Food and weight loss.

When it comes to being fit, exercise is super important. You can see benefit from exercise alone. However, sadly (for me), eating is over 50% of it. I hear story after story about "fit but fat" people... (I hate that term, sorry!) People who can run long, lift heavy, have the athletic endurance, but who are still a little overweight.

It all comes down to "calories in, calories out". There are so many complicated diets and theories out there, but that's all there is too it.

Did you hear about the "Twinkie Diet"? A nutrition professor ate junk food every three hours instead of meals. He kept his calories low, and lost weight. While this is a horrifying concept (to me, at least- some people may think eating Twinkies and Oreos as your main diet is a dream come true), the point he was making was that what really matters is "calories in, calories out".

I'm not saying we should all go out and stock up on Twinkies. But, the point is, the body can only handle so many calories of ANYTHING before it becomes excess weight. Avocados are great for you, but too much and you get fat.

However, many of the foods we're told to eat- like broccoli, for example- have lower calories for larger portions. 1 cup of chopped, raw broccoli is only 31 calories. Do you know how much broccoli that is? It's a lot! Eat 180 calories of broccoli and you'll DEFINITELY be full...

Anyway, I hope I've made at least something a resembling a point. While the professor didn't suffer any extreme negative consequences from his diet of processed junk foods, I'm still not ready to make the switch- I want to talk a bit about how to eat higher quality foods and integrate this into a busy lifestyle.

My lunches for the week

One of the things I do is PREPARE! I do a lot of preparing on Sunday for the week ahead. Above, I took a picture of 4 days of lunches I make for the week.

This is a really simple (maybe even boring) lunch: chicken breasts (I use one of the frozen bags you can get at the grocery store), green beans (frozen) and brown rice. I only make 4 because 1). I don't know if it will last longer than 4 days without getting a little questionable and 2). There are usually leftovers on Thursday night I can eat on Friday.

I make it all on Sunday afternoon- pretty easy- and have it all packaged nicely for the mornings when I go looking for lunch.

I also bring snacks with me to work, like these:

P90X Protein Bars

Other snacks that work are cottage cheese (with a little frozen fruit); or celery and peanut butter (never EVER bring the jar- I will eat it ALL!).

Then, there is my favorite: Shakeology. Here's some of the Greenberry flavor-

Did I ever claim to be a good photographer? Good thing I didn't..

Shakeology is a meal replacement/multi-vitamin/supplement... it's just so many things. I'll leave it up to you to find out more about it if interested: Shakeology

So, if you get nothing else out of this post, get these points:
1. BE PREPARED!
2. CALORIES IN, CALORIES OUT!
3. Oh, and pre-measure your peanut butter. Seriously- never carry a jar with you. It is not just one serving!

Be healthy!
Sarah