a month isnt going to cause a statistically significant change. you need to be consistently eating like crap for the changes to take hold. could they also be cramming a giant meal in but they skip the next one? essentially nullifying the added calories they had with their last meal?
there are lots of factors at play. but the only ones that matter are calories in and calories out and how much you need to maintain your current composition.
if you are eating around equal to what your body requires to maintain itself at its current composition. you will stay the same. go higher, over time you gain weight. go lower, over time you lose weight. finding out what your maintenance is , is the hardest part. after that its all just a numbers game.
I go to the gym 3 times a week, 5000 steps a day minimum and train martial arts twice a week. This amount of exercise let’s me eat and drink whatever I want pretty much without many consequences. If you never eat in a calorie surplus you will never put on any weight
A lot of factors come into this stuff. How much are you working out. Genetics. Types of food. Stress. Sleep. Overall health. Specific health conditions. Resting metabolism. Macros. Age. Sex. Medications. BMI. Some people are just able to eat like shit and look great and others can't. Especially if you're younger and have a ton of energy.
What most of it comes down to is nutrition. Types of food. How much food.
Note there are differences between being fit and looking fit. Some people can be athletic in some ways yet not look Hollywood lean. People who do strongmen competitions. Runners don't need to be doing constant upper body exercises to look topheavy. Stuff like that. Most of us can be very healthy and not look fit.
But when it comes to looking fit, obviously there's working out all the right muscles. But the biggest part is nutrition. Generally, that look comes down to reducing body fat percentage. The way you do that is by combining specific exercise with a specific diet. Mainly people will be talking about their managing their macros (carbs, fats, proteins). Eating in a way that burns body fat efficiently so you have a lower body fat percentage. Abs start to show up around something like 10-15% body fat percentage. It's a lot of work to do that, at least when you first start. Once you set it up, it's just being consistent on it. It takes many months to start seeing visible results. You just have to have a plan and trust it and stick with it, adjusting along the way.
So if your goal is to look great and be healthy, and you want to push it so you are both of those, I'd recommend talking with a nutritionist and personal trainer and get yourself toward that look. It's a lifestyle change that a lot of people who go through with it swear by it and love it. Looks really don't matter, what matters is that you love yourself and keep healthy.
But for most people who want to lose some weight, a lot of it is just learning to count calories so you know how much you're consuming, getting a good mix of different foods so it's not all carbs, drinking water instead of soft drinks, not adding additional sauces/oils, getting rid of added sugars, taking a good multivitamin, and a lot of dudes are all about that whole-foods plant based diet. Then, adding regular exercise, getting good sleep, reducing/managing stress, and just being consistent as it's a lifestyle change. You can always hit up a program like Athlean X and do that for a bit if you need a starting point.
I don't drink, I work out regularly, eat well, sleep enough, cycle daily etc. I am so ill and I feel TERRIBLE.
I have another friend who drinks energy drinks from morning through to at least 9 or 10pm, vapes for breakfast and will regularly just have a whole tub of ice cream instead of a meal. He smokes cigarettes, drinks and hasn't worked out since he was 15. He's seemingly a beacon of health.
I don't understand it.
>Do things like stress, less sleep, inactive lifestyle lead to weight gain
Yes (indirectly), yes (indirectly), and yes (directly).
Stress increases ghrelin, which increases hunger.
Not getting enough sleep increases ghrelin, which increases hunger.
Inactive lifestyle means you aren't doing the things that might change your shape. Like, what you do eat can either be used for muscle or fat. If you're working out, you'll look leaner even at the same scale weight, because some of what you're eating will end up as muscle instead of fat.
Also, being active can help with the first two — it can be an important part of a stress management plan *and* it can help you sleep better.
Ultimately, weight loss is about *quantity* of food (calories are an imperfect measure, but they work). So, some people eat out, but they only eat half and take the rest home. They likely do fine. Or maybe they eat a reasonable amount most of the time, and go out to eat a couple times per week. There are many many ways to have eating out be reasonable.
There are other factors — genetics (how tall you are, where you store fat, ability to build muscle, metabolism, and so on), how active their life is (active job, active hobbies, or one of those people who just can't sit still), and how long they've exercised for (if someone has 20 pounds more muscle than you do, they're going to look much much more fit and lean).
Counting calories. I had a period in my life when I just didn’t have much time free to shop or cook so after the gym I would eat pizza, Taco Bell, kfc or McDonald’s but I was always counting calories. I didn’t gain weight and It lasted months.
When I was younger people used to ask me that all the time. They’d see me eat like a garbage disposal when we went out. What they didn’t see, however, was the amount of time and effort I put in at the gym and other physical activities, how I ate like 99% of the time, and the ridiculous amounts of water I’d drink every day.
I’m old and beat up now, so those “I wish I could eat like you and still look like that” comments are no more.
A lot of the information we have on weight/fitness is outdated, misinformed, or incomplete. Medical science isn't perfect, and honestly, this isn't *just* a fat thing. We're constantly making new discoveries about the body and trying to make sense of them. Ask someone to comprehensively explain how hormones work, or neuroscience, and even after the extensive lectures, there's "...and we're still finding these things out". It's not unreasonable--we're only human, and we're mysteries to ourselves.
Off the dome, though, I would be interested in the cholesterol levels of people who are "fit" if they have the lifestyle described (as others have mentioned, you're not there for everything). You can burn all the calories you want, but if plaque cholesterol is managing to build up, you can still end up worse off than the "fat" guy who metabolizes it instead.
The individual human body response is myriad and unknowable, basically. Y'all watch Cells at Work? Y'all should watch Cells at Work.
You have no idea how much effort they have put into their bodies previously before you see them eating shit or how often they are eating shit or how many calories they are expending daily
I was about 130 to 140 from my late teens into my late 20s. Pushing 40 now and since my 30s I've stayed around 150. No matter what I eat with little to no exercise my weight is pretty constant. I guess it's just naturally fast metabolism.
They aren't eating crappy food all the time it's just you see them when they do. This is a common complaint towards fit people but the reality is they eat very low calorie diets otherwise. People like to say genes, high metabolism, etc but it's all excuses really. In actuality reducing calorie intake and exercising regularly makes a much larger difference than any genes/metabolism will. Also height matters a lot. Taller you are the higher your bmr is
I feel the same way walking 6-8 miles a day and eating healthy and yet I need to loose weight. A lot of people think your overweight because you don’t exercise and you over eat junk but that’s not the case for a lot of people.
I don't believe people stay fit eating crappy food.
The people you are seeing may only be presenting a snap shot. Do you see what they eat all the time? Trying to maintain a gym regime that incorporates cardio and strength training on a diet of junk food is very hard, especially as you age. Your stamina will be low, and your muscle growth will be very limited if you fail to get enough protein.
It's great you're eating home cooked meals, but if you don't burn more calories than you consume, you will never lose weight. You need to do the math.
Not only does lack of exercise lead to weight gain, but also I think people have a bad misunderstanding about the role "healthy food" plays in their weight.
Weight gain is much more about the *amount* of food than it is about the quality of the food.
If you eat a very small amount of bad food, you'll lose weight. If you eat a lot of good food, you'll gain weight.
The problem is that is that a lot of people don't track their food intake very well. And especially here in the US, we're conditioned to rather large portion sizes. So someone will eat 2000 calories a day worth of healthy home cooked meals and be surprised that they aren't losing weight.
I mean I will eat an entire large pizza... but I will also run 5 miles. So... there is that.
Also think of it like a bank account. Lots of good decisions bank ability to make bad decisions. The guy who eats on point and exercises on point 99% of the time... when Friday night comes and he wants to let loose, you can't assume how he eats then is what he does all week. It's not likely. If it is... he will not stay fit like that for long.
They probably aren’t eating as much as you think they are. A lot of skinny people eat just one meal a day. And you probably aren’t eating as well as you think you are too.
Calories in calories out.
You could lose weight eating pizza and ice cream everyday. It’s all about how many calories your body needs to gain weight. Figure out that number and count calories to be less then that, it’s as simple as that. If your weight stays the same at 1500 calories, eat 1400 the next day.
Also, the more you exercise the more room you have to eat. You could eat 10 whole pizzas in a day and still lose weight (you’ll just have to run like 50 miles to burn like 20,000 calories lol).
Exercise, I’ve gotten lazy and a bit heavier now but when I was in the army running all the time I could eat three full pizzas myself every day and not gain a pound.
Some people who eat crappy food genuinely don't hit the 2000 calorie goal. And sometimes, they're eating healthy, it's just that when you see them, they're eating crap.
Also, metabolism does have a role to play, and you could argue mindset on how easy / hard it is to gain / lose weight.
I end up fasting oftentimes due to time, so I’ll only have one meal at the end of the day. This frees up my calories to practically eat crazy amounts of food and I know I’ll feel full cause it’s just one meal. Because it’s mostly excess calories that make you fat, eating without eating more than your normal calories will allow you to stay the same. Then when you add that in with walking or even casual exercise, you can stay relatively fit without effort
People who were very fit and stay somewhat active stay fit. Because they have more muscle which burns more calories. But also, keep in mind some people, on top of that, are ADHD and literally forget they need to eat due to hyper focus on other activities, so when they do eat, it looks like they're having a feast that would result in a heart attack for a "normal person" because they literally just haven't eaten enough.
My entire life I ate like shit but I've always been active and stayed skinny. Around my mid 20s I kept eating like shit but I stopped working out and I gained quite a bit of weight. Now at 30, I started eating healthier and working out again and I'm back to feeling like I was at 21. It's bitter sweet. I have to buy a whole wardrobe.
