What Eating 200 Grams of Protein Looks Like

I’ve gotten several questions about what it looks like to eat 200 grams of protein in a day, which is my current goal, and this is my attempt to show you what I am doing by explaining an entire day of eating.

Before I go into all of the details, I am choosing to eat 200 grams of protein because that is my “goal weight.”

If you refer back to this article from Andrew, you can see different ways to calculate what your protein intake should be.

Example Day of 200g of Protein

BREAKFAST

This is one of my normal variations of oatmeal that I will have for breakfast.

I love mixing my protein powder with oatmeal and much prefer milk over water to aid in the mixing process for taste and a little protein boost.

I usually just buy whatever berries are on sale to throw on top.

Here is another variation of my morning oats if this doesn’t look as tasty to you.

LUNCH

This lunch might be a little higher in fat than I would like, but right now it works for me and it is super tasty!

I am getting all of my protein here from natural sources which is always nice; sometimes three protein shakes a day gets annoying. If you want to limit the fat as well, you could switch to using only egg whites or remove the cheese altogether.

AFTERNOON SNACK

Nothing special about this snack other than I really love pretzel sticks. Also, shoutout to a friend who shared these specific pretzels with me. They are the absolute best.

DINNER

As boring as it sounds, chicken and rice in some form is a pretty common combination for me.

I try to spice things up by using different recipes and cooking the chicken different ways and using different vegetables each meal prep.

Boneless, skinless chicken breast is one of my personal staples for my current fat loss diet.

The spinach here was sautéed in a fat free spray, which caused it to taste a little more sad than if I had used olive oil, but I have to cut out things here and there for my goals!

EVENING SNACK

As you can see, I finished off my day by drinking another protein shake (with water this time) and also treated myself to a spoonful of almond butter for desert.

The idea of having a spoonful of almond butter for desert might not excite most people, however, it is a really great compromise for me to get something that is very sweet and enjoyable into my diet.

Looking Back At My Day

Overall this was a very good day in regards to how much protein I ate, and where my calories were coming from. I am always happy to have a day where I can limit the amount of processed foods in my diet, and I always seem to feel better after a day of eating like this.

The adjustment of coming from a bulking diet to a fat loss diet was tough at first, but the human body is pretty incredible.

For example, I was eating almost twice as many calories as what this entire day shows when I was bulking and there is no way I would’ve thought this amount of food would have filled me up.

After a few weeks of dieting, my stomach has adjusted to what I am feeding it, and this amount of food kept me satisfied all day.

Also, keep in mind that you don’t have to track your calories meticulously to achieve exciting fat loss outcomes. This is just the methodology I’ve chosen based on what works well for my own lifestyle.

If the thought of tracking your calories is overwhelming to you, I highly recommend you check out this article called “How to Improve Your Body Composition Without Tracking Calories.”

And finally, we do offer online body recomposition coaching for anyone who is looking to enter into that next level of commitment and accountability.

If that has your curiosity piqued, click here to learn more about how it works and how to apply.

11 Things You're Getting the "Most Wrong" about Fat Loss

1: You’re dismissing the importance of overall calories in search of a quick-fix diet with a sexy name.

As obvious as it becomes once you’re following the right crowd of experts in the fitness industry, the simplicity of getting into a caloric deficit for fat loss really feels like a tabloid’s best-kept secret.

But to be fair, the marketing for these diets like keto and carnivore and even the IIFYM (If It Fits Your Macros) movement is so good that most well-intentioned people fall prey to the quick-fix claims of “shedding 16 pounds of body fat in one week by switching to the (fill in the blank) diet!”

That’s just not how it works.

But, I promised myself I’d keep this blog short and sweet: Your fat loss results depend almost solely on your ability to eat a little bit less than you currently need while supplementing that lowered food intake with strategic training and exercise to expedite the process.

Let me encourage you to quit diet-hopping and become a student of energy - a student of calories and how those calories (both consumed and burned) dictate whether or not you lose the body fat you want to.

2: You don’t realize how important eating an adequate amount of protein is for maintaining muscle mass while losing fat.

This one speaks for itself, and there’s no use beating a dead horse because that’s a terrible expression in the first place.

Looking back on my own dieting history, I bet there were seasons of life when I was eating less than 50g of protein per day while trying to “get huge” because I thought training was all that mattered.

And although your training is certainly the most important aspect of improving your body composition, your nutrition is extremely important as well - particularly when it comes to protein.

Nowadays, I eat about 150g of plant protein per day, and that makes a big difference for someone trying to optimize their body composition.

Some of my favorite sources are soy milk, Ezekiel bread, chickpea pasta, tofu, tempeh, seitan, plant-based protein powders, and hemp seeds.

If you need guidance on figuring out your own protein needs, click here.

3: You think that carbs “make you fat.”

Carbs don’t make you fat. Too many calories relative to your current metabolic needs make you “fat.”

Eating too many carbs can certainly make you “fat,” but carbs are not an evil fat-gaining entity all by themselves.

You could “get fat” eating nut butters or guzzling beer just as easily.

4: You think that lemon juice “makes you skinny.”

Lemon juice doesn't make you skinny, but if you trade your typical breakfast sandwich and choco-mocha-frappa-latte with 27 pumps of honey and a tower of whipped cream from Starbucks for a glass of tap water with lemon juice (all else being equal), you just might lose some body fat.

