Tip 4. Eat The Right Amount of Calories

by ayoub oubarka

We're not going to starve ourselves! In fact, proper weight loss is best accomplished by eating more
frequently than you're probably used to! Let me say that again: you're going to eat more food than you are
right now. You're going to eat better food, more often, but at a lower calorie intake. If you're like I used
to be, you're probably skipping breakfast. This means that when lunchtime comes around, you're starving,
so you probably overeat the wrong kinds of food (like pizza, wings, Chinese, etc.) for lunch - and I'll bet it's
fast food or takeout. Then, you don't eat anything again for six to eight hours, and pack in a monster dinner.

Now here's what happens: your body isn't getting any food first thing in the morning, so your metabolism
isn't getting started. Your "calorie-burning fire" doesn't get started in the morning, so you're not really
burning as many calories as you should be. Also, your body is saying, "uh, oh - I'm not getting any food. I
better hold on to whatever body fat I can because we're starving!" This is bad. If you don't eat enough food,
often enough, your body will basically go into starvation mode and hang on to whatever body fat it can.

The key to unlocking your stored fat is to feed yourself enough good food so that your body doesn't need
to store any additional fat, while at the same time getting plenty of exercise and strength training to burn
whatever fat you currently have and build muscle.

There are a bunch of factors that go into calculating metabolic rates and all that jazz, but you can use this
chart as a basic measurement of how many calories you should be eating as part of your weight-loss diet.
Notice it's based on your current weight and your gender. Women need fewer calories then do men. Also,
if you're a smaller person, you need less energy than a larger person. Use this chart to determine how many
calories you should be eating on a daily basis.
 

Current  Weight	Women	Men
Under 130	1000	1200
130 – 150	1200	1400
151 - 200	1400	1600
201 - 250	1600	1800
251 - 300	1800	2000
301 - 350	2000	2200
351 - 400	2200	2400

Now here's something that's vitally important... you want to make sure you get enough calories every day,
otherwise your body will go into "starvation" mode. You want to make sure that you eat your meals at
least four times a day to keep your metabolism running. If you don't eat, your body will go into starvation
mode. It will realize that it's not getting enough food, and will hold on to body fat. It's important to get
enough calories spaced throughout the day to keep your fire stoked. Don't think that by starving yourself
you're going to lose weight. It will be the wrong kind of weight. Remember, your body will eat it's own
muscle tissue first before burning fat if it doesn't have enough protein.

I would say that the minimum calories you should be eating is about 20% less than your recommended
amount. So, if the chart about says you should be on an 1800-calorie diet, you should make sure you're
getting at least 1440 calories a day.

We have many exellent low-calorie sample meal plans available on our Web site at
RicksWeightLoss.com.
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