1. Think calories in vs calories out, it will bring much-needed clarity as to how weight loss works

To understand weight loss, you must baseline the energy balance equation as the scientific first principle of weight loss. This will make you understand that fad diets like juice cleanse programs may have briefly worked for you in the past only because they somehow induced a caloric deficit through their diet regimes, not because of the 'miracle' ingredients or revolutionary systems they came wrapped in. 

Everything that causes you to lose weight works by shifting either calories in or calories out. The next time you come across a weight loss program that seems to work well for others, don’t ask yourself ‘what’s the magic?’. Instead, ask yourself ‘How does this reduce calories in and/or increase calories out effectively’?

From the energy balance equation, we can think of 2 possible approaches to induce a caloric deficit and lose weight:

1. Decrease calories in by consuming less food

2. Increase calories out by exercising and being more active

Your next question might then be, ‘which of the two is more effective’? Which brings us to our next point:

2. Prioritize diet over exercise, it’s far more effective for weight loss

A study published in the International Journal of Obesity analyzed over 700 peer-reviewed, scientific papers published over a 25-year period; it is the most extensive research of its kind done to date. The effectiveness of just dieting, just exercising, and combining diet with exercise across all 700 studies was examined. Controlling for other factors, on average, the diet-only groups lost 370% more weight than the exercise-only groups (10.7kg vs 2.9kg lost) over a 16-week period. The diet + exercise groups performed only marginally better than the diet-only groups (11.0kg vs 10.7kg lost)[2]:  

Exercising is next to useless if there is no diet plan to complement it. So, your focus should be on first reducing calories in by restricting food intake; it is far more effective for weight loss than exercising. Once you have your diet down, incorporate a simple weight lifting regime or other high intensity interval training (e.g. sprinting) – it’ll maintain your metabolism at healthy levels. It’ll also make you look good by preserving your muscle mass.

So, to see the best results, you have to nail your diet. But this is one area where most people struggle, even seasoned dieters. And it's because the fundamental driver of sustainable weight loss is overlooked for fancy gimmicks that don't work. If there's one thing you want to take away from this article, let it be this:

3. Consistency is key, and you need to make small changes iteratively instead of drastic lifestyle changes to be consistent

(Very, very important.)

We are conditioned to believe that we reap rewards in proportion to the intensity of our efforts. While this holds true in other aspects of our life, such as work and relationships, the inverse is true for weight loss. The ideal approach to weight loss is rather counter-intuitive – you need to keep your eyes off the ball instead of fixating on it. Spending hours at the gym and trying extra hard to eat perfect is a sure-fire way to burn out and fall off the bandwagon. Scientific research has concluded time and time again that sustainable weight loss takes consistent effort, maintained over a long period of time.

In a study published in the US National Library of Medicine, 90 obese adults were randomly assigned one of two diet plans, one based purely on solid foods and one based on liquid meal replacements. 4 months in, the meal replacement group on average lost almost twice as much weight as the food-based group (12.3% vs 6.9% of starting weight lost). In addition, a much higher portion of the meal replacement group saw successful weight loss – a stunning 93% lost notable weight as opposed to only 55% in the food-based group[3].

This huge difference in weight lost and success rates were attributable not to any miracle supplements or diet plans, it was just because the meal replacement group had a simple, convenient diet plan they could stick to easily in the long run without much hassle or preparation.

Another year long study published by the USDA Human Nutrition Center compared weight loss based on diet type on 160 overweight adults. The results showed that weight loss ultimately boiled down to consistent calorie restriction. The strongest predictor of weight loss over a 12-month period was not the type of diet or macronutrient intake, but the dieters' ability to consistently reduce their caloric intake in the long run[4].

The key to being consistent is to not treat weight loss as a full-time job; strive to make your weight loss program ‘run in the background’. About a month into your regime, it should almost become second nature to you, like brushing your teeth or bathing. To achieve this state, you need to moderate. Make small changes iteratively to your diet and keep your comfort foods in. If you love eating chicken rice, make it a point to order lean meat (e.g. chicken breast) and ask for less rice – don’t strike it off completely from your diet. Want to have that occasional meal at McDonald’s with your favourite garlic chili sauce? Have it anyway, but make sure you ask for small fries and make your drink a diet soda. Hate the taste of celery? Don’t force it into your diet. Every time you make a change to your eating habits, ask yourself this: Can I put up with this change for the rest of my life? If the answer is no, don’t do it.

