The Diet of your dreams || How to use macro-nutrients to your advantage to put together food items you enjoy? || Reaching the Dream Physique and maintaining it year round

Let’s say, we have the most aware and hardworking person. The guy works his ass off for achieving his dream physique and he is smart enough to figure out the most realistic and achievable physique for himself with a body fat percentage of 10-15 percent, that can easily be maintained year round. He started from somewhere around 20 percent when he decided to diet down and fortunately he achieved his target body fat, but the problem really started when he couldn’t sustain in that body fat range for more than a month and on the contrary, gained back a couple of pounds more than the very starting point when he went off diet.

Now, a lot of us can relate to the above scenario. We work hard, we suffer while dieting and maybe finally achieve our goal, but couldn’t stay there for long enough. While part of reason for this problem can be blamed on our genetics and our respective set points for our individual body, other half can totally be the outcome of our ignorance and poor choices while dieting.

We work hard, we suffer while dieting and maybe finally achieve our dream physique, but couldn’t stay there for long enough and maintain it year round.

A lot of the weight bouncing back problem after reaching our goal can be solved if we could just be on a diet that we enjoy and can sustain on the same for a lifetime. The slower and the longer, we diet, being in the slightest possible calorie deficit, without suffering and enjoying our food, the more likely it is to not only reach our dream physique but to maintain it year round with ease.

The slower and the longer, we diet, being in the slightest possible calorie deficit, without suffering and enjoying our food, the more likely it is to not only reach our dream physique but to maintain it year round with ease.

Dieting can be fun, if done properly, making smart choices. There are two extremes of our eating habits, eating food that we otherwise hate, something that we do while dieting in general and the other extreme being the food that we love, which is the primary reason why we are dieting because most of these favourites of ours are generally calorie dense items.

Dieting can be fun, if done properly, making smart choices. A simple example can be drinking diet coke(approximately 0 calories) instead of regular original coke that is calorie dense.

On the spectrum of food, our most hated and loved food items being two very extremes, we need to find the middle ground, where we are dieting and making progress without hating our meals and suffering but being satisfied. This can be achieved with ease by making intelligent decision making while selecting the condiments and spices that we use to flavour our food, picking the lowest calorie ones available. Now, with those low calorie alternatives for regular condiments, we can make the food tastier, we need to now only pick for food items that can keep us full for longer time with lower calories to avoid the feeling of starving while dieting. This truly boils down to the selection of macro-nutrients.

Protein and fibre rich food items are the ones that can keep us full for a longer time for the satiating effects. On addition, protein also has a higher thermic effect than other macros, i.e, a lot of calories from protein are actually used and burnt out in the digestion of protein itself. Carbs and fats, on the contrary are fast digesting macro-nutrients than protein but they make the food tastier mostly.

So, balanced and well-thought recipe compilations using the right amount of macros can make a low calorie dense and more fulfilling and satisfying combination for our taste buds and gut, making the whole process of dieting, simpler, satisfying and successful at the same time.

March 17, 2021 0

Roadmap to the perfect diet for your dream physique || How to put together the diet for yourself? || Make yourself a diet that can be followed everyday

The web has definitely made knowledge, a lot more accessible but with unlimited access, there arises the trouble of misinformation and information overload.

Ever tried searching for best diets, you will get a ton of results, keto diet, intermittent fasting, warrior’s diet, crash diet, liquid only diet, low fat diet and what not. If I am being honest, these humongous amount of information is sometimes way too confusing for understanding how to approach the whole process of dieting according to one’s individual goals.

We need to train hard and yet be in the smallest calorie deficit. So, basically, we are going for something slower, yet effective approach for both fat loss and muscle gain.

Personally, I have been in my weight loss journey for a long time, so the diet discussion of today’s article will mostly be focused specifically towards fat loss and muscle gain simultaneously. Well, now the most obvious question that arises is, can both these opposing processes happen at the same time? To be precise, yes and it can be done by giving the body sufficient stimuli and keeping it in a calorie deficit. In simple words, we need to train hard and yet be in the smallest calorie deficit. So, basically, we are going for something slower, yet effective approach for both fat loss and muscle gain. Now, the number of daily calories for every individual will vary individually, based on the activity levels and daily calorific intake.