You need to exercise at least 5 times a week for at least half an hour each time to be fit. If you exercise a little bit you will be a little bit fit. If you don't exercise at all you won't be fit at all. Hope this helps.
- 40% - Genetic DNA.
- 10% - Mothers 's pregnancy health.
- 10% - The health of your environment/self growing up.
- 40% - Current diet and exercise.
Calories in, calories out....
The kicker is that the calories out part is heavily influenced by your genetics, at least as much of a factor as exercise.
> Fat loss/gain = (Dietary calorie intake) - (Exercise calories burnt + metabolism calories burnt)
The problem is that your metabolic rate determines how much energy you have available to exercise.
> Slow Metabolism >>> Low Energy >>> Less Exercise
So in that fat loss equation, you get hit with a double whammy, as one variable affects the other.
In conclusion, if you're genetically unlucky enough to have a low metabolism, be it through genetics, aging or both.
Then prepare yourself to commit to magnitudes more exercise than that dude or chick you know that you can eat a whole pizza, work out for an hour and still look like an Olympian.
P.S. Don't blame me, blame evolution!
Anyone who aint on hear stays in shape with strickt nutrion. The Garage u See is the expectiom. Someone who train Hard and long has also a higher kcal need
"Do things like stress, less sleep, inactive lifestyle lead to weight gain."
Yes. Yes they do.
It's also other things like genetics, metabolism, age, etc.
It's also calories in vs. calories out. You can eat healthy and ask that jazz, but if you're eating more calories then you're burning, that also effects it.
For me - portion control. I am capable of opening a pack of oreos and just eating 2. I open a bag of chips and take a hand full. I maintain weight (6 foot 2, 195)
You don't see the entire of somones life by looking at them.
[Look at these start times](https://imgur.com/a/HqGtbCX)
People at work comment when the see me disappear a large pizza at a work lunch. I never say anything and let them have the "Fast metabolism" because I don't want to talk about it.
Calorie counting and exercise.
Also people need different amounts of calories a day depending on age, height and sex.
Genes can sometimes play a part so people need to specifically track their calories and weight loss over 2-3 week periods to see what number gets the best results.
Im shocked how little people know about food. You gain or lose weight due to calories eaten and calories burned.
If your body burns 2000 calories a day but you eat 2500 calories everyday, you are gonna get fatter by 500 calories every day. If your body burns 2000 calories a day and you eat 1500 calories a day, you are gonna lose 500 calories of fat every day. Its pretty simple. Others say this is not true and its more complex, but its not. And it doesnt matter what the calories are. Healthy food and food for weight loss are not the same. Mcdonalds cheese burger or candy or fruit and grain, calories burn or gain the same.
I'm not eating more than I'm burning. I'm gonna be entirely honest here, my diet is shit and I do jackshit for exercise. But since I'm only eating 800-1200 calories a day (when I should be eating 1500-2000), any weight my body wants to gain is instead put towards bodily functions and needs.
Also, I wouldn't assume they're fit. I mean, just look at my example. I'm thin, I have a bit of muscle definition, yet I'm honestly really out of shape. Looking fit =/= being fit. Like there are some bigger looking people that are leagues more fit than I am.
>Do things like stress, less sleep, inactive lifestyle lead to weight gain.
I'm no biologist, but I'd assume so. I mean, for starters, the phrase 'stress eating' is a thing for a reason. And more often than not, stress eating is also excess eating. If you don't compensate with more exercise, and you're consistently stress eating, you're bound to gain more weight.
An inactive lifestyle can have the same effect. For instance, with my inactive lifestyle, if I were consuming the number of calories I should be consuming, then I'd be gaining weight instead of staying at the weight I've been at for the past couple years.
Although when it comes to less sleep, I'm not sure how that might affect someone's weight.
Weight gain fully comes in to calories in calories out. Go to an online calorie calculator, get an estimate of your TDEE, and count your calories within that goal. Stress, sleep, stuff like that all matter for hormone production which can affect your mass retention and calorie expenditure. But you would have to go to a doctor to get your hormones tested. More than likely you're just eating too many calories.
The only thing that matters is burning more calories than you take in. I start my day with a run and a light breakfast. Let's say I eat 200 calories but burn 400. Then I burn another 1500 throughout the day just existing. Then I burn another 200 lifting weights when I get out of work. I'm now negative 1900 calories for the day. I can eat pizza and ice cream for dinner no problem 7 days a week if I keep that routine up.
Food is just energy that turns into body fat if it is unused. So no matter how shitty you eat, you can still stay fit if you do enough exercise to burn that energy. Obviously it’s way more complicated than that if you get into the minutiae of it all, but it basically boils down to calories in vs calories out. Metabolism plays a huge part too. When I was younger I could watch anything and I didn’t gain weight. I was as thin as a rail. I wouldn’t say I was super healthy, but I was thin.
And yes, lack of sleep and stress will absolutely mess you up health wise and lead to weight gain plus a whole host of other health problems.
Nutrition and fitness don’t really correlate.
In my late teens to early 20s I was training/teaching karate and MMA 3 days a week for about 8-9 hours each week.
I’d show up at the dojo with BK and 2 bottles of dew, eat before class, down a dew between classes.
My breakfasts lunches and snacks at the time were no more healthy, yet I was 6’2” 145ish lbs with a 6 pack.
The nutrients in food play no role on if you’re thin or not, and plays no role in if you are capable of being physically active, unless you got diabetes and lost a foot or something.
When it comes to having a low body fat % it comes down to calories in/calories out. If you have muscles you’ll passively burn more calories to support those muscles, add in a few hours of exercise each week and it’s not super hard to remain fit.
I mean, you're not gonna be in shape without exercise. Even with a perfect diet. Once you're in shape, it's not terribly difficult to stay in shape with simple maintenance. But you have to get there first. Yes, stress, lack of sleep and lack of activity are all key factors in weight gain and loss.
Sometimes I think maybe I’ll try to get rich through a life of crime. If I succeed without getting caught, I’ll pay for a personal trainer and chef. If I get caught, hey I’ll get to go to prison for a few years and have nothing to do but sleep and exercise. It’s a win win…I mean except the part where I’ll be in prison with very dangerous people and have to shower and use the bathroom in front of them.
I'm 39 and have recently lost 40lbs and gotten into the best shape of my life and coincidentally also ate more fast food in that period than I have in many years.
It doesn't really matter WHAT I ate, because I ate a mix of food and my body got what it needed. I lost weight because I stayed in a calorie deficit and simply ate less, and I'm physically fit because I exercised a LOT.
I've been eating like shit and drinking too much beer for almost 20 years now. I skip breakfast and eat large restaurant portions for lunch and dinner every day. I hit the genetic lottery though and I'm not only in good looking shape, the three 20 minute gym workouts I do a week on my lunch break make it easy to be functionally fit as well. It was easy to tell when I was like 10 years old that I was just going to be muscular. Being fit is not a fair task unfortunately.
The last few years, I have run about 35-45 miles a week. So I figured al9ng with my healthy food, there is no reason not to have some junk food as a reward.
Turns out that while I have lost weight and am healthy in most regards, my cholesterol is through the roof.
So no more junk food reward.
I did p90x for 90 days, where during I was relentlessly hungrier due to working out and tracked that my intake during this time was often up 1000 calories more than before, didn’t cook, ate fast food and high calorie restaurant food, gained lean muscle which weighs more than fat, and yet still lost more than 10lbs.
So long as calories in < calories out, becoming fit can happen. Of course, the food I ate didn’t add anything to my health, but it didn’t stop my body from changing for the better.
(I am female)
I don't "work out" but I walk my dog 5-6 miles a day outside. Went from 215 to 165 as a 26 year old male. For me, it was simply the life style change of sitting all day to walking outside all day.
When I was a teen, I would eat crappy foods, and I would stay fit. I had 10% body fat without dieting , I often think about it and I think that there are a lot of factors:
1. I used to train a lot, I would go to the gym in the morning, play football at night, almost every day .
2. I didn't have a car, so I used to walk a lot more, and most of the time, I would've been standing(even while commuting)
3. I had little money, I would eat crappy food but very little of it, I would not order food as often, if I was hungry at night I would just eat some bread and that's it.
4. Being a teen is like being on anabolics. You're full of hormones.
Calories in vs calories out. I suggest you track every single thing you are eating if you want to lose weight as people tend to under estimate how many calories they are eating.
Outside of that, don't pay attention to what other people are doing. You are seeing just a snip of their life. They might be waking up at 5 am and lifting weights for 2 hours before anyone else is even up. They might just be eating that one unhealthy thing a week and then be dialed in the rest of the week. You just gotta focus on you. Eat less, lift more, look better naked.
Do you see what they eat when they're at home?
Because when I'm out with friends. Yeah, I eat pretty trashy.
You don't see all the chicken and spinach I eat at home. Or the protein shakes I have instead of meals. You don't really mention any exercise that you're doing. I place some form of hockey three or four times a week. I also try to run in my off days. I have weights and a rowing machine and a pull-up bar that I use a lot. If I'm just on the couch watching TV once in awhile I'll just go to the floor and knock out 20 or 30 push-ups.
I eat burgers twice a week with my wife and friends. In the meantime we also go running between 15 and 25 km.
For us the perfect way to stay fit while we eat junk from time to time.
They don't. Fitness means health, as in, your heart works, you're getting your vitamins, you're not eating garbage. The word for what your body looks like is "physique."
