How To Eat During Your 90 Day Challenge And Beyond

As I sit here to write this post, my head is just spinning with information and anxiety! I want to get this information out there and really HELP. I am not talking about selling shakes, I am talking about educating as many people as possible about what it really takes to lose  some weight and how to properly coordinate what you eat every day.

STEP ONE: Start with the MOST IMPORTANT step. MINDSET! Yes, mindset. How many times have you started something, ANYTHING, that you set your mind to DO and wouldn’t take no for an answer? How did it go? Or maybe you’ve even attempted to lose weight before and going  to the gym was a priority you were just sticking to! We just do better at the things that we WANT to do when we are committed to doing it for ourselves. No one is successful in losing weight if they just don’t want to lose weight or feel they have no reason to do so. Or worse, someone else is MAKING THEM!

So step 1: Set your mindset to DO THIS FOR 90 DAYS (this is a 90 day challenge and not a 2 week challenge).

STEP TWO: 

Know your daily calorie consumption and limitations. Listen, people can tell you there is no need to count calories, BUT, the scientific fact still remains that your body needs a certain amount of calories every day just to function and it will store any EXTRA calories that you didn’t use up (or burn) via your daily activity or exercise. And we are not talking any calorie. So that means, you gotta eat close to what your body needs (both in number and in content for easier processing), or burn thru anything you feed yourself above what you eat that your body didn’t really need.

And forget about eating too much LESS than what your body needs daily because if I eat one banana all day, I am going to physically be exerting some energy in just my daily activity to burn that banana off and then some. But clearly, that’s neither smart nor healthy. AND ironically, your body will go into starvation mode and will hold on to everything its got to protect itself. So you actually won’t be losing weight for too long! And you will get sick.

SO! Let’s find out what you need to be aiming for in terms of calories, protein, carbs, sugar and even sodium every day. And don’t worry, it will be a PIECE OF CAKE to track and once you have been tracking things for 2-3 weeks, you will not only be AMAZED at how much more you know about what you are really eating, but your body will be trained to eat healthier choices naturally. And you won’t be hungry :).

Fun (or tragic) tip: the ingredient that is most often to blame for all this trouble we get into with weight control is SUGAR. They sneak the sucker into EVERYTHING. Even “fat free milk”. LOL. 

I recommend MyFitnessPal because it tracks IT ALL and even your Visalus shakes are included in there. PLUS, if you happen to have an iPhone, this also has a mobile app that scans food labels for ya so you don’t have to type anything in! SCORE!

Ok, so your first assignment is to visit this site (http://www.MyFitnessPal.com) and register for an account (totally free, no worries). And I don’t have an affiliate or any association whatsoever with these folks. I don’t think they sell anything, but I don’t know. I just have their app on my phone and it is EXCELLENT. It has helped me understand WHAT ELSE is being sneaked in my food, and I recommend it to all my clients.

Once you have your account THEN, go find out your DAILY CALORIE LIMIT or what you should aim for daily according to your measurements and how much weight you want to lose and by when. This is a mystical magical number and it will be YOUR BFF! (best friend forever)

The tool will give you your daily calorie goal to aim for, HOWEVER, as you are entering your food in, you will also see a summary of all other nutrients you are consuming and two columns that will show you what your goal should be vs where you are at. So, if eat a donut, you will see a RED negative number next to Sugars with a -46g and then a “goal” of 24g. That means you went over your goal of how much sugar you should be eating. CUS ITS NOT JUST ABOUT THE CALORIES!!!!

If that should happen to you, and it will, just go back and check what you eat that day. It could all be the fault of ONE ITEM (it usually is) instead of a combination of things. Once you know what that is, make the necessary changes. Maybe you eat less or it, cut it out altogether, cut in half… or whatever. The point is that now YOU KNOW!

STEP THREE (I think I am still counting steps right? LOL):

Now that you know what you should aim for eating each day (in terms of calories and such), make your shakes and prepare your meals accordingly! That means that your shake calories count towards that total. And yes that also means YOU HAVE TO ALSO EAT SOLID FOOD! :-)

Why breakfast is important: When our bodies go to sleep,  our metabolism slows WAAAAAY down. So the first meal you eat the next day will re-ignite this FIRE so that your body begins to burn baby burn! If you don’t start this fire til noon, you have wasted 5 or so good solid hours of natural fat burning time! Plus your body is not feeling the love (tired).

So, I recommend a shake at breakfast that is about 250 calories and low in sugar (such as Chocolate Banana Vi-Shape Smoothie). One tsp or two of cocoa (I use organic cocoa), 2 scoops of shake, one med banana, 8oz unsweetened almond milk (or another low cal milk of your choice) and blend. If you don’t have a blender, use the flavor packs for your shake and eat the banana. :-) And yes, you can enjoy your coffee after. I get enough energy from my shake that I now often think I can skip the coffee. But, I MENTALLY enjoy the actual drinking of my coffee so I drink it anyway :)

If you are aiming to lose more than 15lbs I recommend TWO shakes a day.

Why 2 shakes? The bottom line here is that the shakes will nourish your body with what it needs daily without added empty calories. In order to get the same nutrition from your meals, it would take a heck of a lot of meals. So once you drink the shake, and as long as its above 200 calories, you are going to feel satisfied and full for a few hours. Usually until lunch time.

Make your 2nd shake when its most convenient for you. Lunch or dinner. Then make that 3rd main meal something substantial, like some veggies, chicken, fish or something like that. WE buy rotisserie chicken often. Already cooked :-). Remember you are aiming to reach your personal calorie number for the day so use this as a reference to know how to spread your meals throughout the day. You can add snacks in between your main meals. And no matter how cute they are, M’Ms are not snacks. Here is a list of 100 Healthy Snacks for you.

To re-cap: we are aiming to consume what our body needs daily so that it has enough energy to burn fat and function properly.