Demystifying Macros (Part 2)
What are Macros? And why should you care?
Here’s how to track macros, what percentages mean, and why macros can help with your goals
Demystifying Macros (Part 2)
Part 2: Track Macros / Goal Setting / Percentages
In part 1 last week we talked about what macros are and why they affect your body, whether it’s loss or gain.
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So Why Care about Macros? — To solve lack-of-result frustrations. Macros help you set a GOAL and become aware and conscious of how much you tend to OVER OR UNDER EAT or how imbalanced your nutrition may be
If you are liking the results you’re seeing then you may already be getting your macros right. But for people who struggle either with not being able to lose fat, or not being able to gain muscle, then eating according to macro goals can significantly transform your results.
Here are some common questions I get about macros and my answers:
What’s an easy ways to keep track of your calories and macros ?
The number 1 easiest way is to PLAN AHEAD. Setting your nutritional goals and then figuring out what foods meet those goals, & breaking it down into number of meals you need to eat per day & then food prepping is absolutely the easiest way to ensure you’re nutrition is on-point.
Tracking with an app or counting in your head or the ol’ pen and paper tracking, these all lead to frustration, in my opinion & experience with clients.
You can absolutely do what works for you.. but remember… the goal is to LEARN how to eat for the rest of your life. not to be perfect for a certain number of weeks.
Living lean is forever so you’ll be doing yourself a favor if you use macros as training wheels but eventually learn to fly on your own!
In short the answer is not tracking. It’s setting goals and learning how to reach those goals.
I’m not a fan of counting macros, it’s too much work for me, is it really the only or fastest way to get lean?
No, It’s not the ONLY way to get lean. Lots of people are able to get lean without even knowing what macros their consuming. You can take a chance and work toward your goals without caring at all about macros, but if you find yourself frustrated, then taking a look at your macros could help you figure out why.
What will lean you out the FASTEST is not necessarily the best for your body.
Again I want to emphasize that you don’t have to “COUNT” macros — you just need to understand them and how they affect your outcome.
I get the desire for fastest results possible, but I hope that you will get the importance of long term results & focus your attention to creating and building a great, super-healthy body, that will be great and super-healthy forever.
Let’s take the emphasis off of how fast you can get lean, and put it on how WELL & how sustainably you can do it.
What is the main difference in one macro dominating over another? If ‘our body doesn’t know the difference of percentages, & as long as we stay under the calories, we’ll lose,’ how does manipulating the percentages help or hinder our goals?
Your body DOES indeed know the difference between macro types.
Carbs are faster digesting and give more immediate energy, fats are slower digesting and give more lasting energy, and proteins help re-build muscle tissue.
If you’re overeating, you will gain weight regardless of which type of calorie it’s from.
Remember again that we are not just trying to lose weight — we are focusing on building a healthy, lean, athletic, and toned fit body.
Your body needs balanced and well-rounded nutrition to maintain your healthiest weight and also to be healthy in every single way there is to measure health. There’s too much emphasis on weight loss and our hope is to turn your attention to HEALTH & WELLNESS, which of course includes a normal or athletic body fat percentage achieved by training and eating the right amounts of the right types of foods.
How do I know how many calories is too many vs not enough and does the macro percentages have anything to do with that? For example, if I am ‘suppose’ to have 2000 calories, but I feel sufficient and satiated on 1500, is it because my fat percentage is too high? Or protein?
Too much or not enough is a question of how close you are above or below your goals. If you do not know your goals, they are really easy to figure out!
Here’s a BMR calculating website we use (as a shortcut to a more complicated formula), all you need to do is plug in some data about yourself and get your BMR number then multiply by the appropriate activity factor for your lifestyle. Most of you who are on following our workout programs and training at least 3-5x per week are going to use 1.55
GENERAL ESTIMATES HELP US BUILD GENERAL GOOD HABITS
If your goal is 2000 calories per day and some days you get 1700 and other days 2200, then by the end of the week you are actually averaging close to 2000.
If you consistently get only 1500 cals per day you run the risk of stalling your fat loss because of your bodies concern for survival. When not enough food is present, our bodies go into conservation mode instead of readily burning off fat.
I can’t tell you how many women I’ve worked with who get BETTER results when they start eating enough, instead of chronically undereating.
We recommend a deficit of around 300 cals per day to safely burn fat while still getting enough nutrition to maintain your gainz.
If I have reached my macros and still hungry, should I eat more? If I haven’t reached my macros, but I’m already full, should I still eat?
Hunger is temporary, and so is your current physique. If you want to see change in your body, you need to make changes in your eating behaviors. If you keep on “listening to your hunger” and NOT eating according to your goals, you’ll likely see the same results you’re seeing now.
Your nutrition plan is going to be set up to tell you the truth about what you should eat if you’re really serious about your goals. Your hunger on the other hand is going to fluctuate, be driven by emotional feelings & cravings, and quite frankly, not give a damn about your goals.
We have discussions like this one every day in our members site https://www.teamlivelean.com. Join us to get all your questions answered and take the fastest route possiblie to living lean.
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