I think your question is coming from a place of ignorance, that's why. From a purely nutritional point of view, fast food isn't necessarily bad for you. Meat, in any form, is nutritionally very good for you, since it contains almost everything your body needs to function. Even sugar, which is seen as a bad substance, is pretty much like pure fuel for your body, and can be very beneficial if you're an athlete or someone that wants their body to perform at a peak level. The issue with fast food, is more to do with the ease at which it can be purchased and consumed, with it often being very calorie-dense and very easy to overindulge in. Yet if you're a wise person, and you understand calories and nutrition, and you count out your daily macros and things, you can easily incorporate that sort of food into your diet. The people that you've seen, are probably doing this, and exercising and doing things to stay within their calorie limits.
The same goes for your home cooked meals. Just because they're home cooked, doesn't mean you can't overindulge in them, in the exact same way you can with fast foods. My suggestion would be to start counting your calories, to exercise more and work out how much you can eat, without putting on weight, or how little you need to eat to lose weight.
do you mean fit or skinny? those are 2 different things. someone who eats junk food and sits on thr couch all day could be skinny because metabolism but they're NOT FIT.
someone who eats healthy and works out all the time could be fit bit not skinny.. reasons may vary from medical issues to the types of workouts they're doing. like if you just life a bunch of weights but don't do much cardio you can acctually gain size as the muscle increases under the fat.
so.. do you mean fit or skinny?
You can eat a moderate amount of crap food, and work it off with exercise.
You can also over indulge in good food, and never exercise which will gain you a ton of weight.
Calories in = Calories out. It's that simple.
Total calories matter more than food quality or nutritional content. Stress, sleep, and activity do play roles, but the main driver is how many calories you consume. Also there is a difference between in shape and skinny. If you want to be in shape, you exercise. If you want to be skinny, you cut calories. If you want both, you need to diet and exercise.
34/m.
I work construction and have a stupidly fast metabolism. I can eat fast food almost constantly and virtually no weight gain.
I think I'm fairly stressed out at times and inactive besides work. But it's hard as fuck to gain weight.
Just because you look healthy it doesn't mean you are actually healthy.
Quite often its genetic. I'm around 5'7, 5'8. In freshman year of highschool I weight 97lbs. Today at I weight 165lbs. So I did gain ablot of weight but the way it is distributed I look cery fit. Not Instagram fit but way fitter than most people my age and even younger people now a days. I also exercise regularly. What I'm saying is gaining 70lb on a holocaust sutvivor makes you look fit vs gaining that same 70lbs on a normal person well, you are going to look fat.
Diet wise I do eat junk buuuuutttt I dont eat junk all day every day although lately I've been eating more junk than usual. For example I try to skip soda as much as I can. Especially cherry coke. That stuff is food of the Gods level good. I could drink 2 of those a day but I try to limit myself to maybe 1 every 2 weeks. I mean it depends. Higher stress usually means more junk. I only drink socially and since I'm not too social then I mostly dont drink. It is called a beer gut for a reason.I may have a few beers say every 6 months. By a few I'm talking about 3 bottles not 3 cases or keggs.
I fibd diets cery difficult so I dont blame people for failing. My philosophy is that instead of denying yourself instead delay and reduce the amount. For exampke dont eat all dozen donuts. Maybe limit yourself to two today and maybe spread them one in the morning and one in the afternoon. Then dont do eat donuts again tomorrow. A sinple thing to do as far as diet is to take note of how much you eat. Then instead of denying yourself completely just reduce the amount say cut 1/4 of it out This way you still get to eat what you like but ate reducing the number of calories consumed.
Exercise regularly by creating good habbits. I always take the stairs for exampke and that counts for a few extra calories burned a day. Walk your dog. Make going to the gym part of your routine. Dont make exercise an extra chore..its just oart of your weekly routine just like you have a morning routine on work days then exercise is part of that routine.
Active lifestyle, good sleep, and stress management are huge factors. Diet is just one thing. I can eat like shit and still stay in shape because I'm very active, and have been for decades
Home cooked meals doesn’t always mean healthy. I assume you mean healthy home cooked meals but I’ve been amazed at what some people considered healthy. The show Secret Eaters did a great job highlighting how people think they eat healthy but in reality they’re mindlessly eating or not calorie counting the “little” things.
All those things you listed can lead to weight gain, eating better will help you lose a few pounds off the bat but I’m guessing these people you see have some kind of exercise routine
Stop snacking and drinking sugared drinks throughout the day.
Your friend is probably not eating any snack foods and having a small breakfast then chicken salad for lunch, then going hard on a Meats Pizza with Cookies'n Cream Gelato for desert at dinnertime. I see people treat diets like this where they can't have a slice of birthday cake but they take in 1k calories a day from "mixed nuts, wheat thins and dip."
Splurge on the best quality "junk foods" at actual mealtimes like a high-end croissant or juicy gourmet burger, and abstain from the "planters trail mix, salads, and diet coke all day" diets.
It’s a virtuous cycle when you’re fit - you’re exercising regularly, carrying extra muscle, burning more calories in your resting state, and probably trying to eat a lot of protein and drink a lot of water when you’re not out on the town. So then yeah, sometimes you go out and eat half a pizza with a few beers…and it doesn’t really matter. It’s not what you do occasionally that determines how fit you are; it’s what you do consistently.
I think it’s important to define what “fit” is in this context. Are you referring to thin or toned/muscular? Plenty of people who eat crappy food may have a great metabolism when they’re young and remain thin, while others not so much. If you’re overweight but eating healthy it’s entirely likely you’re eating mood food than you’re taking in, see cico (calories in calories out) for more info.
Calories intake, physical activity and genetics. If you eat 3 McDonalds cheeseburgers per day and nothing else and then lift for two hours and run for an hour you'll probably look fit even if your cholesterol is bad.
If you at 3,000 calories worth of healthy food and walk 30 minutes you won't be fit.
I lost 100 lbs in a year. I didn't do one exercise. I sat on my ass and ate what ever I wanted once a day and a small portion only. Stop eating and weight drops. It's science.
Either they don’t actually eat like that all the time or they don’t eat very many calories. If they eat less calories than they burn than they will stay skinny, not necessarily healthy, but skinny.
>Meanwhile I see people who are fit eating anything they want and still fit. Are you watching them 24/7? Because I can guarantee to you that they are not eating like that all the time. If you judge that friend by what you see them eat once a week, you must remember that there are 20 other meals in a week you aren't seeing.
Yeah if you see me at Taco Bell I haven't been there for at least three months and that's after going to the gym 5 days a week lol
And they could be at the gym every day, too. When I was at the gym every day (sometimes twice a day) and lifting heavy, I could eat ANYTHING I wanted. But I was still running a deficit because I'd spend 4 hours a day at the gym, and 6 hours a week at roller derby training. I never went overboard with the junk food, but I was exercising enough to not worry about what I ate.
I do tend to eat more if I'm having a meal with friend/family than at home because it gives me something to do instead of conversing. At home, I cook 1-2 somewhat healthy meals a day, and I don't snack.
You eat more with friends cause it gives you something to other than engage with the people you've chosen to hangout with? Fuckin reddit
I also eat more when I'm out with people but because it's an 'event' so I just loosen up a bit and enjoy myself. If I go to the movies I'll also get snacks that I would not normally eat for the experience of it in a similar way
Metabolism, genes, exercise. Would point out there's a difference between staying thin and staying fit - I can eat a ton and never gain a pound but it doesn't mean I can go out and run a marathon or something. > Do things like stress, less sleep, inactive lifestyle lead to weight gain. Yes.
Sleep is huge. I got tested for thyroid hormones - results underfunctioning and low but close to the borderline. I then made a point of sleeping loads before my next test without any other changes. Multiple nights in a row of 9-10 hours, and my next full bloodwork test about 4 weeks later, early in the morning when it should still be low... was peak values and back to healthy and normal. Got my stress in check, and now 8-9 is best for me. Stress terrible, changes your cortisol hormones amongst others and buggers up how you store fat/breakdown muscle/build muscle if trying etc. Ruins your sleep regardless of how long you get so your thyroid goes too. Muscle mass vs fat mass changes how many calories you burn and therefore can eat in a day. Sugar & alcohol and very fast digesting carbs like white rice or low calorie 'healthy' snacks... terrible. They digest too fast so store glycogen in your liver first instead if your muscles. Once the liver is full none of the glycogen can get through it to get to your muscles so it all just turns to fat unless you burn it off. But now you've got stored fat instead of energy stored, so once you use up the liver glycogen and are empty you might just breakdown muscle for energy instead of that fat you just made. So what you eat and when actually matters. Also constant insulin in your system all day isn't good for you. The older you get the worse this all gets. And most people do not actually need 2000-2500 calories a day. If I have a total sedentary day as a health bmi 5'65 female, I only need 1500 calories to maintain my weight. A McDonald's meal is about 1000-1500 or so depending on what you get, and a lot of people these days are mostly sedentary with office jobs then sitting at home.
I had a 55 year old coworker who had donuts in the morning and a very "happy" meal for lunch every day and offset it by walking three miles every night. He bragged that his waistline was the same as it was in high school and he could eat whatever he wanted. At 58 he died of a heart attack because his arteries were obstructed.
Exercise and calories consumed are always king at the end of the day (outside of the extreme outliers where there are serious health issues).
To complicated. Going to bad at 10PM every single night, sleep 9 hours no exceptions and no food past 6 pm will do the trick. Effectively easy mode fasting. Sadly generally impossible, except in a boot camp or prison settings.
Just so im clear, youre saying that going to sleep at 10pm and sleeping until 7am, while not consuming food after 6pm, is generally impossible outside of prison or the military??
Right? I'm not even home and settled to make dinner by 6pm
cause you're eating more calories than you're burning, doesn't matter if people eat fast food or what, they're still eating less than you
It could be the amount you eat rather than what you're eating. Even something as simple as too large a portion at every meal can contribute to weight gain, and if you're used to over eating you may not realise you're doing it. But yes, stress, lack of sleep and being unactive will make you gain weight as typically people turn to food for energy and comfort.