Why?

Well, you’d be consuming way fewer calories in that scenario.

Again, your ability to stay in a caloric deficit matters most when it comes to losing body fat, which means your attention to your overall caloric intake is paramount.

Yes, I said paramount.

Lemon juice may have some unique health benefits, but the only “fat-burning power” it has in its superhero repertoire is the fact that it’s essentially zero-calorie.

5: You think that intermittent fasting was invented by magical fat loss leprechauns.

I definitely like intermittent fasting as a fat loss strategy, but I’ve personally not seen any super compelling evidence that something on a Disney level of magical is happening when you skip breakfast.

Does it help a lot of people get into a caloric deficit? Totally.

Have tons of people had fat loss success incorporating intermittent fasting? Absolutely.

Have I personally had success with it in the past? Yes!

Is there even some emerging research on the potential benefits of extended longevity? Apparently!

But it isn’t magical in the sense that it’s automatic.

You can absolutely out-eat your restricted eating window by smashing pizza and beer.

Intermittent fasting worked for me because it more easily allowed me to eat within an overall caloric deficit.

6: You’re unaware that walking can get you shredded.

Setting a step goal is probably the second most powerful bit of methodology you could apply to a fat loss goal.

And yes, I would rank walking above actually lifting heavy weights in the gym. Do I have your attention now?

Better yet, walking can be done doing everyday life tasks like parking farther away from your destination on purpose, taking the stairs, or even setting an alarm on your phone to get up and walk every two hours or so.

Sometimes my wife and I even walk the stairs a few times before bed just to hit our step goal for the day because we know that walking is a powerful tool for fat loss.

If you want further data on that, I encourage you to read the blog I put out revealing my exact numbers for Summer Shredding 2020.

Walking - and no, I don’t mean on a treadmill - was a huge part of the reason I was so easily able to lose my first 10 pounds.

And for an even deeper dive on the powerful benefits of walking, check out this article I wrote called How to Leverage Walking to Your Fat Loss Advantage.

7: You’re convinced you have to lift weights to lose fat.

You don’t.

Obviously, I lift weights and do CrossFit because I enjoy that kind of exercise and have physique goals centered around building muscle, but I realize that’s not for everyone. And it doesn’t have to be!

You don’t even have to go to the gym period to lose body fat.

Don’t overhype lifting weights for fat loss if you don’t like lifting weights.

Keep in mind, however, that you do have to lift weights if you want to build muscle, and it will certainly boost your metabolism over time as you continue to put on lean tissue.

Walking alone won’t be able to accomplish that aspect of the mission for you, but it can be implemented powerfully for fat loss.

8: You think that high-intensity exercise and “lots of cardio” are non-negotiables for getting diced.

They aren’t.

Before I started doing CrossFit, I hated both of those things, but I still lost 31 pounds of fat while obtaining the best physique of my life.

Pretty cool, right? You don’t have to do cardio or HIIT (high-intensity interval training) to get leaner.

Now, does doing a bit of cardio-based exercise for the sake of promoting a healthy heart do a person good? Of course!

To be honest with you, I think just about the healthiest life you can live is one that mixes a predominantly plant-based diet with CrossFit training systems, but this article is about fat loss.

And we’re not talking about general health here. If you’re thinking to yourself right now, “Aren’t being healthy and looking good pretty much the same thing"?” let me point you to another article I wrote called Are Being Healthy and “Looking Hot” the Same Thing?

Here we’re just talking about what it takes to lose body fat, and doing formal cardio just doesn’t have to make the list if you don’t want it to.

9: You’re convinced you can target reduce your belly fat or underarm flab if you do crunches and tricep pushdowns.

Friends, this idea that you can target fat loss from any specific area of your body is not true, and it’s probably one of the most misleading and widely-believed fitness myths out there.

If you want to make your arms a little less flabby, you’re going to have to do the same thing as someone who wants to get a six-pack or a less jiggly bum: Get into a caloric deficit either by reducing your food intake or increasing your energy expenditure.

As depressing as this may be, everyone has a different genetic predisposition to hold and distribute body fat in different areas and different amounts.

This is why being “genetically blessed” is very much a term in the fitness space.

Some people simply hold their body fat in more visually appealing ways.

For example, my body fat likes to hang out on my love handles. Do you think I would choose for it to be that way if I could pick? Probably not.

But it is what it is, and I just have to be patient with the process and know that the squishiness on my sides is going to be one of the last places for the chub to fall off. I can’t change my genetics (as far as I know) and neither can you.

The good news, however, is that getting lean is the great equalizer, so if you’re bummed out about your flabby arms - just keep losing body fat!

Eventually, you will be lean, and if you’ve been training with weights and eating an adequate amount of protein while eating an otherwise healthful diet, chances are you’ll be sporting a strong, aesthetically-pleasing frame underneath it all once the hard work is done.

10: You think fat loss happens a lot faster than it really does.

I was very guilty of thinking this for a long time.

In college, I literally thought I could get lean in probably two weeks, but the reality is that a true fat loss phase should probably last anywhere between 8-16 weeks when you lose at expert-recommended rates of 0.5-2 pounds per week.

