Many people ask what is best for weight loss? Exercise or the food we eat? Well, both! But they have different roles.
You might have experienced that you may exercise a lot and you don’t see a ton of weight loss. It is because there are new studies that show that for exercise to be a weight-loss tool, it has to be intense and it has to be more than 60-90 minutes a day and that’s not very practical for a lot of people! So don’t think of your exercise as a calorie burner only, it’s still essential!
What actually drives weight loss is:
- The number of calories that we eat
- The type of calories we eat
- How we eat it
- When we eat it
So it’s not just what we eat, but also how we eat it; Half a bagel may have similar calories as an egg, but they’re not the same type of calories!
How fast do we eat? Are we eating mindfully? Are we eating with the TV or computer? Or are we just eating when we are bored?
All those factors are essential when it comes to calories and the type of calories and how they’re introduced into our body as they’re more important than exercising and weight loss.
However, most people notice that, if you don’t do any exercise, even with the best meal plans, weight loss may not be very successful. So think of your exercise as a tool that does different stuff than just simply losing calories.
So for instance, we don’t get younger, so our flexibility goes down and that will decrease our mobility down the road. Exercise maintains our flexibility and does our basic metabolism, as well as being a mood enhancer. Studies have also shown that exercise increases our adrenaline.
So think of exercise as a tool that can help you actually stick to a meal plan because you care about yourself more besides it increasing your energy level and flexibility.
Disclaimer: This is not to be taken as medical advice. Please advise a healthcare professional or nutritionist before making any drastic changes to your lifestyle.