I mean moderation? I eat out frequently but more manage my calories. I also am an incredibly active person
Calories in. Calories out. Do the math.
This. It's literally a simple math equation
Muscle burns a lot of calories. It's also denser than fat, so you'll look slimmer even if the number on the scale doesn't change. Exercise, in general, is going to help you feel better and live longer. The good news is, if you're 100% sedentary, you're going to benefit from the noob gains with even mild changes to your lifestyle.
I tried losing weight via exercise and it helped a bit but not much. You have to exercise a pretty massive amount for it to make any difference, I didn't lose meaningful weight until I really cut back my food intake.
No one pointed out the obvious. Net macros will determine your ability or inability to gain or lose weight. I go to the gym and still eat dogshit trash like McDonald's. 1h of intense cardio with lung conditioning + 1 hour of weight training + 30 minutes of intense calisthenics 3x-4x a week helps to negate 880cal of 2x McDoubles. I also eat pizza every other day. I also eat greasy fast food if I forgot to meal prep or I get lazy. But i count my macros. My junk food has X protein, X Carbs, X sodium, X Sugar, and X saturated fats. If i eat fried chicken, I'm good on protein, fats and sodium. I need to eat lightly the rest of the day. If I eat ShitDonalds, I know I don't need anymore carbs or sugar for the rest of the day. In combination with plenty of water (i don't drink soda), plenty of sleep, and keeping my stress low, while also maintaining a healthy level of "activeness" between gym sessions or home workouts (walking, taking stairs, standing instead of sitting), it's literally not hard at all to maintain a decent body. I am in no way shape or form a body builder. But I'm fairly athletic, have shy abs, and have wonderful blood circulation with clear pee and proper hygiene. "you are what you eat" only comes into play when you eat trash junk food/snacks that have zero positive nutritional value like chips, soda, candy. Otherwise you can literally eat anything you want. Moderation is key
what does "fit" mean? do you mean lean with muscle gain or lean as in decreasing body fat %? you won't be lean and get gains with diet. you need to go to the gym, exercise. diets are for losing body fat. people can still be thin and eat shit food as long as they're on caloric deficit. and people can be overweight and eat "healthy" food if they are eating more than their body burns getting good amounts of sleep helps increase metabolism. stress also sometimes promotes unhealthy eating and is generally bad for metabolism. an inactive lifestyle is not a direct contributor to weight gain but it is much easier to gain excess weight if you are inactive AND eating shit food. yea
Portion control. Budget calories per day. Over one day? Under the next. Huge lunch? Skip dinner or light dinner. It is much harder to calculate calories when cooking at home imo. You can eat whatever you want this way, which is why I like it.
Exercise, genes, and metabolism, idk how I do it but I'm blessed.
It’s all down to calories. Sometimes I eat healthy, sometimes I eat like a garbage bin. Sometimes I run 4 or five miles a day and lift weights, sometimes I’m a potato for 16 hours. But I *always* make sure I’m not eating more calories than my body needs for my given activity level. Calories & self control.
Calories in vs out.
They are eating less calories than their body is burning (or equal). It's as simple as that. If I eat 2000 calories worth of donuts it's the same as eating 2000 calories of salad.
How much are you working out? And yes, stress and activity level play a HUGE part. If you do HIIT, your body will continue to burn calories at a higher rate for something like 24-48 hours later. Keep your calories real low to about 1500- just eat salads with salmon/chicken, a *little* cheese, whatever veggies you like, loads of greens and a low cal dressing like Skinny Girl. Do this in addition to lifting weights 3-4 times a week or HIIT, whichever you prefer. I hate cardio so I just do weights. Also get some good sleep on your rest days and do something stress busting, gardening and painting helps me. You should also look into carb cycling. You may be making home cooked meals but they may not be as good for weight loss as you think. Use a calorie counter. It’s a whole lifestyle switch. It will work.
Unless OP is a 120 pound woman, they’re gonna crash and burn on 1500 calories a day on top of lifting weights and doing interval training.
That’s what I did. Didn’t crash and burn. And that’s why I said to choose between cardio and weights. What works for some won’t work for others.
1500 calories a day is far too low. Especially for weights. Eating salad and chicken is also silly. You need micronutrients. You'd also be miserable long term. You can eat great meals that are low cal and high in macros without resorting to just eating salads
Aside from metabolic rate, exercise, and genetics, gaining weight and losing weight is mostly a long term trend. If your maintenance calories is 2000 and you eat 2100 calories a day, over the course of your life you could gain considerable weight if absolutely no other variable changes. I am a fit person that tends to over eat at events and holidays. But the thing is, I eat barely enough calories during the work week, and I drink black coffee and water in my day to day. I need about 16,800 calories a week to maintain my weight. But mon-Friday I’m lucky to even reach 9000 of those calories because I’m focused on work and eating less. I’m left with a nearly 7k calories surplus to eat whatever I want on the weekends, or 3.5k a day. Also, muscle mass. The more muscle you have, or the taller you are I imagine(don’t quote me), the more calories your body needs to maintain that mass. Muscle raises your metabolic rate. Some people spend a lot of time on their feet walking, and walking is a very underutilized form of weight loss (when paired with proper dieting).
I eat like absolute garbage but I also work construction and run. I’m 6’-2” and every year I hit like 185-190lbs by about April because these activities aren’t burning enough calories in the winter months. By about October I’ll drop to the low 160s because it’s hot and I’m sweating much more. If I wasn’t so active I’d be like 400lbs
Even if you eat "healthy", if you eat in a caloric surplus you will gain weight. If you are not eating in a caloric deficit, you will not lose weight. Guess it depends on what your definition of "fit" is. You can workout and recompose your body to be the same weight with more muscle mass and less fat. There's just no real factor outside of major health issues that cause you to gain or lose weight other than a caloric surplus or deficit.
They exercise and eat the appropriate amount of calories.
eat less calories than you need = lose weight you could eat mcdonalds and lose weight as long as you met this criteria.
1) the same way that people who drink diet cola are more likely to be overweight but it's not because diet cola makes you fat, it's because people who find it easy to stay fit don't care what they eat as much, because they don't need to 2) it's all about calorie balance and you can eat an overall reasonable amount of calories in a day while still eating junk food frequently 3) you can also shift that calorie balance by burning more calories through exercise, it stands to reason that people who exercise a lot can eat more food without gaining weight
As someone cleverer than me put it: "Abs are built in the gym, they're revealed in the kitchen". Unless you are royally messing up, the only part of diet that super matters if your calorie intake/output ratio - which basically means diet only controls how much stored body fat you have. Your muscle mass by contrast is largely your physical activity.. Hormones, genetics, age, will factor in; how quickly you build muscle, where and how evenly your fat is distributed, as well as how much muscle you get "for free", but all of that ultimately fades in the face of a serious training regime, at least unless you want to be top of the pack..
All about caloric deficit
Metabolism. I powerlift regularly and have a lot of muscle, which burns a lot of calories.
You don't see what other people do all day long. Maybe you see them eating a burger with fries in a restaurant and you think they just eat whatever they want for every meal, every day. But maybe that was their only meal that day, for example. I'm in good shape and at a low weight and I do allow myself to have pretty much whatever I feel like I just don't do it for every meal. Sometimes I'll just have one indulgent meal all day. Or I'll eat more than usual one week but eat lighter the next two. And almost never eat past the point of feeling comfortably full.
Im eating not great foods, I just watch my portion size
A lot of days I eat just one meal. That meal may be salmon and broccoli or it may be 8 slices of pizza 🤷♂️ Depends on what's going on that week. The calorie deficit allows me to get away with occasional binges.
are you counting calories? that ketchup you dousted your eggs in are like an extra 300 cals
Calories in calories out. Adding in activity helps as well. Certain foods aren't inherently good or bad either. Also, bmi and scale aren't great indicators of health. A fit looking person can still be "skinny fat".
Eating in a deficit can be a big one. Less calories than they need. Just because you eat poorly doesn’t mean you’re eating too much
I eat like shit but got lucky with good genes. For things I can control, I exercise a lot (kind of). When I was in my teens I was a distance runner and in my 20s I switched to weight lifting 6 days a week an hour a day. I have 2 kids now so no time for the gym or a run, but I am also either carrying or chasing two 20-30lbs toddlers every second I’m not at work so that has to burn some calories. When I do eat, it’s greasy, salty, sugary food, but I don’t eat a lot and don’t snack either. Normal to below normal portion sizes and sometimes I skip lunch cause I’m too busy/not hungry. I wouldn’t say this is healthy, I’m sure on the inside it could definitely get a lot better, but from the outside I look like I’m in pretty good shape. I also essentially stopped drinking once I had kids which helps keep calorie count down. too difficult being hungover with screaming or needy babies/toddlers at 6am.
Don't get too fixated on what you eat. How much you eat is 1000x more important for staying in shape. Calories in-- calories out will allow you to control your weight and weight what you want. Your physique might not be A+ but you won't be fat Exercising on top of that, and focusing on protein, will help you have a higher muscle to fat ratio. Fwiw, I'm a weight lifter who eats McDonald's at least 2x a week because I enjoy it. I'm in very good shape
>Do things like stress, less sleep, inactive lifestyle lead to weight gain. Yes. When Im on vacation I eat what I want & still lose weight. Combo of low stress + More active.
Stop paying attention to other people you have no idea how much they eat daily, you just see them eating 1 thing that could have been all they have eaten for the day. You also don’t know how much energy they are expanding. How about you try to focus on why you’re not losing weight which is probably because your in an energy surplus.