Think about that. Using those numbers, it could take you up to 20 weeks to lose 10 pounds when done properly and sustainably.

Are you willing to be that patient?

Long story short, it takes commitment, consistency, and patience to get leaner, and this is why so many people give up on their fat loss goals.

They just don’t give their bodies enough time to change.

11: You’re not aware that your metabolism is adaptable.

This one is complex, but it’s important for you to know that your metabolism can be up-regulated or down-regulated depending on a host of factors including your muscle mass, caloric intake, exercise habits, sleep/recovery, and stress levels.

So, try not to be the person that wields their “terrible metabolism” as an uneducated excuse for an unhealthy lifestyle unless you’ve been diagnosed by a medical professional with a legitimate medical condition.

Summary

So, there you have it! These are my top eleven picks for the most common ways we’ve been wrong about fat loss.

Have you been caught being wrong about any of these things?

If so, don’t sweat it. I was wrong about literally all of these things at one point or another in our early twenties. In fact, it’s a huge reason we launched IVRY in the first place.

We wanted to help honest people achieve exciting body recomposition goals without all of the fitness mythology and fat loss lore we fell prey to for years.

So, just learn and move on like we did.

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Thanks for reading, everyone! I sincerely hope you enjoyed the content and learned something.

If you feel like this blog brought you any value at all, consider sending it to a friend or family member!

And, if you're interested in working with me one-on-one, visit The Vegan Gym and apply for coaching. I’ve had nothing but success in guiding people toward their fat loss goals.

Cheers, everyone!

-Andrew

Creating Healthier Eating Habits When Dieting

If you have ever struggled to diet consistently well or to have a healthy mindset while trying to lose weight, this article is for you. I’m going to provide some insight into how I approach the shift from a bulk to a cut, then provide some tangible practices that may help your relationship with food become healthier when dieting.

Struggling to Find a Healthy Relationship With Food

I felt inspired to write this article because it is really hard for me to transition from bulking to cutting, mainly from the mindset of my relationship with food. The same principles apply if you are coming from poor diet habits to beginning a fat loss diet.

When I am bulking, there are so many calories and foods to be consumed throughout the day that it sometimes feels like a chore to eat. 

Anyone who has tried to bulk can probably relate.

Eating a ton of food always sounds awesome at first, but it gets tiring quite rapidly. I might take some flak from bro culture for saying that, but it is truly quite a challenge for me. 

So when I initially shifted to my current fat loss diet, I carried over some bad habits from bulking that were really impeding my progress:

• My meals were way too big.

• I did a lot of late night binging (habit from bulking to try and get my calories!)

• I ate a lot of fast food for quick and easy calories.

I needed to change these habits if I wanted to lose weight and live healthier.

Creating a Healthy Mindset

So now enter the fat loss diet. This is where it is important to really set the correct mindset for dieting and how you treat food. 

During my bulk, when calories were in excess, my mindset for food was more like a chore. It was something that needed to get done to reach my goals, and so unfortunately my outlook on food sort of became soured. 

So the first couple of days when I cut calories (arguably the harder days), I kept some of those bad habits. I tried to fast until a certain time of day, or drink lots of coffee to try and fill myself up just so I could save my calories for a couple of large meals later in the evening. 

It was seriously almost like I was torturing myself to make it to a point of the day where I could torture my stomach with way more food than it could handle. 

It is honestly a little bit hard to admit that, but it’s true. 

So it finally hit me that what I was doing was not only unhealthy, but not working very well as far as the scale was concerned either. So I really sat down and examined how I was treating food and my diet and tried to be mindful about ways to combat a negative mindset. 

Here are some things that helped me have a more positive mindset when it comes to dieting.

Ways to Build Healthy Eating Habits When Dieting

1. Put Your Fork Down Between Bites

If you really spent some time watching people eat, you might be a little grossed out. I can only imagine what my mom thought of me when I was in high school; I probably looked like Joey Chestnut at a hot dog eating contest.

So something I have been doing to try and monitor fullness and satisfaction is just to set my fork down between bites. If you aren’t using a fork, same idea! Set the slice of pizza down between bites, I promise it won’t sprout legs and run away.

If you really want to take this practice to the next level, just be thankful for every bite. 

You don’t have to verbally acknowledge it, just in your head think about how you are thankful that you get to eat in a way that can help meet your goals and realize how blessed you are.

2. Don’t Stuff Yourself Full Every Meal

This one is hard because I don’t know how everyone really approaches food and their meals. 

I think psychologically, somewhere in our brains, there is that primitive voice saying “eat until you are full because you don’t know when you will eat again.”

Well, guess what? You aren’t a primitive nomad, and you more than likely know when your next meal is and probably even have options for what to eat.

So since we know we have another meal coming, try to eat in such a way where you don’t stuff your belly until you can’t fit anything else. 

Arguments can be made that you may be forced to do that when bulking, but when we are cutting, we don’t need to stuff ourselves. 

Outliers exist, such as doing some crazy intermittent fasting diet where you have to eat all of your calories in 4 hours, but for the most part, this is a safe and helpful practice.

A tangible way to try and think about this is to eat until you feel satisfied, not painfully full. If we want to put a number to it, eat until your stomach is at about 80% capacity. 