4. Consume foods that keep you full for little calories

You will get hungry from time to time on a caloric deficit, there’s no way around it. You can’t always reason your way out of these hunger pangs – willpower is a finite resource that you can’t consistently rely on. Instead, you need to actively manage your hunger by eating foods that suppress it. Incorporate more foods that are high in protein (lean meat, low fat dairy, lentils etc.), dietary fiber (fibrous vegetables) and omega 3 fatty acids (fatty fish, chia seeds, flaxseeds) into your diet – they will suppress your appetite for relatively little calories and induce you to consume less calories for the day. 

In general, switching from refined, fatty foods (sugar, fried food, white bread/rice) to minimally processed whole foods goes a long way in keeping you filled for little calories.  

5. Try over and over until it sticks.

This is perhaps the most understated part of weight loss. Tell me if this sounds familiar: You decide seriously that you want to lose weight. You get off to a great start and lose 3kg in 3 weeks. Then something derails your journey. Maybe you had a tough week at work and start binge-eating to cope. Maybe you went overboard during a dinner with friends. Some event like this kills the momentum, and you fall back to your old ways.

Guess what? There's nothing wrong with this - it's actually part of the process. Almost everyone who has lost weight and kept it off had to try 10-15 times before it stuck. But you saw the 15th try being plastered everywhere on social media, and mistook that for the first try.

Instead of fretting the fall, what you need to focus on is getting back on the bandwagon as fast as you can. Take a mental note or journal briefly about what exactly happened, what the trigger was, and how you can deal with the trigger if it comes up again in the future.

After this, instead of resenting yourself, be happy that you caught yourself slipping early, and take a moment to appreciate that you're putting yourself back on track. We work much better with positive reinforcements. Then, have another go at it. It's as simple as that. You're going to find that after 6-7 tries like this, your streaks will be longer, and your slip-ups will be shorter. That's how habits build up.

So, that’s pretty much it – a 10-minute crash course on the basics. If we were to compress the key takeaways into short, succinct advice, it might be:

1) Take in less calories consistently, over a long period

2) Ditch the all-or-nothing mentality and instead make small, sustainable changes to your eating habits

3) Eat more whole foods to keep you full

4) Keep trying until the habits stick.

Hardly anything revolutionary. But this is what fundamentals usually sound like - general, intuitive and lacking shortcuts. Every single one of our customers has seen great results by focusing just on restricting caloric intake consistently over a sustained period. The problem starts when you look for miracle cures – this is where the health industry comes in with its ‘secret sauce’ and starts selling you snake oil.

Simple right? You can get started right away if you want to. You don't even need our shakes to start.

If you're a customer, and want more specific steps to follow, get in touch with us! We offer complimentary weight loss services to all our customers, to help them successfully implement the shakes and lose weight. Don't be shy, make the best use of these services :)

[1] Hall, K. D., Heymsfield, S. B., Kemnitz, J. W., Klein, S., Schoeller, D. A., & Speakman, J. R. (2012). Energy balance and its components: implications for body weight regulation. The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 95(4), 989–994. http://doi.org/10.3945/ajcn.112.036350

[2] Miller, W. C., Koceja, D. M., & Hamilton, E. J. (1997). A meta-analysis of the past 25 years of weight loss research using diet, exercise or diet plus exercise intervention. International Journal of Obesity & Related Metabolic Disorders, 21(10).

[3] Davis, L. M., Coleman, C., Kiel, J., Rampolla, J., Hutchisen, T., Ford, L., … Hanlon-Mitola, A. (2010). Efficacy of a meal replacement diet plan compared to a food-based diet plan after a period of weight loss and weight

[4] Dansinger, M. L., Gleason, J. A., Griffith, J. L., Selker, H. P., & Schaefer, E. J. (2005). Comparison of the Atkins, Ornish, Weight Watchers, and Zone diets for weight loss and heart disease risk reduction: a randomized trial. Jama, 293(1), 43-53.