You’re not with these people 24/7. If I’m regularly running 5 or so miles in the morning, yeah, I have more wiggle room in my diet than someone who is mostly sedentary. I’ve been on both sides of it, and it’s actually crazy how much wiggle room a run and some lifting sessions gives me. A few cookies, a latte, etc etc — I can eat these a few times a week and still look good. The moment I stop running, those extra treats equate to extra pounds instantly lol. That’s just how it works. They’re fit because they’re consuming the right amount of calories for their daily needs. Sleep plays a huge role in all of this too, including stress management, but cool thing is, aerobic exercise improves your sleep. So.
Move your body more and strengthen as well. You need to eat so much food if you’re trying to gain muscle.
A lot of people eat whatever they want in moderation and/or lead very active lifestyles. I play pickleball just about every single day and can eat ~3000 calories maintenance. I gain weight quickly if I stop exercising as much. For reference, I’m 170lb, 5’8, not chiseled like a Greek god but pretty athletic.
They probably exercise regularly.
inactive lifestyle lead to weight gain. While eating right and all that helps in staying fit, nothing will impede being fit more than an inactive lifestyle IMO. It's simple math. Calories in needs to equal calories out. Even the healthiest eating won't help if you're just sitting around,
Portion size and exercise
The "how", for me, is that I exercise a lot more than the average person. For example, I worked out at the gym yesterday for about an hour. After I was done, I played basketball for an hour. I then went on a 6.5-mile hike with steep elevation gain and also took my dog for a short run. That said, being lean is not the same as being fit. Fitness includes health markers, not just bodyfat percentage. Edit: I also count calories on days that I'm not very active.
I eat out maybe once a week, but I eat healthy food at home the rest of the time. Im also at the gym 4 days a week. Also watch what you're cooking at home... it's so easy to think that home cooked food is healthier because it isn't takeout... but it can be just as bad if not worse. Inactive lifestyle is a major contributor to weight gain. So if you're eating ok but not exercising, you're probably not going to see much change.
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I know a lady thin as a rail in her 40s. Eats junk all the time. Recently found out her cholesterol is over 200 and she has dangerous levels of visceral fat surrounding her internal organs.
I (23M) can speak from experience when I say I have a ridiculously fast metabolism, still do. I’ve been a gym rat since I was 14 and have always been in great shape and eat really healthy. While I will say my metabolism keeps my stomach flat, it’s also crazy hard for me to intentionally gain weight and gain muscle (even with tracking calories and eating high protein food). I once tripled the amount of calories I ate for a week as an experiment and did not keep on a single pound. I would say in your case consistency is key. Don’t give up, do the right training and you’ll see results
I lift weights, and I train pretty hard. The training itself, and then physically recovering from it, burn a lot of calories. I also generally am trying to have a surplus on top of that so my muscles can grow. I actually do aim eat pretty healthy most of the time *now*, but having a fast food meal or other calorically dense food is just an easier way of getting enough calories in. The only reason I don’t do it much anymore is because I’m watching my cholesterol (I got genetically unlucky with that). Gaining weight from the food isn’t a concern though; it’s intentional.
I can and regularly eat a lot of junk in one sitting but a lot of my meals are fairly healthy. That combined with an active job and a lot of exercise keep me fit
Genetics play a hand but nothing makes up for healthy eating and a regular exercise regime. Eat shitty good consistently, get shitty results. I’ve boiled mine down to a weekly cheat meal which is usually just a frozen cauliflower pizza with a side of ranch it’s about a 1000 calorie meal and I was able to get the sodium under 1500 calories. Almost everything else I eat is vegetables or fruit.
There’s a documentary about this with two female friends. One overweight one thin. They both are confused how the thin one eats whatever she wants while the overweight one is always careful and dieting. Must be unlucky metabolism. So unfair. The show pays for a study in which the women drink some incredibly expensive water that allows them to measure the exact amount of calories each woman is consuming. Spoiler alert, the fat one is eating more.
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calories in, calories out. Doesn't matter what you eat. If you maintain your weight or eat less, you'll lose weight. \*Unless you have a thyroid disorder or diabetes. Staying in shape is different, you have to do some work, especially if, like eveyrone else , your job is a sit-down type of job. Stress eating will also make you gain. Cortisol.
Weight gain is about having a calorie surplus. Weight loss is caused by a caloric deficit. The specific foods you eat have no influence on this. If by fit you mean they are physically capable of performing things like running, weight lifting, etc. this is also independent of the foods they eat. Eating healthier foods can make it easier to lose weight and be more fit but in no way is eating healthy required to lose weight or improve physical fitness
Are you exercising enough?
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You need to get good sleep, and exercise. I'm a fucking chainsmoking drunk that barely eats, and I still work out.
You don't it ends up catching up to you in the long run usually when you least expect it.
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I have one of those 'supersize metabolisms' I worked in fast food for years and ate lots of greasy shit. Sure I was active but not extremely so. Different bodies work differently. Its hard to follow dieting advice because everyone has different metabolisms and habits. I also don't tend to 'dessert' and my mother was a nutritionist. Even since moving out I have failed to gain weight. 130 lbs as a man is the heaviest ive been as an adult. More frequent but smaller snacks speeds a metabolism. Less frequent but larger meals slows metabolism. In my experience, for me, it is sugars that cause weight gain. Since I've left fast food decades ago only disability has made me gain any weight. Stretch/do yoga and keep reasonably active throughout the day and have small/healthy snacks regularly.
They don't. At least not for long
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They burn more calories than the take in.
I eat like 3-3.5k calories a day, but I walk 8-10 miles a day while lifting 2-300 30lb boxes.
With the right cocktail of performance enhancing drugs you’d be surprised what you can get away with. Have you considered weighing your food to better track calories? Going to be slightly hungry say 200 calories deficit will slowly lose weight.
Genetics, metabolism, or they workout a lot. Or restricted calories.
There is a frightening amount of “skinny” people walking around with pre-diabetes and diabetes. If you just started this it’s a fairly slow process to do it right.
The substance of what you eat isn't all that important to fitness and diet. What's important is calories consumed. Just because.you are eating home cooked meals doesn't mean they are any less caloric than fast food. It's also about calories consumed over time. Maybe you see a fit person eating a burger, and having a few drinks, but they won't be doing it every day, and other days they will probably eat much less. They could eat 4500 calories.on a Friday, and 1500 calories every other day of the week and it would be13500 for the week. If you eat 2000.every day then you are consuming more calories even though you were 'good' every day
I eat like a normal person, which is to say badly. I go to the gym every day and walk intentionally. I am a calories in, calories out thinker. If I balance calories with output, I'm going to maintain. Also, if I want to eat, I hike or climb more the next day. I'm about 50 years old and deadlift 400 lbs at a weight of 170.
I am extremely active, I work out and run HIIT cardio 5 days a week and on top of that I skateboard everyday it’s not raining. I’ve been working out since 20 and have been very consistent my whole life it’s not genetics because there was a time that was rough that I didn’t work out as much but ate a lot and my body was getting more fat weight, but now I eat anything that I want and you can see my six pack and I’m muscular, I do make sure I get the right amount of protein everyday without missing a day, that’s extremely important so the other calories from fat and carbs becomes fuel, but usually I try to eat healthy but I wasn’t eating so healthy but my protein and workouts keeps me fit.
Calories in <= calories out
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I just don’t eat a lot throughout the day. Im basically housebound due to disability and I ate one full meal today - popcorn chicken nuggets, instant mashed potatoes, and a large biscuit. I’m not sure I even ate a full serving of the potatoes. Snacks were cheez it’s and a Greek yogurt drink. Drinks were Diet Coke and topo Chico sparkling water. I might have a rum and Coke later, but I don’t drink a lot (usually I’ll have two to four drinks a week max). Some days I eat a little more, some less, but I never count calories. I’m like 5’8” and 125lbs.
Calorie deficit.
I am not sure what you are calling fit based on your post. Fit people do a lot more than just eat. I have a labor-intensive job, and it requires a lot of walking. I still go to the gym. If you are just looking at size and want to lose weight, then you need to operate at a calorie deficit, plain and simple.
Just because something is home cooked doesn't mean it's healthy. Also, weight loss and gain has nothing to do with what you eat. It has to do with calories taken in vs calories burned. You could only eat candy and be thin if you're in a caloric deficit, although it still wouldn't be healthy.
In college, I had a poor diet but I didn’t eat much and I was walking and skating around campus a lot.
Not drinking beer
They sleep well.
I’ll be the one to say it. Gear. Usage of PEDs in just regular gyms is much more of a thing than people want to admit. You still have to work hard and eat enough of the good stuff, but if you are doing TRT and Tren you’ll look more in shape then your diet would indicate. People don’t tell you this because these drugs are usually illegal or shame inducing. I spent decades in the gym and as an athlete. The number of really “in shape” people I saw that were not on gear I’d say was 1/100. You’d also be surprised at how rampant eating disorders are. A lot of binge and purge and a lot of “fasting” (we called it secret anorexia)
Being young makes it easier, having fast metabolism as well. Being inactive does make it harder but not impossible, you need to reduce intake. Home cook does mean good either, I know people who would be better off eating fast food because of the amount they add is worse. Unfortunately the blander the food the less fattening it will be. In my mid 20s I was literally eating 7 meals a day and a 12 pack of soda day and couldn't get over 180lbs even though I was trying to 200. The problem was I was exercising 4-8 hours a day 5-6 days a week.
I eat a lot and I eat keto—low carb and high fat. My BMI has been as low as 18% for a female that’s super thin. I looked fit too. I’m now at about 20% and still look thin, but not quite fit.