Eventually you start to figure out the amount of food it takes to get you to that ~80% level and then you can be more efficient with your cooking and preparation. 

3. Drink a LOT of water

I need to listen to myself with this one, but I cannot stress how important water is for the health of our bodies. 

I am no scientist, but there are way too many pieces of evidence out there pointing to why we should all be drinking more water. 

Now how you do this is totally personal, and how much you drink depends on many factors.

You could be the gallon jug person.

You could be the one who slams two full glasses upon waking up in the morning. 

It really doesn’t matter to me, but drinking more water will not only benefit your body, but also how you feel in general and how full you feel.

4. Find the Balance Between Food as Enjoyment and Fuel

After growing up in a house with a lot of diversity in the foods we would cook and eat, I have a great appreciation for the different flavors, combinations, and creations that people share.

I don’t know how that experience differs from others, but what I learned from my experience is that I may have learned to enjoy the food a little too much.

I rarely thought about how food was fueling my body and giving me the energy I needed for all of my sports, lifts, etc…

I mean we all know that food is fuel, but do we all actively think about that?

A simple way to rationalize your thoughts before you think about your next meal might be: “Will my body appreciate what I am about to give it, and will this help me reach my goals?”

Now don’t go all food nazi on me here. If you need to grab a McDouble on a road trip or settle for some Kraft Mac in a bind, it’s okay! 

I think it’s just important to be aware that healthier and more nutritious foods are probably going to fuel your body more efficiently than highly processed and fast foods. This is mainly due to the usually lacking nutrient profile in fast and processed foods.

Finding fun and tasty recipes that are full of healthy and satisfying ingredients that can both fill you up and make you feel well may take a little work, but is totally worth it.

Takeaways

It can be hard to set the correct mindset when trying to begin a diet, especially if there are pre-existing bad habits.

Try these to practice healthy eating habits: 

1. Put your fork down between bites

2. Don’t stuff yourself full every meal

3. Drink lots of water

4. Find the balance between food as enjoyment and fuel

These may not be anything groundbreaking, but practicing these habits personally has helped me on my current fat loss journey. 

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If you found this article helpful it would be amazing if you shared it with friends and family! Andrew and I both love creating content and helping others, and we have been really putting in the time recently to pump out quality content.

We post a lot of quick hitters and thoughts that require less explanation than a blog might on our Instagram page @ivry.fitness. Give us a follow if you like what you see because there will always be more to come!

Finally, we have coaching spots available for this summer if you are still thinking about taking your goals seriously and want a coach to help get you there! We are very confident in our past successes and can’t wait to work with you in the future.

-Josh

Collecting Data to Improve Body Composition

A Wrong First Impression

I can remember being in college with little tent-pole legs sticking out of my shorts absolutely despising that guy at the gym who jotted things down into his little miniature notebook.

In fact, I can still almost picture one particular jacked guy with great posture walking around like whatever was written on that tiny notepad held the key to eternal life (or gains) while I was over in my own corner just thinking about what I was going to eat on my Chipotle burrito later that day.

Naturally, I didn't have a great initial experience with all of those guys that would fill out their workouts on little notepads. It all seemed like something professional athletes were supposed to do, and I was pretty sure none of these guys were professional athletes.

I remember thinking “it wasn’t for me” or that I wasn’t knowledgeable or capable enough to create a workout program.

But now that I think back, I was at the gym just for the sake of being at the gym.

I thought, “Well, as long as I'm here, something has to happen, right? If I go push a couple of heavy-ish things around and get a nice sweat in, surely I'll be looking like Arnold in no time.”

As it turns out, I couldn’t have been more wrong, and that guy I had originally judged for being a “meathead with a logbook” was years ahead of me in terms of utilizing the benefits of data collection for the sake of achieving a physique goal.

The Case for Data Collection

The best businesses in the world that seek to grow and surpass any of their wildest dreams all rely heavily on data to influence their decisions. Since I also currently teach math, I was recently reading a few articles on data collection and this quote from Carly Fiorina (former Hewlett-Packard CEO and a 2016 Republican presidential nomination) came up that I thought was relevant not only for business, but for our purposes also:

"The goal is to turn data into information and information into insight."

- Carly Fiorina

Hyper-successful people like Carly clearly use information and data to drive nearly all of their decisions. Now collecting data and information is not a direct indicator of success, but more successful people than not use data-driven ideas to drive their work.

What if we applied these ideas to our body composition goals as well?

Why Should I Collect Data to Improve Body Composition?

We use data and information to drive our decisions all of the time - even in ways we usually don't think about - because our brains do it almost automatically.

For example, say you tell a joke to a couple of friends and they find it extremely funny. We note their responses as important information such as, “my joke is funny, I should tell that again.”

Then we later tell that joke to some other friends and they also laugh. One of the best ways to see if we have a funny joke is to tell people and measure their responses, but we never really think about the process of telling a joke as a data driven solution - in some aspect, it just is!

Why then, do so many people refuse to let data drive their goals of body composition? It just doesn't make sense to me.

Can you still reach your goals without taking down any hard data or tracking anything? Sure. But, that's also like trying to walk from Columbia, Missouri to Mesa, Arizona without using the hundreds of map apps you could easily be accessing on your phone, which begs the question: If you could avoid all the wrong turns and setbacks, wouldn’t you prefer that? If I told you, “You can get to Arizona one of two ways. You either start walking with no resources or you start walking with a handful of helpful resources,” which would you pick?

