Fat People, You Have No Excuse

I don’t mean to be unkind with this title but the tide is turning in the obesity epidemic and we want to be part of that battle.

Nobody wants to be fat, and nobody has to be. Millions of regular people are reclaiming a healthy body and healthy future and you can too.

First the stats.

• 120 million Americans are obese, costing an additional $147 billion per year for health care.
• Obesity is a racial & sociology-economic problem, hitting Mexican Americans (40%) and blacks (50%) particularly hard.
• Women without college degrees are more likely to be obese.
• This problem has been getting worse and worse every year since 1985 (watch the animated map here) but the numbers appear to be leveling off. [Source: CDC]
• Only 1% of Americans exercise regularly. (You see where we’re going with this??)

There are two ways you can escape the fat prison.

#1 Change your diet

#2 Burn more calories probably through exercise

The following knowledge will blow many people’s minds but becoming healthier, lighter, stronger or more muscular is 80% about what you eat. Not about exercise.

As the stories told in pictures below will show, many people got beautiful bodies predominantly through changing their diet.

This has to be an identity-level shift. The average person has to make 300 food decisions per day. If you make every one of those decisions a “battle of the will” for Oreos vs. kale you will lose.

The only way to win consistently over time (and it will take time, like years) is to:

1. Eliminate all temptation foods from your house (and keep them out)
2. Get the ego on your side by making an identity-level shift (“I’m not the kind of person who puts crap in my body”)
3. Surround yourself with a loving community that will continually motivate, inspire & encourage you to stay in this new identity (see Building your ‘Gang of Five‘). I hear the CrossFit community is really good for this.

That’s it. Those three steps.

If you struggle, set aside time every day to be inspired in this journey. . . .go on Tumblr and search the tag “fitspo” you will see a huge number of people who are working out & eating healthy and many before-after stories & pictures that show that this is possible.

Let’s take a look at some examples below:

Example 1

This is the most important example. It shows that WHAT YOU EAT IS THE MOST IMPORTANT. You can work out like a maniac and still be thwarted by what you put in your mouth. Dialing in your diet, and being consistent with it, gets you results.

 Example 2

This is a high school or college athlete so she’s young and people might say that makes it “easier.” Not necessarily, it takes work at any age.

Example 3

Notice that this young lady stuck with her program for 3 years. If you want that kind of result you need to be willing to make a long-term, identity-level lifestyle change.

Example 4

A total body transformation. Notice how much younger she looks in the after photo. But the same ear-to-ear grin in both photos. Base rate of happiness won’t change much even if you get implants or totally transform your body, remember this and do this for the right reasons — for your health, for your kids, for your family, because it makes your brain more resistant to stress — but don’t do it just because you want to feel different emotions.

Example 5 – Men

Typically men are looking to get built / jacked / ripped. Here is a whole series of pictures that show that it is possible.

These guys are not the Rock. They are ordinary guys like you and me who committed to clean eating, heavy lifting, and monthly coaching for 12 months.

If you want to see pics of men losing significant fat see this page.

Scrawny to Brawny program by Precision Nutrition.

As a testimonial, I completed 9 months of this same program and added 23 lbs, mostly muscle, and still gaining. (I am not being compensated for including this information.)

By the way, this is how typical weight gain looks. Plateaus are normal:

Example 6 – All The Steps Along The Way

Here’s a long-term view of gradual weight loss. Cris found 124 lbs unsustainable and settled at a healthier 135 – 140 lbs instead. Fascinating to see how she goes from ‘cute’ even at 200 lbs to ‘stunning gorgeous’ sub 140. I believe the same is possible for most women. Inside every ‘fatty’ you dismiss on the street is a knockout bombshell you would be proud to have on your arm.

These people changed their bodies, you can too.

But please keep in mind:

• It’s sexy to talk about leaving every gym workout sweating and puking and being totally exhausted.
• It’s sexy to talk about pushing past pain and squeezing out that last rep (I know, I do it all the time myself on Twitter)
• It’s not sexy to talk about throwing out the Doritos.
• It’s not sexy to talk about buying raw vegetables by the pound.
• It’s not sexy to talk about the thousands of quiet moments in the grocery store where you make a tiny decision to not walk past the junk food aisles.
• It’s not sexy to talk about baking five pounds of chicken breasts at once, every Sunday night, like clockwork.
• It’s not sexy to talk about eating buffalo burgers wrapped in raw spinach, every day for lunch, five days straight, like clockwork.

But everything in that list that is not sexy is actually what works.

If you can master your diet, you can look however you want. Compared to the 80% effort in diet, the 20% effort in the gym becomes easy. Even puking in a bucket after squats — not pleasant — is so much more fleeting and therefore easier than changing your diet.

HOW TO GET THERE

Most people will give you all kinds of advice about how to start.

It is not information which leads to action, but motivation.

Scroll up and look at the pictures above. If they don’t motivate you, well . . . go find something that will.

If you still want information — here are three steps that anyone can take to get started.

But you have to promise to follow these steps for at least 30 days.

1. Not a drop of alcohol*
2. Throw all junk food in the trash & don’t replace it
3. Put clean protein** in your body within 30 minutes of waking up

(*As a benefit of #1 you will see significant monetary savings which will help you on your way to joining the financial One Percent.)

(**”Clean protein” means farm-fresh eggs, green lentils with sriracha, or even a grass-fed protein shake.)

Executing these tasks will vary in difficulty depending on your emotional state, willpower reserves, living situation, volume of alcohol & junk food in your house, etc.

But if you can throw out the shit that is bad for you, and keep it thrown out, you have a fighting chance. Just a chance.

The rest is up to you.