1) Eating Less in Hope of Losing More

Would you be surprised if I told you to eat twice as often as you do and you will end up losing weight? Though that may sound crazy, eating often actually works to get you leaner! As you’re well aware, a slow metabolism is the arch enemy of fat loss. I’ve got good news: eating speeds up your metabolism. On the other hand, going long periods without eating can slow your metabolism down. In essence, going too long without eating causes your body to sense starvation. When your body senses starvation it works to compensate by decreasing your metabolism in order to preserve energy. In this starvation mode your body will also tend to hold on to fat as it is the perfect storage form of energy. On the other hand, since muscle is metabolically costly, it will be more readily used for energy – not a good thing! So instead of eating infrequently, it’s important to eat often – about every three hours. This reassures your body that you will feed it regularly. Once your body is sure of your commitment to feed it regularly, it will be more likely to allow stored body fat be used for energy. Likewise your metabolism will rev up and stay revved up. Frequently nourishing your body will also allow it to more easily maintain and even build lean muscle tissue. This is important not only because muscle goes on in the right places and simply looks good, but also because having more muscle means having a higher metabolism. And what’s the point of losing weight if it’s muscle? Eating small, healthy meals about every three hours is the best way to keep your metabolism revving and to allow your body to build lean, sexy muscle while burning unsightly body fat.

2) Failing to Eat Enough Protein

Eating ample protein is not just for bodybuilders. The fact that protein helps build lean muscle and helps prevent the loss of valuable muscle when dieting makes it popular among those of us who know how valuable lean muscle mass is. But there are far more benefits of consuming protein than just its’ role in building and maintaining lean muscle. Eating protein also keeps you satisfied longer. Due to it’s slower digestion and the fact that it doesn’t cause a subsequent dip in blood sugar like most simple, high-glycemic carbs do, you’ll stay fuller and satisfied longer by eating protein with each meal or snack. Another great thing about protein is that it is not readily turned into body fat. Whereas over-consuming too many carbs or fat is likely to cause body fat formation, excess protein is not easily converted into fat. To say protein is a dieter’s friend is an understatement. That’s why it’s important to eat significant amounts of protein with every meal and every snack. This will help keep blood sugar stable, supply a steady supply of amino acids to aid muscle recuperation, keep hunger at bay, and help keep your metabolism flying like a humming bird instead of crawling like a snail.

3) Eating Carbs by Themselves

This is a mistake that far too many people make. When you eat carbohydrates by themselves, especially if the carbs are not high in fiber, your body will digest and absorb the carbs more quickly than if protein and healthy fat were also present. This results in a significant release of insulin. While moderate amounts of insulin are fine, high levels of this hormone can lead to body fat formation and low blood sugar among other things. Therefore it’s important to eat in such a way to moderate insulin release from the pancreas. Consuming a meal rich in protein, complex carbohydrates, fiber, and healthy fat will provide a more steady release of energy than eating carbohydrates by themselves. This results in less insulin being secreted at one time which helps minimize the chance of body fat formation. A meal with protein, healthy fat, and ample fiber ends up being, in essence, more time-released. This, along with eating more frequently as mentioned in diet blunder number one, will help you avoid those ravenous cravings that come from low blood sugar levels. Avoid eating carbohydrate foods by themselves. Instead, think of each snack as a minimeal that should have protein, carbs, and some healthy fats. Ditch the high-carb snack bars in favor of something like cottage cheese and fruit or chicken breast, veggies, and nuts.

4) Allowing Calories to Sneak In

I have counseled many, many people who really think they’re doing well because they eat a salad at lunch. Upon further inspection I find that the salad is jam-packed with fat and even sugar. Take a Caesar salad as an example. Most meal sized portions of a Caesar salad have about 30g of fat. In fact, I found a couple of Caesar salads from popular restaurants that had 1,000 calories and 70g of fat! Could you imagine eating that and naively thinking you were eating something healthy?Even if you’re not choosing a Caesar, avoid ruining a healthy grilled chicken salad by adding a high-sugar or high-fat dressing. Instead, opt for vinegar or one of the many dressings now available that have 15 calories or less per 2 tbsp. Though it may sound a bit anal, one way to ensure eating a healthy but tasty salad is to order it plain and top with your own dressing that you brought to the restaurant. You may need to be a tad sneaky as some places may frown on such, but I’ve never had a problem nor have any of my clients. Likewise, be careful when eating out as restaurants typically add butter, oil, and salt to foods. The carb and fat content of restaurant entrées is usually a lot higher than you would think. I know because I’ve researched many of them. For example, how many calories would you think Kung-Pao Chicken had – 500, 700? Try 1,240 - including a whopping 80g of fat! No, that’s not a typo. Oh, but here’s some good news – the same restaurant has a “healthy” version that has only 960 calories and 54g of fat. Uh, hello?! Since when is 54g of fat and 960 calories in one meal considered healthy? Another popular fast-food restaurant offers sandwiches that are implied to be healthy and “fresh.” The roast turkey and Swiss sandwich (which is on wheat bread by the way) has 725 calories, 30g of fat, and a blood pressure raising 1,788mg of sodium. You could’ve gotten a large Jamocha shake from the same place for less fat and calories that that! I could go on and on with other examples of how eating out will fill your diet with sneaky calories, but I think you get the point. Make eating out the exception rather than the rule. Only by bringing your food from home will you really know its’ nutrition value.