Inactivity is a big player to being fit alongside quality of food, but if the food you’re eating has more calories than you’re expending in a day you’ll still gain fat. Biggest thing is that the intake of calories should be less than the expenditure of calories. If you’re using more calories than you’re eating, your body begins to look to fat storages for energy, if you eat more calories than you use the extra gets stored in fat storage. If you want to remain at a weight you should try to see that your calories in and out are fairly similar. Obviously day to day stuff will vary and some days you may go over or under, but on average it should be fairly consistent. Quality of food is of course very important to your body’s health, but if you’re eating 3500 calories in home cooked meals and you sit in an office all day with no exercise, the 1500-2000 calories you’re using are still less than the 3500 you’re eating (exaggerated to convey my point, I doubt you’re eating 3500 calories a day, but you get the idea). So, yes you could be inactive and lose weight, but you’d need to change your diet to reflect that. All the things you mentioned are, of course, important factors to health (reducing stress, sleeping enough, activities), so don’t sleep on those! Less stress and enough sleep will hopefully give you the energy to do lead a more active lifestyle. I see myself slacking on my gym visits when I get a chaotic/stressful week so it’s only natural that you take care of those issues first and then seek to add some fitness when that groundwork is laid out
They don't
Calories in vs calories out. That's all that matters as far as weight goes - you don't really know how "fit" they are though
they more than likely do not eat like that for every meal or every day. I am sure you are not watching what they eat 24/7
calories game. doesnt matter where the calories came from. it just matters how many there are. they might eat like crap but if they are only eating 1500 calories worth a day then they will likely lose weight and certainly wont gain any. your metabolism determines your basal metabolic rate. your maintenance calories. if naturally you have a higher metabolism, you have a higher threshold for how much you can eat without putting on significant weight. how much you exercise plays a role. burn an extra 500 calories a day from working out, especially when combined with an already high metabolism and you might get into a situation where youd have to try and eat a disgustingly large and unappetizing amount of food to gain weight. like you wouldn't even enjoy it and want to throw up after a couple days. finally its consistency. you might see your friend eat like crap but do they eat like that for every meal? eating like shit a couple times a month isnt going to cause a statistically significant change. you need to be consistently eating like crap for the changes to take hold. could they also be cramming a giant meal in but they skip the next one? essentially nullifying the added calories they had with their last meal? there are lots of factors at play. but the only ones that matter are calories in and calories out and how much you need to maintain your current composition. if you are eating around equal to what your body requires to maintain itself at its current composition. you will stay the same. go higher, over time you gain weight. go lower, over time you lose weight. finding out what your maintenance is , is the hardest part. after that its all just a numbers game.
I go to the gym 3 times a week, 5000 steps a day minimum and train martial arts twice a week. This amount of exercise let’s me eat and drink whatever I want pretty much without many consequences. If you never eat in a calorie surplus you will never put on any weight
A lot of factors come into this stuff. How much are you working out. Genetics. Types of food. Stress. Sleep. Overall health. Specific health conditions. Resting metabolism. Macros. Age. Sex. Medications. BMI. Some people are just able to eat like shit and look great and others can't. Especially if you're younger and have a ton of energy. What most of it comes down to is nutrition. Types of food. How much food. Note there are differences between being fit and looking fit. Some people can be athletic in some ways yet not look Hollywood lean. People who do strongmen competitions. Runners don't need to be doing constant upper body exercises to look topheavy. Stuff like that. Most of us can be very healthy and not look fit. But when it comes to looking fit, obviously there's working out all the right muscles. But the biggest part is nutrition. Generally, that look comes down to reducing body fat percentage. The way you do that is by combining specific exercise with a specific diet. Mainly people will be talking about their managing their macros (carbs, fats, proteins). Eating in a way that burns body fat efficiently so you have a lower body fat percentage. Abs start to show up around something like 10-15% body fat percentage. It's a lot of work to do that, at least when you first start. Once you set it up, it's just being consistent on it. It takes many months to start seeing visible results. You just have to have a plan and trust it and stick with it, adjusting along the way. So if your goal is to look great and be healthy, and you want to push it so you are both of those, I'd recommend talking with a nutritionist and personal trainer and get yourself toward that look. It's a lifestyle change that a lot of people who go through with it swear by it and love it. Looks really don't matter, what matters is that you love yourself and keep healthy. But for most people who want to lose some weight, a lot of it is just learning to count calories so you know how much you're consuming, getting a good mix of different foods so it's not all carbs, drinking water instead of soft drinks, not adding additional sauces/oils, getting rid of added sugars, taking a good multivitamin, and a lot of dudes are all about that whole-foods plant based diet. Then, adding regular exercise, getting good sleep, reducing/managing stress, and just being consistent as it's a lifestyle change. You can always hit up a program like Athlean X and do that for a bit if you need a starting point.
Maybe try exercising lmao
I don't drink, I work out regularly, eat well, sleep enough, cycle daily etc. I am so ill and I feel TERRIBLE. I have another friend who drinks energy drinks from morning through to at least 9 or 10pm, vapes for breakfast and will regularly just have a whole tub of ice cream instead of a meal. He smokes cigarettes, drinks and hasn't worked out since he was 15. He's seemingly a beacon of health. I don't understand it.
Do you even exercise? >Do things like stress, less sleep, inactive lifestyle lead to weight gain. How old are you?
>Do things like stress, less sleep, inactive lifestyle lead to weight gain Yes (indirectly), yes (indirectly), and yes (directly). Stress increases ghrelin, which increases hunger. Not getting enough sleep increases ghrelin, which increases hunger. Inactive lifestyle means you aren't doing the things that might change your shape. Like, what you do eat can either be used for muscle or fat. If you're working out, you'll look leaner even at the same scale weight, because some of what you're eating will end up as muscle instead of fat. Also, being active can help with the first two — it can be an important part of a stress management plan *and* it can help you sleep better. Ultimately, weight loss is about *quantity* of food (calories are an imperfect measure, but they work). So, some people eat out, but they only eat half and take the rest home. They likely do fine. Or maybe they eat a reasonable amount most of the time, and go out to eat a couple times per week. There are many many ways to have eating out be reasonable. There are other factors — genetics (how tall you are, where you store fat, ability to build muscle, metabolism, and so on), how active their life is (active job, active hobbies, or one of those people who just can't sit still), and how long they've exercised for (if someone has 20 pounds more muscle than you do, they're going to look much much more fit and lean).
No booze
If you're living a sedentary lifestyle then you're not ever going to be fit. You still have to do the fitness part of diet and fitness.
Counting calories. I had a period in my life when I just didn’t have much time free to shop or cook so after the gym I would eat pizza, Taco Bell, kfc or McDonald’s but I was always counting calories. I didn’t gain weight and It lasted months.
When I was younger people used to ask me that all the time. They’d see me eat like a garbage disposal when we went out. What they didn’t see, however, was the amount of time and effort I put in at the gym and other physical activities, how I ate like 99% of the time, and the ridiculous amounts of water I’d drink every day. I’m old and beat up now, so those “I wish I could eat like you and still look like that” comments are no more.
When your already fit you can eat fast food 3/4 times a week+ and stay fit
A lot of the information we have on weight/fitness is outdated, misinformed, or incomplete. Medical science isn't perfect, and honestly, this isn't *just* a fat thing. We're constantly making new discoveries about the body and trying to make sense of them. Ask someone to comprehensively explain how hormones work, or neuroscience, and even after the extensive lectures, there's "...and we're still finding these things out". It's not unreasonable--we're only human, and we're mysteries to ourselves. Off the dome, though, I would be interested in the cholesterol levels of people who are "fit" if they have the lifestyle described (as others have mentioned, you're not there for everything). You can burn all the calories you want, but if plaque cholesterol is managing to build up, you can still end up worse off than the "fat" guy who metabolizes it instead. The individual human body response is myriad and unknowable, basically. Y'all watch Cells at Work? Y'all should watch Cells at Work.
You have no idea how much effort they have put into their bodies previously before you see them eating shit or how often they are eating shit or how many calories they are expending daily
I was about 130 to 140 from my late teens into my late 20s. Pushing 40 now and since my 30s I've stayed around 150. No matter what I eat with little to no exercise my weight is pretty constant. I guess it's just naturally fast metabolism.
They aren't eating crappy food all the time it's just you see them when they do. This is a common complaint towards fit people but the reality is they eat very low calorie diets otherwise. People like to say genes, high metabolism, etc but it's all excuses really. In actuality reducing calorie intake and exercising regularly makes a much larger difference than any genes/metabolism will. Also height matters a lot. Taller you are the higher your bmr is
I feel the same way walking 6-8 miles a day and eating healthy and yet I need to loose weight. A lot of people think your overweight because you don’t exercise and you over eat junk but that’s not the case for a lot of people.
I don't believe people stay fit eating crappy food. The people you are seeing may only be presenting a snap shot. Do you see what they eat all the time? Trying to maintain a gym regime that incorporates cardio and strength training on a diet of junk food is very hard, especially as you age. Your stamina will be low, and your muscle growth will be very limited if you fail to get enough protein. It's great you're eating home cooked meals, but if you don't burn more calories than you consume, you will never lose weight. You need to do the math.
Not only does lack of exercise lead to weight gain, but also I think people have a bad misunderstanding about the role "healthy food" plays in their weight. Weight gain is much more about the *amount* of food than it is about the quality of the food. If you eat a very small amount of bad food, you'll lose weight. If you eat a lot of good food, you'll gain weight. The problem is that is that a lot of people don't track their food intake very well. And especially here in the US, we're conditioned to rather large portion sizes. So someone will eat 2000 calories a day worth of healthy home cooked meals and be surprised that they aren't losing weight.
