Transcription
Most people think the key to a faster metabolism is staying in fat loss mode, hard and long. But after helping thousands of people increase their metabolism and lose weight, I found that the longer you grind, the more your hunger rises, cravings spike, and energy drops.
So instead of grinding harder, I do something that sounds completely backward. I force my clients to intentionally stop dieting long before they ever hit a plateau. But how you stop dieting follows a specific protocol, and in this video, I'm breaking down both of its parts. But I can already hear your alarm. Wouldn't stopping dieting just stretch your time to goal by a lot?
We think this because we carry the mechanical model of weight loss in our heads. This model came about in 1944, when scientists took 36 healthy men and slashed their calories in half. Every one of them lost lots of weight and kept losing weight, even as their metabolism also nearly halved. So our mental model became that of a seesaw. The harder we restrict, the more weight we lose. But the difference is those men were totally dependent on the scientists for food. Unlike the lab, we can get food, and we do, as our hunger gets loud.
So in real life, weight loss is less like a seesaw and more like a spring. At first, when you push on a spring, it's easy. Similarly, any weight loss plan feels easy at start because our body doesn't put up much resistance. But then as we keep going, our body starts pushing back harder and harder by spiking hunger and cravings and lowering our metabolism. This leads to two paths with the same destination. You either get thrown off plan and weight loss ends, or you push harder and harder, your body also pushes back by dialing your metabolism lower and lower until weight loss ends. We cannot outpace our metabolism slowing down, and yet we need to keep losing weight. So what do we do?
Some of us try to solve this by using the other factor in the mechanical model. More exercise, more weight loss. Any calorie calculator will show you can nearly double your calorie burn by doing hard exercise and having a physical job. This describes exactly the daily life of the last hunter-gatherer tribe left on Earth, the Hadza. They walk miles every single day, climb trees, and hunt wild game, definitely qualifying for the double calorie burn. And yet scientists were stunned. They found the Hadza burn the exact same number of calories per day as a sedentary office worker.
You see, our phones and bodies have something in common. When your phone is on 20% battery and you launch a heavy app, your phone launches it, and then steals energy from elsewhere. It dims the screen and turns off background apps. Our bodies similarly fund vigorous exercise by slashing normal fidgeting and the desire to move and giving less and less energy to your brain, hence the exhaustion and brain fog you feel. Also, just like your phone flashes the red battery icon to get you to charge it, your body flashes hunger and cravings with urgency to get you to fuel it. Not only does your body slow down your metabolism the longer you restrict, it also detects when your activity puts your normal energy budget at risk and it compensates to bring your total burn to your normal amount regardless.
So then are we doomed to suffering at a snail's pace to goal? Fortunately, a team of researchers stumbled onto something remarkable. They split people into two groups for 16 weeks, all doing the same diet. And yet group A's metabolism tanked, hunger skyrocketed, and they regained all the fat they lost within six months. While group B not only lost far more fat, but also had kept it off when the researchers checked in six months later. Why the difference? Group A had dieted the way the mechanical model suggests, like a marathon where you keep restricting and think this will result in the most weight loss over time, while group B worked in sprints. They were restricted, then rested, then restricted, and repeat. But the key here was aligning each phase with their specific body fat stage. I call this the Go Stop Go method, and it keeps your metabolism at the highest level while you lose weight. Not to mention causes near zero suffering.
But how do you implement it for your body fat stage? Since the vast majority of you are over 30% body fat as a woman or over 20% as a man, that's who I'm going to list the four habits in the go phase for. Habit one is about exercise, or lack thereof. You see, if you combine all the research on metabolism, it concludes that we get a 5% metabolism boost from exercise. Now, at your body fat stage, your body expends more energy than someone leaner exercising, and so it puts your normal energy budget at risk faster, causing your hunger to spike. Most of us end up overeating and jeopardizing our weight loss. Additionally, if you put the small 5% metabolism boost against the risk of overeating, the conclusion becomes obvious. If you don't enjoy exercise, skip it. If you love exercise, then dial it to a level that doesn't cause you to overeat. But skipping exercise alone isn't going to lose your weight.
