In previous posts, I laid out the basic nuts and bolts of nutrition and calories. I furthermore suggested that making incremental lifestyle adjustments will lead to long-term success for people seeking to improve their health and fitness.

In keeping with this one-foot-in-front-of-the-other philosophy, I’m happy to announce the kick-off of our first-ever Strength in Numbers Weight Loss Challenge!  In general, I don’t get too excited about weight loss challenges but since I made this one up, I’m wildly enthusiastic about it.  Additionally, initiating this challenge gave me the opportunity to use the irresistibly sexy phrase ‘weight loss challenge’ in the title of my post …which is guaranteed to generate far more views than I usually expect.

What I am suggesting will indeed be a challenge…but may seem too simplistic to be effective.  I promise you, however, that it will be an eye opening experience that will ultimately lead to more healthful, more enjoyable eating.

The Strength In Numbers 7-Day Weight Loss Challenge

Day One – Today, prior to putting anything food or beverage in your mouth, acknowledge it. Say to yourself, “I am eating a handful of peanuts as I head to the car.” or “I am eating a bowl of chips as I watch TV.” or “I’m drinking a delightfully fruity sangria”. “I’m sitting down to a dinner of salad, lasagna. I’m eating a second helping of lasagna”.

Day Two –  Continue to acknowledge food and beverages. Additionally, you’re going to sit down, preferably at the kitchen table, before you eat or drink. That means you won’t be snagging a cookie to eat on the run. No standing in front of the open fridge eating out of a Tupperware container. Put down your phone, book, crossword puzzle. No driving, Facebooking or TV watching. (Socializing with the people with whom you are dining is allowed and encouraged) Just sit with your food. Notice and enjoy.

Day Three – Continue with the previous challenges while we ratchet up the degree of difficulty. Put down your fork/spoon/chopsticks between EVERY mouthful. Yes, while you are chewing, sit with your hands in your lap or on the table. Resist the urge to load up your eating utensil with the next bite. Enjoy what you’re CURRENTLY chewing.

Days Four-Seven – Repeat – Acknowledge what you’ll be sitting down to eat and enjoy it one bite at a time.

I’d love for you to give this a try. And I’d love to hear from you when you do!

In a previous post, we established that a calorie is a unit of energy. Our bodies require energy in the form of food in order to carry out cellular functions.

Now that we’re clear that all calories are the same, we need to start becoming savvy as to whence the calories cometh.

Calories (energy) can come from fats, carbohydrates and proteins, a.k.a., MACRONUTRIENTS. 

Calories (energy) pal around with equally important little friends known as MICRONUTRIENTS

Before we go any further, I’m going to make a bold statement here…

It is my firm belief that the people who concern themselves mostly with nutrition and very little with calories, will find themselves, GRADUALLY AND WITH GREAT PLEASURE, eating for performance and maintaining a healthy body composition throughout their lives.

I think it would be swell if every one reading this would commit that little gem to memory. Write it in black permanent marker on your frontal lobe, folks, and refer back to it every time you find yourself in a restaurant or grocery store, seated at a dining room table, standing in your pantry , staring into the refrigerator or standing wherever you might be thinking to put food in your mouth.

The above statement pretty much summarizes my entire diet philosophy, so we’ll be revisiting it soon and often.

So let’s get comfy and start talking nutrition.

Disclaimer: What follows is extremely basic and simplistic on purpose. It covers just about everything most people in search of improved health and fitness will need to know.

Macronutrients…where calories call home…

Carbohydrates – Fruits, Vegetables, Pastas, Rice, Oats, Bread. All of them are broken down to basic sugars which are stored in your muscle, brain and liver cells to be used for exercise and brain function.

Proteins – Meat, eggs, dairy products, nuts, fish. Mostly utilized for cellular repair and maintenance and hormone regulation.

Fats – Oils, butter, lard. Fats are essential for nervous system function and development as well as vitamin absorption.

Here’s a visual of those macronutrients which includes overlapping to indicate that foods typically aren’t just one category. For example, meats (mostly proteins) also contain varying amounts of fat and even some carbohydrates.

Micronutrients…friends and associates of calories…

Vitamins – Organic substances, available to us in food, that are essential for normal bodily growth and function

Minerals – Non-organic substances, available to us in food, that are essential for normal bodily growth and function.

Helpful visual…

Look familiar?

And that’s all the further we’re going on this subject here at the award-winning Strength In Numbers website. In my life, I have found that the more time I spend gathering information beyond what will get the job done, the longer I put off getting down to business.

I’m not going to leave you hanging, however. Our next post will feature a friendly, easy-to-access discussion of energy and nutrition intake management.

All calories are the same. EXACTLY the same.

Calories are delightfully definable and reliable little characters who wish to remain indistinguishable from their calorie counterparts.

Fortunately for us, a calorie is a simple thing to understand…A calorie is simply a unit of measure defined as:

 The amount of energy required to raise 1 gram of water by 1 degree. 

Since our bodies aren’t in the business of boiling water, how is this information useful to us, the consumers of calories?

Well, for starters, the definition puts calories in perspective. Calories are a predictable unit of measure…completely neutral. They aren’t good, bad, friendly, unkind or anything in between.

Merely a simple unit of energy

Simply stated, the energy in the calories you consume is used to power a multitude of cellular functions. Unused calories are stored.

Isn’t that nice and straightforward?

It would be convenient if we could just be happy and healthy with that little bit of information. But here’s the thing…

Calories are neither discerning nor judgmental. As such, before you go putting them in your mouth, you’re going to want to know something about where those calories live and who they’re chumming around with.

And that’s what we’ll be looking at in the next exciting episode:

Everything You Need to Know About Nutrients!