What Do I Track?

As you may have noticed if you follow us on Instagram, Andrew and I are always posting little tidbits surrounding our habits of tracking calories, macros, workouts, steps, sleep quality and a host of other things, and this is why: Data is a friend of anyone pursuing a physique-related goal.

From here on, I’m going to talk mainly about my own process and things I'm personally doing.

I was very slow to join the tracking movement as you could tell by my initial response to people tracking in the gym, but clearly I was missing something. So I began to learn and practice all of these ideas about how to eat healthier, make better gains, and optimize rest and performance. My thought was: If I have all of these tools, why not try to use them to my advantage? Especially if the work to track some data points seems to be minimal.

Here are some of the (nearly) daily things I track:

• Steps

• Total Calories

• Macros

• Sleep Quality

• Sodium Intake

• Scale Weight

• My Workouts

Some of these things are easier than others to track, like entering my scale weight into a spreadsheet versus guessing my sleep quality based on how I feel when I wake up. One is straight forward, and the other is pretty subjective since I can’t measure the quality directly.

Here is what it looks like for me on my spreadsheet:

Examples of Why Tracking Has Been Useful for My Personal Fat Loss Goals

Weight Spikes

Occasionally my weight will spike up randomly, and you can even see that happen a few times on my sheet. Specifically near the end of the first week in the image, we can see a fluctuation of bodyweight. Without tracking anything, I probably have no idea what happened, or I could maybe at least incorrectly blame something.

With tracking however, I knew that I had eaten deep dish pizza for a special occasion on April 23 and a couple of other food items high in sodium. That was the only large meal I had eaten that day aside from a couple of other small snacks, so I know I kept my calories low (just didn’t report them for some reason). So why the weight gain? Sodium levels. Any time you eat out or make a dish that is high in sodium, even if you keep a lock on calories and macro numbers, you still might end up with a higher number on the scale the next morning because sodium causes us to hold a little bit of water, skewing your numbers a little bit.

Tracking As a Road Map for When You Get Lost

At some point in the cutting or gaining process, what you were doing before stops working. This is completely reasonable and logical because a lot of things about your body are changing as you gain and lose weight, so naturally it makes sense that the things that we need to do will slightly change.

This year it happened way earlier in the cutting process, and I have written a lot about it in several past social media posts, but essentially what happened was that I was struggling to lose weight early based on what worked for me last year and how I was implementing the diet this year. If I am a type of person that doesn’t track any of the categories listed above, I would probably be clueless about how to progress

However, with this data, I was able to manipulate a few things very easily and started to see results. I personally decided to increase my step count while also trying to better limit the fat consumption in my diet, and it worked!

Trying to Diagnose the Reason for a Poor Workout

This example has a little more nuance than the others, but it is something that has still been helpful for me when tracking. Several weeks ago I went to the [garage] gym and had a memorably horrible day; I felt sluggish, and asleep at the wheel with no motivation or strength to get anything done. I got in a few movements to justify being there and then left, albeit a bit puzzled.

The date I referenced was April 21, and if you peep the logbook picture above, you will see that my sleep quality from the previous night was listed as bad. I remember that night. I got maybe 3 hours of sleep? Again, this may make sense to most people… obviously my workouts suffered because my sleep was poor. Sometimes I have horrible sleep and then go into the best workouts of my life, so sleep may not always tell the entire story.

Another factor could’ve been that I had around 2,300 calories the day before as well (this was at a time when I was eating close to 2,700 cals), so the two could have compounded to provide the perfect storm for a poor workout.

How Much Work Does Tracking Data Take?

Tracking is one of the easiest and potentially most life changing investments you can make on your fitness journey.

I do almost all of my tracking (outside of entering my food into MyFitnessPal) in the mornings. My morning routine is almost always this:

• Wake up

• Use the restroom

• Weigh myself

• Enter bodyweight for that day, then sleep quality, total steps, sodium intake, calories, and macros from the day before into my spreadsheet.

Entering these things takes me maybe a maximum of five minutes if you move slow in the mornings like me, but realistically it only takes a couple minutes of transferring some numbers over into a spreadsheet and you’re done!

What you will probably find when you start is that it isn’t necessarily hard to input the data, but it can be hard to be consistent about tracking if you don’t have a routine for doing so. I mentioned my routine above, but that doesn’t have to be yours. I’d suggest to find a time to update your spreadsheet as often as possible (ideally daily), and start making that a habit!

Conclusion

Hopefully from the information laid out here, you can see why we value tracking data with our own programs, but also why we generally ask clients to track these sorts of things.

The more information we have at our disposal, the more informed decisions we can make. If building a healthy lifestyle and a better body composition is something that you are wanting to work hard for, or you are already working hard for it, then consider tracking some of the things listed in the article to give you a better chance at achieving the composition that you want.

To clarify, data isn’t the only tool we use at IVRY to help our clients, and like I’ve said already: if it’s easy to track this data and it’s easily accessible, it would be silly not to let those numbers help inform decisions along with other important factors.

I encourage you as you continue on with your body composition journey to start using data as a friend and a guide, and to let us know how it goes!