After we know about the calorie requirements, now is the time to know about macros. Macros or macronutrients are carbohydrates, fats and protein. Carbohydrates and fats, being the energy sources for essential process of the body, while protein is the building block of the body, basically, this helps in muscle building.

Now, particularly protein is required in a quantity of 1 gram per pound of bodyweight and fats and carbs, according to the limits of daily calorific intake for optimal fat loss and muscle building.

What if one cannot hit the daily macros goal? Well, if one couldn’t satisfy the 1 gram per pound of body weight range, if the person is eating bot fats and carbohydrates in abundance and atleast 0.5 grams per pound body weight of protein, the person can still get away with descent results, as the carbs and fats will have a protein sparing effect. Coming to carbs, if you have a minimal to very low amount of carbs, something like a keto diet, you can still get results, considering that you’re getting fats and protein in abundance. The body will convert the protein into glucose(simpler form of carbs). Fats are something complex, it’s higher in calories than other two macronutrients, however, it’s essential for some major functions of the body. You must consume your daily dose of essential fatty acids like omega 3s. However, you don’t want to overeat fatty foods as they are super high in calories and most probably screw your diet really bad.

We know how to frame a diet for yourself but how do you know if a diet is perfect for you? Well, as simple as it may sound, a diet that you can stick for a lifetime is the perfect diet for you. This will not only help you loose weight, but also will help you keeping the weight away.

A diet that you can stick for a lifetime is the perfect diet for you.

If I am making a diet for me, there will not be any completely restricted food items. A perfect diet will be the one for me, that allows every food item in moderation, this will not only keep one satisfied but also will ensure that the person will stick to the diet for a longer period.

March 4, 2021 0

Hate and Demotivation || Not being afraid of Naysayers and dealing with them || Motivational Blogpost

We all have them in our lives, the haters and the naysayers, the ones who aren’t happy with your progress and prosperity. They are the people who resist you in every correct step of yours and shall encourage you for every wrong decision.

I have faced them quite a few times till now and I think results and right actions speak louder than frustrated words of the moment. So, every time I hear someone call me with names like ‘bodybuilder’, ‘dietman’, ‘fitness model’, I choose to say quiet and put in more work, dedication to my fitness journey. At the end, they are seeing your progress, they will be shut eventually but at the very soul, you must remember why did you start? What every rep of the workout means to you? How does your workout help you cope with the daily hussle?

You must remember why did you start? What every rep of the workout means to you? How does your workout help you cope with the daily hussle?

Even if we keep reminding ourselves about our purpose, there will be times when we fail and that’s when they, the haters will hit us the hardest. You, the person who has worked his ass off for a destiny must remember you aren’t lost but it’s just a pause, a pause to introspect, learn and get back stronger.

Educating yourself will always be the strongest move. Learning, applying and reassessing must be your weapon of choice when it comes to your fitness journey. There will be mistakes and failures in the path, infact a fair number of them, but they will be learning points, moments to humble yourself and make you ready to accept new ideas and try things out of the box.

You are in your fitness journey for your own life, it’s longevity and wellness. Everytime, you put in work, you are improving and that’s what matters.

Let them bark, till you shock them with what you have achieved.

February 24, 2021 0

Dieting and clean eating is not the same as eating horribly tasting food || Eat everything you like and achieve your dream physique

I have been dieting continuously, since the time I started training. Plenty of mistakes, sufferings, until I finally found my myntra to diet the right way. A way where I can eat like a normal person, enjoy everything I like and yet lose weight.

When I first started dieting, I started with Intermittent Fasting and I lowered my daily calorific intake for more than a half of what it used to be, not the smartest thing to do, of course. Specifically, speaking about that phase, my energy levels were nearly zero. I ate, trained and slept. I also lost weight really quick, starting from 98 kgs dropping down to nearly 85 kgs in just 3 months, losing fat and also sacrificing a significant amount of muscle mass at the same time.

