Avoiding This Habit Makes You A Slave, Not Free

While I was losing 100lbs, I thought counting calories was dumb and for women (for some reason).

I thought it would be annoying, restrictive, and would ruin my eating enjoyment.

However, I ended up trying it, and was honestly blown away by the speed of the results.

Before, I had lost 40lbs through pure exercise, which was only possible because I was so fat and exercised so much.

(If you wanna know my exercise philosophy, check out the Balanced Body Blueprint to make your workouts much simpler.)

But then, because of calorie tracking, the last 60lbs came off much, much faster.

That's when I realized that counting my calories is not something that will restrict me or make me feel like I'm in a cage.

It’s actually what set me free, as corny as it sounds.

A lot of people think that counting calories is annoying, toxic, messes with their mental health, and all this other bullshit.

To be fair, if you're meticulously tracking every gram of spinach that you eat, your experience will probably suck.

But you don't have to go that far.

Those tiny amounts of calories are not going to make or break your progress, whether you're trying to gain weight or lose weight.

However, if you don't track anything at all, you simply will not know what's going on with your body.

Just because you're not keeping track of your calories doesn't mean your body isn't.

Spoilers: it is.

And while you may feel that not tracking your calories will make you feel more free, what it actually does is limit your progress because you have no idea where you're going.

Because you've never marked anything down, there's no starting point on your map.

You can go 40 miles west, 60 miles south—it doesn't matter, and it doesn't mean anything to you because you don't know where you started or where you are.

By not tracking your calories (which most people don't do), they're actually more restricted than ever.

If people view calorie counting as restrictive, they will:

• Not count their calories

• Not know what's happening

• Miss out on a lot of progress

• Have a false sense of liberty just because they don't want to take accountability

😈 DEVIL’S ADVOCACY 😈

What about those who don’t want to track their calories? What do they sound like?

• "I don't want to count my calories, that's bad for my mental health." (You know what’s bad for your mental health? Poor physical health.)

• "I feel great when I don't have to count calories." (It's okay if you don't want to… but you also have to be okay with not being in control. And if you're not in control, I don't think you'll feel as free as you could be if you were in control.)

• "Cavemen didn't count their calories, and they were okay." (Cavemen had shitty teeth and died early. Just because humans used to do something doesn't mean they should continue to act in that way.)

However, if you start tracking, that would be incredibly helpful because then you can control the progress to your goal. You can be free of this mystery, so to speak.

WHAT’S IN IT FOR ME?

• If you view tracking your calories as liberating rather than restrictive, you can be in total control of your body and your goals.

• You can also be on the same page as your body because, as I said, your body is keeping track of your calories. It's just you who was previously out of the loop.

• You can be in accordance with what your body knows, and that way you can have a better indication of where your health is going and where your weight is going.

• Eventually, you’ll be fairly knowledgeable about food, and keeping track will make you feel better.

• Once you can eyeball certain foods like strawberries or eggs or whatever it is.

• In certain situations in which you can't track your calories, you’ll feel more free because all the information you have will let you make an educated guess, and you won't feel lost or restricted by things you don't know.

ACTION STEPS:

This video is a step-by-step guide to tracking your calories.

But if you prefer text, check out the steps below it.

1. Go to a calorie calculator, put in your information, and find out your maintenance calorie amount.

2. Decide if you want to gain or lose weight. Eat at a surplus if you want to gain weight and eat at a deficit if you want to lose weight.

3. Get a calorie tracking app like MyFitnessPal or MyNetDiary to help you keep a food log that is as accurate as you can make it.

4. Remember: just because you can't track literally everything does not mean that you shouldn't try. Just tracking as much as possible puts you in a much better space and makes you feel more free and in control than if you knew absolutely nothing. It’s way better than feeling lost and being restricted by what you didn't know.

Okay, bye!