Happy New Years

Mike Smead:
Scott has asked me to write about my experience during this 8 week challenge. Well...to be honest I haven't done much during the past 8 weeks, especially during the holiday's. But I have had some success this last year with losing unwanted weight and maintaining my weight. I have found that everyone needs to figure out how their own body operates and how it handles the calories you take in everyday. What I can do is tell everyone what worked for me and how I was able to lose 30 lbs this year. The key to my weight loss was diet diet diet, and water water water, and more water!!

First, I figured out that I needed to "program" my body. When I say "program", I mean that you need to let your body know when you are going to eat and take in calories. A scheduled eating program is essential to losing unwanted fat. When your body knows it is going to process food or calories that you take in, your body is prepared to take in those calories and your metabolism is ready to process them. Hunger pains are a good thing and when your body tells you that you're hungry, you should eat! Eating often in small portions with healthy snacks in between meals is much more effective than eating healthy 2 or 3 large portions in a day. When I first started my diet I felt like I was eating a ton of food, but in reality I was eating the same or less amount of food throughout the course of a day. I found I was eating 3-4 small meals a day with 2-3 healthy snacks in between meals.

Second, my diet and the types of foods that I would eat. We've all heard about the low carb diets and how amazing they are. I'm not a fan of low carb diets because carbs are what give us our energy. I believe in eating carbs, and your body needs them to give you energy. They key to carb intake is when you take in carbs. I would eat my carbs early in they day and decrease my carb intake throughout the day. If you take your carbs early in the day, then your body has the entire day to burn off those carbs and your body won't store them to fat. I usually included my carb intake during breakfast and lunch. I disciplined myself to not eat any carbs after 5 pm. The types of foods I eat are what I call "naked foods"...meaning don't eat foods that have been processed. I eat a lot of fruits, vegatables and protein foods that haven't been processed. When we eat foods in their natural state our bodies take full advantage of the nutrients they provide and it is much easier for out bodies to process. Balanced and small portioned meals were the healthiest

Third, I said it before...water, water, water and more water. I drink 6-10 bottles of water a day. Water flushes out your body of all the unwanted calories and keeps your body clean on the inside.

As a result of my new diet and lifestyle change, I have found it is much easier to maintain my weight. Because I have 'programmed' my body and it's metabolism, I am able to cheat from time to time and eat some of the foods that we all love. I hope my experience will help some of you and happy holiday's.