After I lost some weight, I actually wanted to slow down the process a bit and also wanted to gain some muscle at the same time. This time, I increased the calories, yet being in a significant 500 calories deficit from my maintenance calories and continued with Intermittent Fasting, adopting a super low fat, low carb and high protein approach. Again, not really the smartest approach. Even if, I got some results, I wasn’t satisfied with the way of eating. Eating boiled foods, the basic chicken, broccoli and rice approach. I hated my meals and desperately waited for weekends to get those cheat meals in. Honestly, this felt like a torture.

After this phase, covid-19 came in, gyms were shut and we were stuck at home. I continued with some home workouts, eating whatever was cooked at home. This time, I gained some weight. I gained nearly 9 kgs, but I was satisfied with the way I ate. I enjoyed my food and I wanted the same satisfaction while I go back to dieting again. So, the whole lockdown was dedicated to search for low calorie condiments and spices that can make my food interesting. Luckily, I found a few of them. I tried out different normal recipes, but the only change was, changing the regular condiments with the low calorie ones that I found in the lockdown. So, this time, I am losing weight slower than last time to preserve most of the muscle mass and build some more muscle and lose fat, while enjoying my food.

There are a couple of points, I keep in my head, while making my meals this time. The Protein and the fibre content of the meal should be highest, as they both have higher thermic effect and keeps me full for longer time. Carbs should be added in right amount to stay in the calorie limit, yet bring in taste. Fat from oil must be avoided, as it adds up to total calorie intake and contributes the least to keep me full.

Weight vs Time Graph for a Month, tracking my monthly progress.

I don’t have significant changes as my results but I have my weight and time graph for a month. I have been doing this and getting some good results, being happy and satisfied with whatever I eat. At the end, dieting is not eating boiled food, but making smarter choices to enjoy the food, while making progress.

February 17, 2021 0

You can never count calories accurately. Here’s why?

We all know, calories in and calories out, together is what helps us get our dream physique. If one is losing weight, calories in must be lower than calories out and vice-versa for anyone gaining weight, but why do most of us fail to reach our goal, if the mantra is that simple. Where are we going wrong?

Well, the answer is we are counting calories wrong and I am not here to tell you, it’s your fault, because it’s not. Practically, no one can track calories accurately.

Have you seen labels on food packaging that says 1 cup serving size or 1 tablespoon or teaspoon serving size? They provide the nutrition table according to that serving size. Now, the cup, the tablespoon and the teaspoon weight is considered different in different countries. So, the nutrition label on the packet becomes insignificant with these differences in these relative measurements methods across the world (However, if the serving size is mentioned in grams, the accuracy improves significantly.)

It’s difficult to track calories of items like bread, cheese slices and similar items. Every slice of bread and cheese are different in size and width. Even if you know, the total calories of the pack and can weigh out every slice to find the right calories per slice but it just too impractical and time consuming for me. Many people simply use apps like myfitnesspal or similar apps to track calories and macros which makes approximate estimations to track daily calorie intake and thus, compromises some accuracy along with it.

Lastly, even if you track everything right. You do all the calculation manually, you can still be incorrect, considering the fact that labels lie. This is somewhat of a marketing gimmick used by companies. There are a lot of companies, that shows less calories per serving than in real. If lower calories per serving is mentioned, the sales will go up because people will be more willing to buy it.

Now, this article is not to discourage you to track calories. It’s just that you need to know, we are just tracking it with significant approximations, so the total calorie intake that you track is always somewhat incorrect. So, along with tracking calories, it’s important to track your weight daily and measure the weekly progress. Along with daily weight check in, use the mirror to track your progress.

February 3, 2021 0

Top 7 mistakes that’s killing your progress | You need to Stop!

After writing the 8 mistakes for beginners blog, I actually decided to make it a series where I can point out the mistake and say why it’s wrong. I do think it’s a better way of learning in general.

So, here are the 7 common mistakes that most people in the gym make, that’s slowing down their progress.