Enter habit two, which takes advantage of the conclusion that we get a 10% metabolism boost from daily movements like bouncing legs, fidgeting, and walking. By skipping exercise, you've already upped your chance of continuing to walk and fidget more, trading a 5% boost with a 10% boost. Additionally, I recommend tracking towards 6,000 steps a day to push closer to the full 10% boost. The steps can be leisurely, no need to aim for high intensity. So far, we have only covered 15% of what increases our metabolism. Let's turn to habit three for the next big chunk.
15% of our metabolism boost comes from digesting food. But not all food is the same. Now, most people think protein is only about building muscle, but it's actually pulling triple duty. Digesting protein boosts your metabolism the most, keeps you full longer, and reduces how tempting junk and sweets feel. Data from my clients shows you want to have one palm-sized amount of lean protein, four times a day, about four hours apart. So you spread out its benefits while not feeling overly stuffed or getting gassy. You can grab my lean protein cheat sheet from the link in the description below.
And finally, habit four is the most important one because it accounts for 70% of our metabolism. This 70% is spent maintaining your current size and body. To cut our size, we must cut the energy we supply this level. But not cut so hard that the spring snaps back, causing regain. Data from my clients show to aim for a 15% calorie deficit, as anything larger causes a high risk of regain. You can use my calorie calculator linked in the description below to find your 15% deficit calorie target. And while a 15% deficit will cause you to suffer hunger, cravings, and energy drops the least, you can double these odds by aligning the target with your lifestyle. Select one to two days as your high calorie days in the calculator, so you have room to enjoy when you eat out.
Do these four things for eight weeks, then assess week to week until 12 weeks if you want to keep going with them. But then once you hit 12 weeks, just like group B, you must transition into the stop phase. This phase walks a tightrope. It's not a cheat phase where you binge hard, but it's also a phase where you are allowed to overeat. It's a phase where the scale may go up, but your chances of keeping the weight off go way up too. It's a phase where you'll feel terrified you're undoing everything, but it will actually come out with a faster metabolism. But all these advantages only happen if you stay within these four guardrails.
Guardrail one, eat within 100 calories of your maintenance target. Many of my clients continue to undereat in the stop phase because they're afraid of gaining weight and so remain part of group A. Actually eating for your current size is what reboots your metabolism. Your 10% daily movement increases, your body sheds less muscle, and so you enter the next go phase with a thrumming metabolism. But won't your weight increase if you eat more? Yes, your weight will increase, but your fat won't as long as you stay around maintenance calories. That weight increase is mostly extra stored carbs and fat, and both come off fast when you return to the go phase. So is this clearance to go to town on some donuts and pizza? Close, but not quite. You do want those extra calories to come from carbs, because carbs is what tells your brain that the famine is over. Time to relax. Still worried you'll accidentally overeat? You can't as long as you stay within your maintenance target.
Now just because you're taking a diet break, it doesn't mean it's a movement break. Keep your steps up to what they were in the go phase to keep maximizing that 10% metabolism boost. So then how long do you stay in the stop phase, just maintaining? Look, it takes up to 4 days for your body to even realize it's out of a calorie deficit, and a full 10 to 14 days for your hormones and metabolism to reboot. So stay in the stop phase for 2 weeks, and then assess if you feel excited to return to the go phase. If not, stay in stop and reassess week by week. Your mental needs matter just as much as your physical needs. Then once you're ready, return to the 4 habits in the go phase, and rinse and repeat until you get to goal.
Now back to the original question. How long will it take to get to goal this way? It depends on your body and lifestyle. That's why I created the Body Fat Tracker that calculates how long it'll take you to get to goal, and updates that timeline as you check in every week. Bonus, the check-ins automatically split your weight into fat vs lean mass, so you can tell during the stop phase if you're gaining any fat. It's linked in the description below. You should also watch this video that shows you how to keep your timeline as short as possible by avoiding the mistakes I see all the time. Don't miss the complete step-by-step breakdown here. And finally, if you want my help shortening the timeline by reducing trial and error, then learn more about my weight loss program in the description and comments below. And always remember, you can do it!