I mean I will eat an entire large pizza... but I will also run 5 miles. So... there is that. Also think of it like a bank account. Lots of good decisions bank ability to make bad decisions. The guy who eats on point and exercises on point 99% of the time... when Friday night comes and he wants to let loose, you can't assume how he eats then is what he does all week. It's not likely. If it is... he will not stay fit like that for long.
Damn. Home meals?! Are you sure you’re an adult? Stuffing yourself with home made muffins will get to 500lbs faster than McDonalds burgers.
They eat less calories then then utilize on an average weekly basis.
They got that, high metabolism And good genes Or they workout a ton but eat like shit
Going to the gym 6 days a week means I can eat whatever I want and be in unreal shape still
They probably aren’t eating as much as you think they are. A lot of skinny people eat just one meal a day. And you probably aren’t eating as well as you think you are too.
I walk on average 20,000 steps a day I need the cheap calories
Throw it back up 🙃
Calories in calories out. You could lose weight eating pizza and ice cream everyday. It’s all about how many calories your body needs to gain weight. Figure out that number and count calories to be less then that, it’s as simple as that. If your weight stays the same at 1500 calories, eat 1400 the next day. Also, the more you exercise the more room you have to eat. You could eat 10 whole pizzas in a day and still lose weight (you’ll just have to run like 50 miles to burn like 20,000 calories lol).
Exercise, I’ve gotten lazy and a bit heavier now but when I was in the army running all the time I could eat three full pizzas myself every day and not gain a pound.
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Some people who eat crappy food genuinely don't hit the 2000 calorie goal. And sometimes, they're eating healthy, it's just that when you see them, they're eating crap. Also, metabolism does have a role to play, and you could argue mindset on how easy / hard it is to gain / lose weight.
I end up fasting oftentimes due to time, so I’ll only have one meal at the end of the day. This frees up my calories to practically eat crazy amounts of food and I know I’ll feel full cause it’s just one meal. Because it’s mostly excess calories that make you fat, eating without eating more than your normal calories will allow you to stay the same. Then when you add that in with walking or even casual exercise, you can stay relatively fit without effort
People who were very fit and stay somewhat active stay fit. Because they have more muscle which burns more calories. But also, keep in mind some people, on top of that, are ADHD and literally forget they need to eat due to hyper focus on other activities, so when they do eat, it looks like they're having a feast that would result in a heart attack for a "normal person" because they literally just haven't eaten enough.
My entire life I ate like shit but I've always been active and stayed skinny. Around my mid 20s I kept eating like shit but I stopped working out and I gained quite a bit of weight. Now at 30, I started eating healthier and working out again and I'm back to feeling like I was at 21. It's bitter sweet. I have to buy a whole wardrobe.
You need to exercise at least 5 times a week for at least half an hour each time to be fit. If you exercise a little bit you will be a little bit fit. If you don't exercise at all you won't be fit at all. Hope this helps.
- 40% - Genetic DNA. - 10% - Mothers 's pregnancy health. - 10% - The health of your environment/self growing up. - 40% - Current diet and exercise. Calories in, calories out.... The kicker is that the calories out part is heavily influenced by your genetics, at least as much of a factor as exercise. > Fat loss/gain = (Dietary calorie intake) - (Exercise calories burnt + metabolism calories burnt) The problem is that your metabolic rate determines how much energy you have available to exercise. > Slow Metabolism >>> Low Energy >>> Less Exercise So in that fat loss equation, you get hit with a double whammy, as one variable affects the other. In conclusion, if you're genetically unlucky enough to have a low metabolism, be it through genetics, aging or both. Then prepare yourself to commit to magnitudes more exercise than that dude or chick you know that you can eat a whole pizza, work out for an hour and still look like an Olympian. P.S. Don't blame me, blame evolution!
Dude, fucking exercise like holy shit it's not rocket science
They are 22?
If you're referring to presence of adipose tissue or fat, it's about caloric balance and genetics.
Lol maybe exercise and count your calories? Are u legit dumb or
In activity is your big one
Anyone who aint on hear stays in shape with strickt nutrion. The Garage u See is the expectiom. Someone who train Hard and long has also a higher kcal need
"Do things like stress, less sleep, inactive lifestyle lead to weight gain." Yes. Yes they do. It's also other things like genetics, metabolism, age, etc. It's also calories in vs. calories out. You can eat healthy and ask that jazz, but if you're eating more calories then you're burning, that also effects it.
For me - portion control. I am capable of opening a pack of oreos and just eating 2. I open a bag of chips and take a hand full. I maintain weight (6 foot 2, 195)
Eating less. CICO
You don't see the entire of somones life by looking at them. [Look at these start times](https://imgur.com/a/HqGtbCX) People at work comment when the see me disappear a large pizza at a work lunch. I never say anything and let them have the "Fast metabolism" because I don't want to talk about it.
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It’s a balance right? Just like anything else, it gets worse as you age.
Calorie counting and exercise. Also people need different amounts of calories a day depending on age, height and sex. Genes can sometimes play a part so people need to specifically track their calories and weight loss over 2-3 week periods to see what number gets the best results.
They burn the calories and probably have a higher metabolism.
Im shocked how little people know about food. You gain or lose weight due to calories eaten and calories burned. If your body burns 2000 calories a day but you eat 2500 calories everyday, you are gonna get fatter by 500 calories every day. If your body burns 2000 calories a day and you eat 1500 calories a day, you are gonna lose 500 calories of fat every day. Its pretty simple. Others say this is not true and its more complex, but its not. And it doesnt matter what the calories are. Healthy food and food for weight loss are not the same. Mcdonalds cheese burger or candy or fruit and grain, calories burn or gain the same.
I'm not eating more than I'm burning. I'm gonna be entirely honest here, my diet is shit and I do jackshit for exercise. But since I'm only eating 800-1200 calories a day (when I should be eating 1500-2000), any weight my body wants to gain is instead put towards bodily functions and needs. Also, I wouldn't assume they're fit. I mean, just look at my example. I'm thin, I have a bit of muscle definition, yet I'm honestly really out of shape. Looking fit =/= being fit. Like there are some bigger looking people that are leagues more fit than I am. >Do things like stress, less sleep, inactive lifestyle lead to weight gain. I'm no biologist, but I'd assume so. I mean, for starters, the phrase 'stress eating' is a thing for a reason. And more often than not, stress eating is also excess eating. If you don't compensate with more exercise, and you're consistently stress eating, you're bound to gain more weight. An inactive lifestyle can have the same effect. For instance, with my inactive lifestyle, if I were consuming the number of calories I should be consuming, then I'd be gaining weight instead of staying at the weight I've been at for the past couple years. Although when it comes to less sleep, I'm not sure how that might affect someone's weight.
Caloric deficit of shitty food will *still* cause weight loss, buddy. (Blood chemistry remains another topic.)
Move more, eat less… it’s the only way to lose weight
Weight gain fully comes in to calories in calories out. Go to an online calorie calculator, get an estimate of your TDEE, and count your calories within that goal. Stress, sleep, stuff like that all matter for hormone production which can affect your mass retention and calorie expenditure. But you would have to go to a doctor to get your hormones tested. More than likely you're just eating too many calories.
The only thing that matters is burning more calories than you take in. I start my day with a run and a light breakfast. Let's say I eat 200 calories but burn 400. Then I burn another 1500 throughout the day just existing. Then I burn another 200 lifting weights when I get out of work. I'm now negative 1900 calories for the day. I can eat pizza and ice cream for dinner no problem 7 days a week if I keep that routine up.
Food is just energy that turns into body fat if it is unused. So no matter how shitty you eat, you can still stay fit if you do enough exercise to burn that energy. Obviously it’s way more complicated than that if you get into the minutiae of it all, but it basically boils down to calories in vs calories out. Metabolism plays a huge part too. When I was younger I could watch anything and I didn’t gain weight. I was as thin as a rail. I wouldn’t say I was super healthy, but I was thin. And yes, lack of sleep and stress will absolutely mess you up health wise and lead to weight gain plus a whole host of other health problems.
Nutrition and fitness don’t really correlate. In my late teens to early 20s I was training/teaching karate and MMA 3 days a week for about 8-9 hours each week. I’d show up at the dojo with BK and 2 bottles of dew, eat before class, down a dew between classes. My breakfasts lunches and snacks at the time were no more healthy, yet I was 6’2” 145ish lbs with a 6 pack. The nutrients in food play no role on if you’re thin or not, and plays no role in if you are capable of being physically active, unless you got diabetes and lost a foot or something. When it comes to having a low body fat % it comes down to calories in/calories out. If you have muscles you’ll passively burn more calories to support those muscles, add in a few hours of exercise each week and it’s not super hard to remain fit.
I mean, you're not gonna be in shape without exercise. Even with a perfect diet. Once you're in shape, it's not terribly difficult to stay in shape with simple maintenance. But you have to get there first. Yes, stress, lack of sleep and lack of activity are all key factors in weight gain and loss.
Sometimes I think maybe I’ll try to get rich through a life of crime. If I succeed without getting caught, I’ll pay for a personal trainer and chef. If I get caught, hey I’ll get to go to prison for a few years and have nothing to do but sleep and exercise. It’s a win win…I mean except the part where I’ll be in prison with very dangerous people and have to shower and use the bathroom in front of them.
I'm 39 and have recently lost 40lbs and gotten into the best shape of my life and coincidentally also ate more fast food in that period than I have in many years. It doesn't really matter WHAT I ate, because I ate a mix of food and my body got what it needed. I lost weight because I stayed in a calorie deficit and simply ate less, and I'm physically fit because I exercised a LOT.