1. Suppliments over a Proper Diet: This is by far the most common mistake, that people make. They think food suppliments are an absolute necessity when it comes to nutrition in general but on the contrary as the name itself suggest suppliments are the products that help you fulfill your requirements that you can’t satisfy from whole foods. They are not a replacement for food itself. If you can satisfy your protein requirements for a day from whole foods, you absolutely don’t need to invest in protein powders. You don’t need to invest in fat burners for getting lean, you can just do it by making smarter food choices and reducing your total daily calorific intake. I mean if you are filthy rich and want to buy those suppliments, sure you can but I am not one of them and don’t wanna buy those super costly suppliments when I can fulfill my requirements from food itself, just a personal opinion. I am not against the use of suppliments but just wanna convey the message that you don’t need to buy all of them. You just need to get the ones that are an absolute necessity.

A well balanced diet is all you need to make progress in your fitness journey. Don’t fall into the marketing gimmicks of the Suppliment Companies and choose to buy the suppliments, that are an absolute necessity and save yourself some bucks.

2. Underestimating Warmups and doing it the wrong way: Warmups are one of the most undervalued topics when it comes to fitness discussions. Warmups are hands down a must. It keeps you injury free, helps you lift more and perform well in the gym. However, people either skip the warmups or do it the wrong way. Have you seen that person in the gym who reaches the weights arena and starts with his static stretching routine? Yes, I just wanna say, don’t be that guy. That’s stupidity or maybe lack of knowledge but whatever just don’t do it. There are various studies done regarding the topic and the conclusion of the studies is static stretching before a weight session, doesn’t do any benefit, rather it decreases your strength and makes you more injury prone. If you really wanna stretch before the workouts, go for the dynamic stretch and save the static stretching for the end of the workout. I don’t do stretching in my warmups. I generally do a moderate intensity cardio for 5-10 minutess and then, 2-3 warmup sets with weights for the particular muscle, I am training for the day.

Static stretching before a weight session, doesn’t do any benefit, rather it decreases your strength and makes you more injury prone. If you really wanna stretch before the workouts, go for the dynamic stretching and save the static stretching for the end of the workout.

3. Neglecting Cardio: I was that guy, you will always see in the weights room but never in the cardio room. Everyone likes those massive biceps and the badass chest and shoulder muscles but at the end, we need to remember the heart is what helps us to function efficiently. THE HEART IS THE MOST IMPORTANT MUSCLE. Doing cardio will not only help your cardiovascular health, help you live longer and a healthier life but it will also help you in lifting by improving your endurance in general. So, when you do cardio regularly, it’s more likely that you will perform well in those sets with crazy high rep ranges. An average of 20 minutes of cardio is recommended for a person in a day at minimum and it’s advised to be done all days of the week. Now, when I say cardio must be done, it’s not necessary to do all of it in the gym itself. For me, I do the warmups with cardio itself, then I brought in some minor daily life changes which help me hit my cardio duration target for the day by taking stairs whenever possible and walking or cycling to nearby places I need to visit.

An average of 20 minutes of cardio is recommended for a person in a day at minimum and it’s advised to be done all days of the week, regardless of the weight training schedule.

4. Underestimating Sleep: If someone asks me, what’s the most important thing to improve your recovery and overall performance, my answer is always gonna be sleep. Now, the duration of sleep required for an individual to be at peak performance varies from person to person. There are people who require just 6 hours of sleep a day to be at optimum performance and there are people like me who require a good amount of 8 hours to 9 hours of sleep to be at my peak. So, find the sweet sleep duration for yourself and don’t make the mistake of underestimating the importance of sleep required for your daily performance.

5. Not using Internet to it’s Full Potential: In the last article, we have discussed about getting a trainer and how strong of an impact, a good coach have to one’s fitness journey but the only truth is very few people actually have access to a well learned trainer. This is when the internet gets into the conversation, being an extremely powerful tool to educate yourself. Now, the Internet do have a lot of fitness influencers who spew nonsense for more attention but there are good educated people too. You just need to find the right people to learn from. If you want to learn about form and exercise movements, I highly recommend the 3 ‘How to’ playlists from ScottHermanFitness on YouTube. If you want to learn about dieting and weight loss, I highly recommend you to check out Greg Doucette on YouTube.

