(This is another Guest Post by John Barban – I’ll be back later this week)
I was walking through the book store the other day and I saw a couple new nutrition books that were displayed on a special table in the middle of the aisle, you know the ones that are new and the book store wants to get people to notice them.
Then I noticed something a bit odd.
When you see one nutrition book by itself with no other nutrition books around it seems as though it could really have the answer you are looking for.
HOWEVER, when you see dozens of nutrition books lined up beside each other, well then each one just doesn’t seem all that profound. After all there are at least 50 different nutrition books at the book store I was at, each one telling a different story about how to lose weight. How could they all possibly be right?
The answer is, they can’t! (and they can at the same time)
Each one of them puts a slightly different spin on the reason we gain weight and how we can lose weight.
Each one of them talks about life changing success stories that their program has produced.
So how is it possible that each of them are telling a different story about how fat loss really works, but all of them can produce results?
The answer is simple. The only way, and I mean the ONLY way to lose weight is to eat less calories than you burn off.
The way you go about doing this, or better yet, the way you go about telling yourself how your body is doing this is the only difference between any of these books.
Behind every single diet book ever written is the simple concept of eating less. They use many different ways to dress up this concept, and this extra ‘dress-up’ (ie the catch or the hook) is the reason we hand them our hard-earned money.
Here is Video to illustrate my point. It’s my quick and dirty book review of just a few selections from our library.
As I’m sure you’ll notice this gets confusing and quite contradictory right away.
And this is also why I think Eat Stop Eat is the easiest way to lose weight without driving yourself nuts.
Enjoy.
John Barban
To Learn more about Eat Stop Eat go here ==> www.EatStopEat.com
Nice. I like how your videos are simple: they just cut the fat and get straight to brass tacks.
By the way, I read your latest project. I’ve actually been doing that every since I started ESE because I’m lazy! All I what is to maintain muscle mass, why go through all the craziness?
The key is stated above the video. Ultimately it is all about eating less, and stopping for brief fasts is just plain easy
, no fuss, no muss, and no difficult rules.
haha, that’s great John. I agree that Eat Stop Eat is the way to go overall – it definitely can save you from going mad with all of those conflicting things on the market! And it’s particularly great because no matter what the truth turns out to be regarding the health properties of various foods (hmm, so curious that the so-called ‘facts’ about nutrition seem to change so often
), Eat Stop Eat is clearly the way to go to keep body fat levels healthy – so flexible.
I’ve deliberately gained and lost weight using the calories-in-and-out model since I was in my teens with *very* different food choices (low fat, high carb, high animal protein, vegetarian, etc) – yes, I’ve read a LOT of books on diet by now! But it was always the same thing – the calories in and out are what mattered. Some foods are much better for satiety for me and make it easier to not overeat (I eat a moderate protein, lowish carb Paleo type diet), but in the end it’s the in and out that matters when it comes to what my body fat levels end up being.
~ Lillea
So far I’ve only been successful in fasting a whole day twice. The second time I only made it until about 3:30 or 4pm. The last two times I tried, I got a whiff of my husband’s toast and my son’s bagel and that was it, I had to have my breakfast. How do people find this so easy? Maybe if I lived alone and had total control over what was going on in the kitchen I could, but at this time I can’t seem to exert the proper self-control. We both work at home so that does make it hard. Any ideas or suggestions? I’ve lost 9 pounds since April but have been at a plateau for the past three weeks and my only hope to break it is ESE.
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haha, that’s great John. I agree that Eat Stop Eat is the way to go overall – it definitely can save you from going mad with all of those conflicting things on the market! And it’s particularly great because no matter what the truth turns out to be regarding the health properties of various foods (hmm, so curious that the so-called ‘facts’ about nutrition seem to change so often
), Eat Stop Eat is clearly the way to go to keep body fat levels healthy – so flexible.
I’ve deliberately gained and lost weight using the calories-in-and-out model since I was in my teens with *very* different food choices (low fat, high carb, high animal protein, vegetarian, etc) – yes, I’ve read a LOT of books on diet by now! But it was always the same thing – the calories in and out are what mattered. Some foods are much better for satiety for me and make it easier to not overeat (I eat a moderate protein, lowish carb Paleo type diet), but in the end it’s the in and out that matters when it comes to what my body fat levels end up being.
~ Lillea
P.S. – Sorry, forgot to tell you great post!
@Jan
Jan are you splitting your fasts between two days?
B
John, every time I hear there’s some new content from you I immediatelly stop what i’m doing and have to see it.
The world needs to see more of your thoughts. Please produce more content.
Great video. The funny thing is that he didn’t even mention some of the really “far out there” diets.
Something else I find interesting. Some diet experts are so quick to knock fasting for fat loss, however, they are telling people they can never eat another food group again, or they are giving incredible restriction recommendations!
Why would someone think it is better to follow very restrictive, compulsive eating habits instead of simply taking a small break from eating to lose weight?
It’s baffling if you think about it . . .
That’s something else that Eat Stop Eat has that other “diets” dont: it helps you learn why you eat, and it helps you develop a healthy relationship with food. I have yet to come across another diet that does that.
Well done, John!
I must admit I’m talking to everyone who asks me about my weight loss about this program. I actually didn’t find the fasting all that hard except for one or two days so far (been doing it for two months now). Maybe it’s willpower, maybe it’s genetic, not sure, but it’s simply not been that hard. My wife has been very helpful in that she makes sure not to cook foods I like the days I’m fasting and asks me if it’s my fasting day before mentioning food or going out to eat or anything of the sort.