5) Eating Calorie Dense Foods

Even if you refrain from eating out, there is another way that calories can easily sneak into your diet, and that’s by way of calorie dense foods like nuts, oils, and processed foods. One ounce of nuts and one single tablespoon of oil each have 14 grams of fat. So let’s say you’re cooking some chicken breast at home and you cook it in some olive oil. Sure, olive oil is good for you, but if you ended up consuming two tablespoons (which isn’t that much) you’d be taking in an extra 28g fat. Now that olive oil doesn’t seem quite so “healthy,” does it? While I encourage the consumption of olive oil, make sure to measure it and consume the appropriate serving size. Maybe you read that pistachios are good for you, which they are. So you sit down and have some. Unless your taste buds are messed up, you’re not going to stop at just one ounce of this ever so tasty nut. Instead, you’ll end up eating two to three ounces easily. Well, now you can add 28 to 42g to your daily fat intake. You don’t have to have a PhD in nutrition to know that that’s probably too much fat to consume in one sitting. Processed foods are yet another source of concentrated calories. Let’s say you have a couple of toaster pastries for breakfast. That’s over 400 calories, 75g of carbs, and 40g sugar alone. And that’s not including the milk, juice, or whatever else you had with it. On the other hand, a small bowl of oatmeal has 150 calories, 27g of carbs (4 of which is fiber), and virtually no sugar. As an added bonus, the oatmeal will keep you satisfied FAR longer than the more artificial breakfast. Another example is juice. Just one cup of apple juice, for example, has 117 calories, virtually all of which comes from the 27g of sugar. (To get an idea how much sugar that is – it’s over five teaspoons!) On the other hand one apple has 80 calories, 4g of fiber, and will keep you hunger at bay as opposed to the juice which will make you crash and burn. When consuming calorie dense foods like nuts and oil, make sure to keep a close eye on your serving size. Likewise, try to avoid processed foods that are really concentrated sources of calories, practically devoid of nutrients, and don’t provide a steady energy supply. Instead, opt for natural foods like lean meats, fruits, vegetables, and whole grains which give you much more nutrition and satisfaction per calorie.

6) Starting Over on Monday

People that struggle with their weight are in a perpetual state of starting over on their diet. This all-or-none mentality is the demise of fat loss. Just because you eat bad for one meal doesn’t mean you’ve blown your diet. It’s just one tiny setback. Pick right back up where you left off and eat right the next meal. Let’s say you were driving from San Francisco to Los Angeles. You’ve been driving a couple of hours and get off the highway to get gas. After getting back on the road you realize that you’re heading north instead of south. Would you say “screw it, I’m going the wrong way so I’ll just go back to San Francisco and try again later”? Of course you wouldn’t. You’d simply turn around, get headed back in the right direction, and continue south toward your destination. Dieting (I prefer the term eating right) is the same way. If and when you find yourself headed in the wrong direction, immediately correct your path and continue on. Here are some numbers to drive the point home. Friday night you eat one bad meal that has 500 more calories than you need. If you decide to just start over on Monday as so many people do, you’ll easily end up eating four more meals that weekend that have 500 extra calories. This “starting over” logic resulted in you consuming 2,500 extra calories as opposed to the original 500. Guess what? That’s five times worse! Now when you do start over on Monday, you have to burn 2,500 calories just to get back to where you were before your little setback on Friday evening. By waiting to start on Monday, you now have to spend the next five days or so getting back to where you were. Had you just resumed your proper diet on Saturday after your Friday night indiscretion, you’d be back to square one the next day. Don’t turn one bad meal into five. Eat healthy one meal at a time and a get off that dieting merry-go-round that’s just spinning you in circles.

7) Relying on Diet Alone

The last of my top 7 diet blunders addresses the millions of people who simply go on a diet to lose weight. This is NOT the way to lasting fat loss, my friend! I love analogies, so allow me to give you another one. Let’s say you want to have more money in the bank. Would you just focus on making more money or spending less money? If you’re smart, you would address both. Making more and spending less would result in a larger savings account much faster than doing either or. Plus it would be easier to do some of each than an extreme amount of one or the other. Losing fat is the same way, just the exact opposite. Because you want to tap into your body fat (your body’s savings account for calories), you have to either burn more calories, consume fewer calories, or – you guessed it – both. It’s common sense that addressing both will result in a much quicker rate of fat loss. Plus it’ll be easier. Try eating 500 less calories per day than you do now. It’s pretty tough. Try burning 500 more calories than you do now. That’s not easier either. Now try eating just 250 less while burning 250 more. That’s far easier. I have not even addressed the fact that if your exercise is high-intensity in nature that you’ll burn more calories in the next 24 hours than you normally would have. This allows you to turn a cardio session in which you burned 200 calories into a very effective net calorie burn of about double that (or even more). Now that’s a lot of calorie bang for your exercise buck! Additionally, dieting alone often results in a loss of muscle mass. Losing muscle will make you less shapely, weaker, and will send you home with a slower metabolism. On the other hand, if you do some resistance training along with your diet, then you will not likely lose any precious muscle. In fact, you’ll probably gain a little lean muscle mass. This will keep your metabolism higher and make you look and feel better. In case you’re not yet convinced that diet and exercise should go hand in hand, I’ll give you even more proof. A study was conducted that took a look at the habits of people who had achieved and maintained a weight that they were happy with. (What better way to learn than from successful people?)Researchers found that these individuals exercised about five hours per week. While you may not exercise that much, you could imagine that if you don’t exercise at all you’ll be hard pressed to achieve a physique that makes you happy. As you can see, eating right and exercising are FAR more effective together than either alone. Exercising will magnify the effects of a good diet by burning calories and keeping your metabolism high. So do your body (and your heart) a favor by having a balanced approach to your fat loss.

Parting Words

Now that you know the seven most common mistakes that people make when dieting, you have a major advantage on your quest to get leaner and lose body fat. Apply the tips contained in this article and you’ll be on your way to achieving the health, wellness, and rockin’ body that you so desire.

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