6. Socialising in mid of Workouts: Now, this is just a personal opinion but I actually consider socialising in between workouts as a mistake. It breaks your concentration, takes your mind away from exercising to every random topic possible. I don’t enjoy that and feel like concentrating on workouts just help me end with a better and more efficient workout in general.

7. Overcomplicating the Simple Path: When you learn from the internet, the obvious next thing that’s gonna happen to you is information overload. You will get advice to train in a particular RPE, train with a particular rep range for muscle hypertrophy. You will get advice regarding number of meals in a day and meal timings. You will get advice regarding the best workout timing and what not. The reality is you need to do things that give you results. There’s no best time for the gym. You just need to show up everyday. The rep range that gives you results is the best rep range. The number of meals in a day is the number of times, you feel hungry (however, the total calorific intake needs to be fixed, irrespective of the number of meals). You just need to keep things simple, train harder than last time, eat clean, learn forever and stay committed.

January 13, 2021 0

Adele’s Transformation| Body Positivity and Fat Acceptance Movement | Right or Wrong | My Opinion

Body Positivity, Fat Acceptance Movement, Fat Pride, Fat Empowerment or Fat Activism is a movement that started as an anti-fat bias movement and primarily focuses on changing the society’s opinion towards plus size men and women. This movement calls out every fat person to accept, be proud and love their body, the way it is, without being bothered about any other person’s opinion and honestly, I do think the motive behind this activity is truly great, I do think everyone must be proud of who they are and how they look.

I have been a fat kid, my whole life and to be honest, fat shaming is a real thing. People often put you down because of the way you look and I think most fat people will accept this.

Recently, I actually see this movement getting a bit more of momentum. I see my friends talking about it, I see people from my batch post about it on social media but I also see a toxic side of the movement and by toxic side, I imply to people, part of this movement, putting down any person who was previously one of them and now, lost their weight, to be healthy and achieve their dream physique. So, basically, a movement like ‘Fat Pride’ that started to bring in positivity in the society is responsible for spreading negativity further.

Captured in the Frame: Adele
Adele Transformation (100 lbs, weight loss)
The Picture is borrowed from https://www.instagram.com/adele/?hl=en for educational purposes only.
**Please mail the page moderator for any copyright infringement and the image shall be replaced/removed.**

In the above picture, we have Adele, English Songwriter and Singer and recently she just went through this amazing transformation. She dropped nearly 100 lbs of weight and personally, a person like me who’s on his own transformation journey can say 100 lbs is no joke, it’s a good amount of work, sacrifice and dedication. Now, I am bringing her into this conversation for a reason and I quote some comments from the after photo post of her transformation (second image in the collage), “i really missed your old figure, you’re perfect in every shape and form”, “u are now just too thin”, “Why adele why did you lost all the weight, u were beautiful the way u were earlier, adele. Just kidding, but you were more beautiful earlier”, “you aren’t beautiful anymore 😭😭” and there are a ton of these negative comments.

I have also seen a lot of positive comments in the post but when you have a following of 39.5M, even the smallest chunk of negativity is quite significant. The matter is, it deeply saddens me. There are people who don’t appreciate the hardwork she has put into this transformation. People are unhappy and complaining about the fact that she just tried to lose weight, be in a healthy weight range and just feel good in general.

Now, if you think about the root of this negativity, trust me it comes from deep within of the people who made those comments, it’s because they used to feel good about themselves as their idol was one of them. Now that, their favourite is in perfect shape, they feel bad about them. So, all these negativity is nothing but insecurities of the general mass.

Instead, the very correct attitude will be if they draw in some motivation from the transformation, start training and exercising, eating better and healthier to be better than the last day.

Lastly, I want you to take this message with you from this post. Accepting the way, you are, it’s great but it is better to work on ourselves to be better than the present day. I do support the Fat Acceptance Movement, but at the same time, I want every single person, part of the activity to exercise and to eat healthy, get better than the last day. At the end, we know it’s not about how we look, but it’s difficult to do things when one is overweight, so it’s better to loose a bit of weight, just to feel good and perform better everyday. In the end, Fat Pride should always be about loving yourself the way you look but should never become an excuse to live an unhealthy life and further put on weight by eating junk in the name of body positivity.

December 9, 2020 0