If you found this post helpful or are interested in learning more or having some personal coaching, we are currently adding new clients to our roster! Just click here to learn more!

My Hot Take on the Trending Sexiness of Intuitive Eating in Context of Body Recomposition

It’s a big question in the fitness space: Intuitive eating or counting macros? Which approach is really better for helping you achieve you body composition goals? Let’s set the scene.

For the purposes of this write-up, I’ll be using the phrase “intuitive eating" exclusively in context of those who are implementing it as a strategy for systematic fat loss or muscle gain, which means I’m not talking about it for anyone who is simply looking for a dietary approach that "works for them.” On the other hand, the second term I’ll be considering in-depth is a dietary approach commonly known as the “If It Fits Your Macros” movement (IIFYM), which favors a less intuitive and more calculated methodology to physique improvement that involves eating a certain amount of proteins, carbohydrates, and fats per day within a given caloric window. Another apparent perk of IIFYM? You can eat “whatever you want” (even the “unhealthy foods”) to hit those macronutrient targets. But, there are pros and cons of both.

Let’s break it down even a bit further.

DEFINING THE TERMS

Intuitive eating, as I see it, is a culture of eating that says, “Eat what you want and when you want according to your hunger cues.” Simply put, eat when you’re hungry and stop when you’re satisfied. It seems simple and to the point, and it is.

Counting your macros, however, urges its users to eat within a certain caloric and macronutrient range on a daily or weekly basis with little to no consideration of hunger cues or any natural inclination of when to eat.

Are you starting to see the trend? As their names suggest, one promotes fluidity while the other favors systematic calculation.

As the title suggests, however, intuitive eating (at least for the time being) has certainly stolen the cultural spotlight for many people - and for good reason. If you think about it, the idea really is quite sexy. It’s natural and seemingly casual. It’s loose and fluid - carefree and maybe even a bit rebellious.

Now, since this is a hot take, I’m probably going to reveal some bias in this write-up, but that doesn’t mean I’m saying one is inherently better than the other, nor does it mean I think you should or shouldn’t do one or the other. That choice is 100% up to you. These are just my thoughts and opinions, and I want to make that very clear throughout.

In thinking about this, I’ve developed an analogy called the “Jacked Guy In a Grocery Store” analogy.

MY “JACKED GUY IN A GROCERY STORE” ANALOGY

Imagine walking through the grocery store and noticing a man in his early 30’s with a phenomenally fit and attractive shape. Being a curious kitten, you muster the courage to ask him “what his secret is,” and he responds with something like this: “I just listen to my body actually. If I’m hungry, I eat. And I always stop when I’m satiated. It works great for me and it keeps me looking the way I want to.”

Sexy, right? You’d be instantly drawn to the effortlessness in his voice, and the mystery of its simplicity would be fascinating.

Now, imagine the exact same scenario, but he offers you this response instead: “I’m actually really meticulous about the amount of calories I consume, and I tailor them according to my current goals. I eat between 3-5 meals a day, and I always design my meals around a high-quality protein source supplemented with a vegetable and a carb source like potatoes or rice since I workout quite a bit. If I’m trying to build muscle I eat a bit more and when I’m trying to trim up I reduce my portion sizes. But generally I eat the same whole foods and try to minimize the junk. Oh, and I eat plenty of fruits and veggies.”

And you think in your head something like this, “Well, that actually makes a lot of sense.” Why?

Because his answer was boring. I’d even be willing to bet you’d be a bit disappointed. No secret remedy? Just an honest application of a bunch of stuff that makes pretty good logical sense?

However, I’m not saying that the guy in our first scenario is a complete unicorn. For those with favorable genetics for physique development, it’s quite possible to look really good while putting little thought into your diet. In fact, those people are all over Instagram. As I’ve heard it said many times, plenty of people look amazing in spite of their poor practices. They are the genetically “blessed” - the ones who can “get away with it.

But this is certainly not the norm, and it’s certainly not a plausible reality for too many people who are just embarking on their fitness journeys - especially if you’re setting sail because you’re currently 30 pounds overweight. After all, if you were already genetically blessed, would you really be asking people in the grocery store for their secret remedy? Probably not. You’d have a remedy of your own with little interest in what happened to be working for someone else.

Having said that, let’s get into the practical applications.

I THINK MOST OF US ARE HOLDING OUT FOR A QUICK-FIX SOLUTION.

In the online coaching space, hundreds and thousands of people are finding coaches online, engaging with them, and hiring them to help them achieve their body composition goals. It’s also worth mentioning that there are plenty of people out there who, despite not being able to afford an online coach, are doing their best to implement the “right kind” of diet and exercise to either drop body fat or muscle-up for beach season. So in this case we’re considering two major populations of people placing a value of either money, time, or other resources into their body composition: the people who have already hired coaches and those who are basically trying to coach themselves to save a buck.

And yet one thing I have found to be the case with many of these people when they talk to me about “losing weight” or “getting jacked” is that they just don’t want to track their calories or count their macros. In fact, as soon as I tell people I track my macros, I can almost always sense an immediate and unmistakable disinterest in continuing the conversation. Why? Because I don’t have the secret remedy they’ve been searching for. There’s nothing sexy about tracking your macros to achieve your physique goals just like there’s nothing sexy about a university student studying for weeks on end to pass their chemistry exam. 

