M3 Nutrition Fundamentals

Nutrition Fundamentals

Just because you're not sick doesn't mean you're healthy. The food you eat can be either the safest and most powerful form of medicine, or the slowest form of poison. 

No change will alter your well-being as much as changing what you eat.

EATING FOR SUCCESS

The best type of diet is one that is made up of real (whole) foods. Real foods are foods found in nature, close to their natural SOURCE: unaltered, unprocessed, unrefined, full of nutrients. Where these foods are found, there are no food labels! We were created to eat this way and have been for most of human existence. Think about where the food you eat most often came from and how much it has been altered.

Here's an example: if you pick an from a tree, is it healthy? Always! Apples are full of water, fiber and amazon healthy nutrients. Is applesauce healthy? IT DEPENDS! The father you move away from the SOURCE, the more processed, unhealthy and expensive the food typically becomes. Foods lose nutrients every time they are processed and typically there are more ingredients added to keep them from staying good for longer and tasting “better”.

 

Real foods are nutritious and make you feel better after you eat them. Choose foods based on their ability to positively impact your health and well-being. Eliminate the processed foods and add more foods that come from the earth such as vegetables, fruits, whole grains, and quality proteins like fresh fish and meats.

A calorie is a unit of energy. Regulating calories is key for maintaining a proper weight. If you do not know how much money you spend, how can you maintain good financial health? If you do not know how many calories you are eating, how can you maintain a proper weight? Although calories are not the only contribution to your metabolism, it does play a large role in overall weight. If you put more calories in than your metabolism burns, you will likely store those calories as new tissue, likely body fat. 

WEIGHT MANAGEMENT IS MORE THAN RESTRICTING CALORIES

Tracking calories and not thinking about the quality or nutrients within those calories is old-school and outdated. Becoming aware of the calorie content of certain foods you eat regularly or meals you have consistently is important, but thinking that weight loss is simply calories in and calories out will not give you the proper weight management tools to have sustainable success.

We recommend using a calorie counter to plug in a day or two as you begin your journey and work with your coach to figure out the proper daily caloric intake and also breakdown within each meal, given your starting point, activity level and goals. Generally, you do not want to ever have a daily intake less than 1,200 calories. It will cause your Metabolic Efficiency to become low and your metabolic rate will decrease. Too low of a calorie intake is one of the biggest contributors to a “slow metabolism”. 

Your Metabolism Assessment has a place for calorie intake and also your body weight. 1,800 calories is a good daily calorie goal for the average person, but feel free to consult with your coach to get a more customized number. It is good to use a calorie counter and check in once in a while (we recommend once a week) to keep you accountable and aware of your intake but not enough to obsess over these numbers.