THE SECRET OF EXERCISE AND WEIGHT LOSS

BY: FITZ-GEORGE RATTRAY

I have been saying this openly for years, telling everyone who would listen, there is indeed a secret connection between exercise and weight loss. The secret is…

EXERCISE DOES NOT AND WILL NOT FUNCTIONALLY OR SUSTAINABLY HELP WITH WEIGHT LOSS!

I have repeatedly told this to members and repeatedly they say, ”I cheated, but I worked out” or, “I went to the gym, and thought I would have lost more yesterday” or, “I’m thinking of starting walking/the gym for weight loss, or to increase weight loss.” 

Shockingly, these statements are often spoken my members who have repeatedly been told that exercise had DOZENS OF IMPORTANT HEALTH AND WELLNESS BENEFITS, but it will not directly affect weight loss.

Over the years I have given calculations, and rational explaining the how and why, but this time I will put forward the latest study.

EXERCISE – WALKING 10,000 STEPS A DAY WILL NOT HELP WITH WEIGHT LOSS

Fit bands, Android and Apple watches everywhere have been ticking off their motion sensors feeding their pedometer apps with millions of steps all around the world. Individuals walking and marching on the spot in the belief that each step will bring them closer to that fitness industry stated magical number, convinced that they will be healthier and certainly slimmer for their numerically set magical number.

After years of the many marching on their metabolic mission a recent study conducted at Brigham Young University found that an increased step count between 10,000 and 15,000 steps per day, six days per week over the course of 24 weeks, did NOT prevent the usual average gain of 3.4 pounds commonly gained by students for that period.

For weight management, the steps were categorically useless.

WHY DO PEOPLE BELIEVE THAT EXERCISE WILL RESULT IN WEIGHT LOSS

In the 1970s as more people began to gain weight and suffer from dietary related illnesses research was placing the cause squarely at the feet of the refined food industry. 

To avoid taking the responsibility and losing business they helped to promote the idea that it is not what you are eating, but it is your own laziness which will kill you. The solution, embrace the “bro” logic, that movement requires energy, therefore, more movement means more metabolism resulting in less fat. Human efficiency and adaptability is not taken into consideration here, ignoring our ability to do more with less energy over time.

They told us to go to the gym and work off those pounds.  In our imagination this fiction seems so logical, that even in the face of actual research, people, wrongly, cannot conceive anything else to be true.

This false idea persists in the hearts and minds of entire nations to this very day and is still foolishly promoted by:

• corporate wellness programs
• trainers
• merchants
• manufacturers
• and shows like the biggest loser

All influencing populations on a wrong, ineffective undermining path, diminishing the responsibility and focus from nutrition, while protecting the processed foods industry and making many millions for many in the fitness industry.

HOW IS EXERCISE USEFUL?

But, is exercise useless?  No, exercise is most definitely critically useful, and is one of the best things you can do for your wellbeing. Exercise can:

• Increase healthy muscle mass for long term increased metabolism and body weight management.  Yes, don’t be foolishly scared by lifting heavy weights…that goes for you too ladies
• Lengthen your life span
• Create a mindset and culture to allow you to embrace a healthy diet and lifestyle
• Manage moods and provide emotional benefits
• Strengthen joints
• Reduce pains
• Increase and maintain fitness, mobility, balance and functionality
• Build heart, pulmonary and vascular health

Exercise will do all that and much more, but because humans are extremely efficient and adaptive animals, it will not directly make you lose weight, you will NEVER train away a poor diet.

Face the reality, embrace the discipline and get serious once and for all about your nutrition and change your life.

If you truly want to lower your body fat, change your body and health, get the fiction out of your head once and for all, and embrace the real knowledge of a fact-based wellness program.