If I heard that my friend had passed his final with flying colors and asked him how he did it, what do you imagine he would say? He’d probably tell you that he attended class attentively, took detailed notes, compiled a study guide, and then studied those materials meticulously. And in that case, what sense would it make for me to be - dare I say - disappointed in that answer? None at all! In fact, I doubt anyone would be naive enough to offer any other answer but just some good and honest hard work.

But just for fun, let’s talk about what many of us would rather hear him say. “Oh, I just went to class when I felt like it, took notes when I felt like it, and studied when I felt like it. And it was awesome. It all just kind of happened casually and I got an A. Actually, now that I think about it, I don’t think I ever took notes.” (insert casual chuckle)

In my experience, a lot of people only get interested when they become convinced that getting the physique of their dreams is easily achievable. And let’s be honest, eating intuitively will always be easier than counting your macronutrient intake, which is why I think people are so eager to kick a more meticulous approach to the curb.

Now, here’s where things might get a little spicy.

I have to admit that I get a bit miffed when people seem to want to achieve a physique goal without counting their macros, and here’s why: For a lot of people, intuitive eating is exactly what led them to hire a body composition coach in the first place. And, to be fair, if your intuitive eating had actually been working well for you up until this point, we’d probably be discussing something like sports or the weather instead of your muffin top right now. Yikes! Maybe that stings, but I can’t help but be honest in thinking that’s the truth of it.

At the very same time, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with having a muffin top. I have personally had a muffin top of my own in certain seasons of life.

Maybe your significant other adores your muffin top and you feel like a king among men accentuating your waistline accomplishment. Good on you! I really say that without sarcasm because I never want to pretend like we all have to have the same idea of what’s attractive or desirable in terms of body shape. If you are healthy and feeling amazing in your own body, press on.

Do you see my bigger point though? How silly is it to approach a coach while 20-30+ pounds overweight and insist on an approach that continues to allow you to eat intuitively?

In some sense I’d even be tempted to tell someone that they’ve "lost their privilege" of eating intuitively, but that really makes you sound like a super villain. You had a good thing (intuitive eating) and it became a bad thing (overeating to the point of unhealthy weight gain), and now we’re going to try a different thing if (and that’s a big if) you’re telling me you have serious goals about changing your body shape. 

It's kind of like an sixteen year-old kid being given a cool sports car from his parents just because they wanted to gift him something special for being their son. But sooner than later he starts breaking curfew because he’s out drinking booze and smooching on Sally Sue on the weekends, and his grades start to suffer. At the end of the semester he’s sitting on a report card of two F’s, a D+, and an A+ for irresponsibility. The car gets yanked and mom starts driving him around again until he’s proven he can correct his behavior.

“If the food habits you’ve been practicing for years have led you into unwanted weight gain, it might be time to consider a more intensive approach - even if it means sacrificing a bit of convenience. ”

so, you’re saying intuitive eating is bad?

Of course not. Intuitive eating can be bad just like counting your macros can be bad, but here’s the real equalizer:

The same physiological principles have to be applied when aiming to lose body fat whether you are counting your macros or not. To be clear, your body doesn’t know whether you’re eating intuitively or counting your macros. It just knows how many calories you are consuming on a regular basis. Maybe the science-y crowd would say, “It only recognizes overall energy balance.”

All I’m really saying here is that you will lose body fat if you are in a caloric deficit. Whether you are counting those calories on your finger or implementing another strategy altogether is meaningless.

The problem is that most people cannot intuitively eat in a caloric deficit.

Therefore, the only way I could possibly recommend an intuitive eating approach as your coach is if you could intuitively eat in a caloric deficit, which - in all fairness - is possible. Sadly, however, I might argue that for 99% of people, that would be individually impossible. Why?

Because, again, you have proven that eating intuitively has not worked for you. It is, in fact, primarily responsible for your current unwanted body shape. By very definition of the word intuitive, it has to be eliminated as a viable strategy moving forward because your intuition is skewed. Your diet can be anything but intuitive. And I don’t say this to “be mean” or anything - I say it to provide the groundwork for a real solution that can lead to a healthier and shapelier body for anyone struggling with this.

IS THERE A MIDDLE GROUND?

I think so. The next best approach (for those adamantly opposed to tracking macros), however, would be to consider what some are calling a “mindful eating approach,” but even this comes with great limitation. 

Mindful eating is probably best defined as a somewhat guided approach to eating, without counting calories or macros, that does its best to serve a desired outcome of physical recomposition. But I didn’t pull that from the Oxford library - I’m just saying this is how I think most people in the fitness space are thinking about it.

When I think of mindful eating, I think of a plate that is made up of half protein, a quarter of vegetables, and a quarter “healthy carbs.” In short, you’re paying a bit more attention to what you’re eating and doing your best to control your portions. It’s not totally Freestyle Friday, but you’re not weighing things on scales and popping data points into MyFitnessPal.

But the problem even with mindful eating for physique-related pursuits is that you still have little to no knowledge of your caloric consumption, and at the end of the day, calories are king when it comes to fat loss. As a result, the ambiguity in both intuitive and mindful approaches becomes limiting for a coach since one of our biggest cards to play in the greater game of fat loss is the card of regulated and strategic calorie consumption.

