In this article I'm going to use my 15 years of experience to explain some common myths and misconceptions about fitness and fat loss. Some of the fallacies are so ingrained that it may be very difficult for you to take them on board. What I'm going to present is not only based on convincing science and research but is also backed up by my many years of trying to change people's body shapes.
One of the biggest myths circulated by the food industry and also some members of the fitness industry are that low fat products will help you lose weight. Not only is this not true but often these low fat products will actually help you gain weight due to the fact that all these low fat products invariably replace the fat with sugar.
These high sugar foods cause havoc with your blood sugar and lead to your body storing the excess sugar as fat through the influence of the hormone insulin.
If you really want to lose weight and drop a dress size quickly you need to eat real foods, not packaged rubbish, and stay away from high sugar alternatives that masquerade as low fat foods. Eat organic meat and fish, fresh vegetables, fruit in moderation, nuts and seeds.
The second big myth about weight loss is that lots of cardiovascular exercise will help you tone up and lose weight. Again nothing could be further from the truth. Having worked in numerous gyms for over a decade I can categorically say that the people who spend the most amount of time on the cardio machines see the least amount of body shape changes. The folks who hit the weights room or the exercise studio fare much better. The reason is that weight training and circuit classes are anabolic, in that they build muscle tissue - therefore increasing your resting metabolic rate. When you spend an hour on the cross trainer, which is catabolic, the hormonal effect causes your body to lose muscle mass which obviously decreases your metabolic rate.
If you want to squeeze into that dress in a month's time then spend your workouts lifting weights (even your own body weight) and performing high intensity circuit classes or running drills.
The final myth that I'm going to discuss in this article is the hilarious one about calorie counting or point system based diets. This myth is based on the conclusion that a calorie is a calorie regardless of where it comes from. Without going into the science of why this is ludicrous I will merely point out that if you took two people and fed the first person 2000 calories a day of real foods made up of meat, fish, vegetables, nuts and seeds and stood them next to a person who got the exact same 2000 calories but all in the form of chocolate and crisps then these two people would look vastly different!
While being aware of your caloric intake can have benefits it's much more important to consider where you're getting the calories from and this is the problem with the calorie count model. The answer is to not count calories or restrict them or use any antiquated point scheme but to eat real foods regularly and in sensible portion sizes.
I'm sure many of you will be surprised by some of the points I've made here in this article but I hope it's given you some take away tips to help you drop that dress size in the next month.
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