Past fasting being hard… you’re done. That’s it. You win. Program successful. What other diet or weight loss program can you say that if you follow ONE rule, you have gotten everything right. AND that one rule doesn’t involve counting or complex measurements you can get wrong. If I cheat on a fast, I’d certainly know it, no gray area here. Eat or don’t eat.
I had already begun a lifting program about 4 months before for muscle increase and fat loss and found that although I was getting stronger, I wasn’t losing any weight. Well, I finally started losing the weight using Eat Stop Eat. I’ve lost 10 pounds in 6 weeks. Most importantly since it’s a diet modification it’s something I know I’ll have to keep up (even though I may be able to stagger the fasts farther out) for the rest of my life and I’m fine with that. This is simple enough to be doing decades from now.
Also, although I only have 6 weeks of numbers so far (I’m an engineer I keep good numbers) it has not impacted my lifting strength gains and in fact it looks like I’ve GAINED lean body mass while doing eat stop eat. I may be eating more on other days than some others on this same diet, but I was eating enough before to keep weight steady and gain muscle mass. Now I simply fast twice a week and I’m now losing weight at a reasonable rate and the same muscle gains (will see, but at least some) are still happening!
Thanks Brad, and I must admit the trickiest part is telling people to actually BUY your program. It’s too simple! I know your program includes a great deal of science that as an engineer I loved, but they see my results and they don’t seem to need that. They just want to know the ‘how’… and as we know the ‘how’ is about as simple as it can get.
Some may find it harder based on genetics, medical conditions, etc… but no one can say it’s not ‘simple’ and ‘effective’.
I think we all need to ban together and convince John to get his nose out of the books and start doing more blog posts…
I think if we all yell at him enough we can get a once a week post!
B
@Jan
Hey Jan,
I too have a family and am often tempted when I smell something really good. I’ve found that I actually prefer to fast on busy days. I work at Church all day Sunday from 8-3pm. I’m super busy and even if I could eat I don’t have time to stop and eat on Sundays. So by the time I reach 3pm I’m not really so hungry and I can easily make it until 5 or 6pm. Maybe that would help you too – pick a day when you’re busy with other things – so you don’t think about it so much? Good luck! I’ve lost 28lbs so far with Eat Stop Eat and I really feel it’s more mental than anything else. I can always tell myself – I’ll have that tomorrow – when fasting and mental it’s not so tough.
Great video. I find ESE to be very easy due to the fact that I am single, live alone, and am very lazy when it comes to food. So this works very well for me. For the most part, I have a big salad at lunch and the rest of the time I snack on seeds, nuts, and fruit. When I fast, it is noon to noon.
@Sarah
Sarah, Congratulations! That is awesome.
Hey Brad, I apologize if this has been asked before but I just read your elimination experiment, it doesn’t look like you do any cardio? Do you not do cardio at all?
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@Brad Pilon
I was attempting to just do once a week, but have not even accomplished that. The first attempt was successful, about two months ago. I think a part of me is not 100% into it because I keep reading about how we should have an early hearty breakfast…so when I begin to waver I just choose to believe the other programs that tell us how important it is to keep feeding our muscles. I do believe deep down that you are right so I just need to DO IT! Thanks, Sara, I do remember that the day this worked for me I had lots of activities lined up. Congrats on your progress, that’s fantastic.
Great review Jon. Couldn’t agree more about the same message being touted by these books about having a caloric deficit. Is there anything easier then ESE? I’ve found it to be the easiest program to follow out there while others try to complicate things and make losing weight to be harder than it really is.
Dear Brad,
I’ve tried your ESE twice per week and have found it to be successful once I got past the guilty programming of you’ve got to eat 6x per day and what about losing muscle mass? After several weeks I began to get stomach pains about an hour after eating which I never had previous to ESE. I think maybe I have reduced the need for Hydrochloric acid in my stomach so when I went back to eating I wasn’t making enough? I really enjoy your scientific analysis of eating,and thought I’d just ask you if you’ve had any other comments about similar circumstances?
Thanks, Bruce
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Great video. I was chuckling…
It reminded me of a post that Brad wrote for my friend Rusty Moore’s Fitness Black Book blog where he talked about all these different diet strategies and how they all worked…because they got people to do something different and (usually) all involved eating less.
The ESE approach is so simple and practical…I lost 2 inches off my waist in about 4 weeks (from a 34 to a 32), and I was in pretty fair shape to begin with.
I think doug wins a reward for encapturing ESE the best. I wish I could capture the sheer brilliant elegance and effectiveness as well as his did.
So let’s just say dougX2, lol.
p.s.
I can’t express how glad I am that John committed to doing more content! The world needs more of Johnny B. His way of getting to the CORE of things is just brilliant.
Calories in/calories out theory isnt the whole picture i dont think. I recently stumbled across a self experiment where an individual eat in excess of 5000 calories/day of animal fat and protien going as close to zero carb as possible, and still lost weight. Its here…
http://cavemanforum.com/index.php?topic=957.0
Now that puts holes all over the calorie theory. Clearly its all about insulin. Keep your carbs around 50-100grams/day and you’ll lose weight alot more effortlessly.
Brian,
You just cited a single uncontrolled single-subject case study to disprove years of scientific study.
The idea that it is ‘only insulin’ is pure conjecture, and is not a tested, nor proven statement.
BP