That would kind of be like buying the Chicago Bulls back in ‘96 and telling the GM you want a championship, but there’s one catch: You want Jordan on the bench because, well, you guys don’t really get along that well. He’s healthy and ready to lace up, but you’re not willing to put him in the game.

Is that the right move?

LET’S WRAP IT UP

As you can see, I’ve personally not been wooed by the trending sexiness of intuitive eating for those looking to make significant implements in their body composition. If I had to sum it up in one sentence, it would be this: I just really believe that the specificity of data you can accrue through the habits within intelligently structuring and counting your macronutrients are far too valuable to leave to the potential inconsistencies of intuitive eating if you’re serious about attaining physique-related goals in a predictable, systematic way.

But again, I can’t stress enough, though, how important it is that you realize this is just my opinion - just one guy in a world of a lot of guys and gals.

If you prefer a lifestyle of intuitive eating while attempting to achieve your physique goal, you should by all means pursue that route! I mean that sincerely. It’s 100% your life and your diet, which means you have all the power to make those decisions for yourself.

If you want to banter more, hit us up on Instagram! I genuinely always welcome a good conversation from a stranger about all things fitness and food.

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Thanks for reading, everyone! I sincerely hope you enjoyed the content and learned something.

If you feel like this blog brought you any value at all, consider sending it to a friend or family member!

And, if you're interested in working with me one-on-one, visit The Vegan Gym and apply for coaching. I’ve had nothing but success in guiding people toward their fat loss goals.

Cheers, everyone!

-Andrew

"Can I Go Out to Eat?"

Everyone has such different schedules and has a different relationship with food in regards to being healthy, eating out, and cooking at home. There is no one size fits all approach when talking about diets and how to implement nutrition into your daily routine, but we think it’s important to understand what you are getting yourself into, nutritionally, when you eat out.

After diligently tracking food for well over a year now, I’ve come to realize that almost every entree a restaurant provides has an excess of fat, even the “healthy” or “low calorie” options. Now, no matter if your goal is one of fat loss, or lean mass gain, fat levels are generally recommended to be low or moderate. Most people are just generally unaware of the amount of fat content in the entree’s they order when eating out, or have never really cared or thought to look up the foods they might order at the restaurant, but our hope here is that you at least become aware of what you’re ordering!

I grew up in a family where my dad loved to cook and would cook when he had the time, but there were many seasons growing up where both of my parents were busy at work and my siblings and I had sports and activities we had to get to, so we ate out frequently. Since one’s upbringing has an impact on the decisions they make as they get older, I integrated a similar ratio of cooking to eating out when I got to college.

More recently, now that I’ve started trying to live a healthier lifestyle, I’ve cut back on eating out as much as possible. Don’t get me wrong, there is almost always an option that won’t be too detrimental to your goals at every restaurant, but the options are few and generally not as tasty as all of those other items on the menu that are begging to be eaten. My self-control can be inconsistent at times, so now I just try to limit the amount of times I eat out, or at least try to have a plan before I arrive at a restaurant. I know the last sentence can sound silly, or that I’m being really picky, but nutrition has such a huge impact on your fitness and lifestyle goals that I tend to take it very seriously.

I recently went to a restaurant with my family that we would go to all the time when I was growing up. It’s a small regional chain that is a bar and grill type of setting where they have a wide variety of entree options. So a few weeks ago my family decided we were going to head there for dinner. Now that I check the nutrition facts before I eat at a restaurant, I hopped online to check them out, and to my surprise almost every entree had a minimum of 40-50 grams of fat. My mind was blown. I would venture to say the average fat content per entree was around 60 grams of fat. I would eat some meals at this place and consume god-awful amounts of calories and grams of fat, and I had no idea. Some of those entrees were even entrees you might think were “healthy.” I don’t bring this up to scare anyone, but I think this anecdote is relevant for those that have started tracking nutrition themselves.

Hopefully that knowledge is enough for you to at least think more about what you are eating when you go out, but I wanted to leave you with some recommendations for how to approach eating out.

Option 1: Never eat out. Obviously this option is very restrictive, impractical, and probably not very realistic for most people. However, if you commit to this, you will always be in control of what you are consuming, and you can easily figure out the composition of the macronutrients in your food.

Option 2: Eating out when necessary or to be social. This option is probably the most optimal option for most people out there. The idea here is that you cook and prep as many of your meals as you can, but then eat out when you run out of time due to an unexpected project at work, or when you have three kids trying to make it to three different practices in one evening. Life happens, and we have to be realistic! We are also social creatures, and so no one wants to be the lame one not spending time with friends and family just because they are going out to eat. The best advice for this option is to plan ahead of time and try to find something healthier to eat at the restaurant.

Option 3: Eat out whenever you want. This option would definitely not be recommended, but it is the least restrictive yet also the least optimal for nutrition goals. If you take this approach, there is little work in cooking and food prep that needs to be done, but I guarantee you will miss your nutrition targets again and again if you take this approach.

Again, everyone’s lifestyle is different, but in general we think option 2 is the best to fit most people’s needs. We also recommend that if you do eat out, try and limit the times you eat at fast food establishments versus an actual restaurant because often times the fast food quality is a step down from a restaurant.

Cheers,

Josh