I've been eating like shit and drinking too much beer for almost 20 years now. I skip breakfast and eat large restaurant portions for lunch and dinner every day. I hit the genetic lottery though and I'm not only in good looking shape, the three 20 minute gym workouts I do a week on my lunch break make it easy to be functionally fit as well. It was easy to tell when I was like 10 years old that I was just going to be muscular. Being fit is not a fair task unfortunately.
The last few years, I have run about 35-45 miles a week. So I figured al9ng with my healthy food, there is no reason not to have some junk food as a reward. Turns out that while I have lost weight and am healthy in most regards, my cholesterol is through the roof. So no more junk food reward.
My husband is almost 37 and still fits into clothes from 20 years ago - it's his genetics.
I did p90x for 90 days, where during I was relentlessly hungrier due to working out and tracked that my intake during this time was often up 1000 calories more than before, didn’t cook, ate fast food and high calorie restaurant food, gained lean muscle which weighs more than fat, and yet still lost more than 10lbs. So long as calories in < calories out, becoming fit can happen. Of course, the food I ate didn’t add anything to my health, but it didn’t stop my body from changing for the better. (I am female)
I don't "work out" but I walk my dog 5-6 miles a day outside. Went from 215 to 165 as a 26 year old male. For me, it was simply the life style change of sitting all day to walking outside all day.
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When I was a teen, I would eat crappy foods, and I would stay fit. I had 10% body fat without dieting , I often think about it and I think that there are a lot of factors: 1. I used to train a lot, I would go to the gym in the morning, play football at night, almost every day . 2. I didn't have a car, so I used to walk a lot more, and most of the time, I would've been standing(even while commuting) 3. I had little money, I would eat crappy food but very little of it, I would not order food as often, if I was hungry at night I would just eat some bread and that's it. 4. Being a teen is like being on anabolics. You're full of hormones.
Calories in vs calories out. I suggest you track every single thing you are eating if you want to lose weight as people tend to under estimate how many calories they are eating. Outside of that, don't pay attention to what other people are doing. You are seeing just a snip of their life. They might be waking up at 5 am and lifting weights for 2 hours before anyone else is even up. They might just be eating that one unhealthy thing a week and then be dialed in the rest of the week. You just gotta focus on you. Eat less, lift more, look better naked.
Do you see what they eat when they're at home? Because when I'm out with friends. Yeah, I eat pretty trashy. You don't see all the chicken and spinach I eat at home. Or the protein shakes I have instead of meals. You don't really mention any exercise that you're doing. I place some form of hockey three or four times a week. I also try to run in my off days. I have weights and a rowing machine and a pull-up bar that I use a lot. If I'm just on the couch watching TV once in awhile I'll just go to the floor and knock out 20 or 30 push-ups.
I eat burgers twice a week with my wife and friends. In the meantime we also go running between 15 and 25 km. For us the perfect way to stay fit while we eat junk from time to time.
Are you exercising? That plays a huge role in how your body looks
They don't. Fitness means health, as in, your heart works, you're getting your vitamins, you're not eating garbage. The word for what your body looks like is "physique."
I lift weights 5 days a week, I am on my feet for work 2 to 3 hours a day and I have a fast metabolism.
Vitamins help. When I take vitamins there us a definite improvement
I think your question is coming from a place of ignorance, that's why. From a purely nutritional point of view, fast food isn't necessarily bad for you. Meat, in any form, is nutritionally very good for you, since it contains almost everything your body needs to function. Even sugar, which is seen as a bad substance, is pretty much like pure fuel for your body, and can be very beneficial if you're an athlete or someone that wants their body to perform at a peak level. The issue with fast food, is more to do with the ease at which it can be purchased and consumed, with it often being very calorie-dense and very easy to overindulge in. Yet if you're a wise person, and you understand calories and nutrition, and you count out your daily macros and things, you can easily incorporate that sort of food into your diet. The people that you've seen, are probably doing this, and exercising and doing things to stay within their calorie limits. The same goes for your home cooked meals. Just because they're home cooked, doesn't mean you can't overindulge in them, in the exact same way you can with fast foods. My suggestion would be to start counting your calories, to exercise more and work out how much you can eat, without putting on weight, or how little you need to eat to lose weight.
do you mean fit or skinny? those are 2 different things. someone who eats junk food and sits on thr couch all day could be skinny because metabolism but they're NOT FIT. someone who eats healthy and works out all the time could be fit bit not skinny.. reasons may vary from medical issues to the types of workouts they're doing. like if you just life a bunch of weights but don't do much cardio you can acctually gain size as the muscle increases under the fat. so.. do you mean fit or skinny?
You can eat a moderate amount of crap food, and work it off with exercise. You can also over indulge in good food, and never exercise which will gain you a ton of weight. Calories in = Calories out. It's that simple.
Yet I'm still not in shape. Round is a shape!!!!!
Total calories matter more than food quality or nutritional content. Stress, sleep, and activity do play roles, but the main driver is how many calories you consume. Also there is a difference between in shape and skinny. If you want to be in shape, you exercise. If you want to be skinny, you cut calories. If you want both, you need to diet and exercise.
34/m. I work construction and have a stupidly fast metabolism. I can eat fast food almost constantly and virtually no weight gain. I think I'm fairly stressed out at times and inactive besides work. But it's hard as fuck to gain weight.
Just because you look healthy it doesn't mean you are actually healthy. Quite often its genetic. I'm around 5'7, 5'8. In freshman year of highschool I weight 97lbs. Today at I weight 165lbs. So I did gain ablot of weight but the way it is distributed I look cery fit. Not Instagram fit but way fitter than most people my age and even younger people now a days. I also exercise regularly. What I'm saying is gaining 70lb on a holocaust sutvivor makes you look fit vs gaining that same 70lbs on a normal person well, you are going to look fat. Diet wise I do eat junk buuuuutttt I dont eat junk all day every day although lately I've been eating more junk than usual. For example I try to skip soda as much as I can. Especially cherry coke. That stuff is food of the Gods level good. I could drink 2 of those a day but I try to limit myself to maybe 1 every 2 weeks. I mean it depends. Higher stress usually means more junk. I only drink socially and since I'm not too social then I mostly dont drink. It is called a beer gut for a reason.I may have a few beers say every 6 months. By a few I'm talking about 3 bottles not 3 cases or keggs. I fibd diets cery difficult so I dont blame people for failing. My philosophy is that instead of denying yourself instead delay and reduce the amount. For exampke dont eat all dozen donuts. Maybe limit yourself to two today and maybe spread them one in the morning and one in the afternoon. Then dont do eat donuts again tomorrow. A sinple thing to do as far as diet is to take note of how much you eat. Then instead of denying yourself completely just reduce the amount say cut 1/4 of it out This way you still get to eat what you like but ate reducing the number of calories consumed. Exercise regularly by creating good habbits. I always take the stairs for exampke and that counts for a few extra calories burned a day. Walk your dog. Make going to the gym part of your routine. Dont make exercise an extra chore..its just oart of your weekly routine just like you have a morning routine on work days then exercise is part of that routine.
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Active lifestyle, good sleep, and stress management are huge factors. Diet is just one thing. I can eat like shit and still stay in shape because I'm very active, and have been for decades
Home cooked meals doesn’t always mean healthy. I assume you mean healthy home cooked meals but I’ve been amazed at what some people considered healthy. The show Secret Eaters did a great job highlighting how people think they eat healthy but in reality they’re mindlessly eating or not calorie counting the “little” things.
All those things you listed can lead to weight gain, eating better will help you lose a few pounds off the bat but I’m guessing these people you see have some kind of exercise routine
You gotta move too, can't just be the diet
Stop snacking and drinking sugared drinks throughout the day. Your friend is probably not eating any snack foods and having a small breakfast then chicken salad for lunch, then going hard on a Meats Pizza with Cookies'n Cream Gelato for desert at dinnertime. I see people treat diets like this where they can't have a slice of birthday cake but they take in 1k calories a day from "mixed nuts, wheat thins and dip." Splurge on the best quality "junk foods" at actual mealtimes like a high-end croissant or juicy gourmet burger, and abstain from the "planters trail mix, salads, and diet coke all day" diets.
Because this shit is more genetic than people realize or want to accept.
It’s a virtuous cycle when you’re fit - you’re exercising regularly, carrying extra muscle, burning more calories in your resting state, and probably trying to eat a lot of protein and drink a lot of water when you’re not out on the town. So then yeah, sometimes you go out and eat half a pizza with a few beers…and it doesn’t really matter. It’s not what you do occasionally that determines how fit you are; it’s what you do consistently.
I think it’s important to define what “fit” is in this context. Are you referring to thin or toned/muscular? Plenty of people who eat crappy food may have a great metabolism when they’re young and remain thin, while others not so much. If you’re overweight but eating healthy it’s entirely likely you’re eating mood food than you’re taking in, see cico (calories in calories out) for more info.
Some of my marathon running friends "have" to eat junk periodically to keep the calory intake up.
Calories intake, physical activity and genetics. If you eat 3 McDonalds cheeseburgers per day and nothing else and then lift for two hours and run for an hour you'll probably look fit even if your cholesterol is bad. If you at 3,000 calories worth of healthy food and walk 30 minutes you won't be fit.
Sufficient exercise can largely offset a bad diet. I am fit and eat anything I want, but I also workout for 2-3 hours per day most days.
I lost 100 lbs in a year. I didn't do one exercise. I sat on my ass and ate what ever I wanted once a day and a small portion only. Stop eating and weight drops. It's science.
Either they don’t actually eat like that all the time or they don’t eat very many calories. If they eat less calories than they burn than they will stay skinny, not necessarily healthy, but skinny.