Your body needs two different things from a diet, "macronutrients" which are fats, carbohydrates and protein, then there are micronutrients which consist in some vitamins, minerals, water, some lipids and amino acids.
First of all if you are fat, you need to eat less, if you're skinny, you have to eat more. So you would have a calorie limit to hit, 1500-2000 if fat and 3000~ if too skinny, but in this calorie limit you should hit the right amount of essential nutrients (macronutrients and micronutrients) that the body needs.
Don't do the wrong thing of eating too many calories while not eating enough protein or carbohydrates.
To start with your diet you should stop eating junk food or anything like that, eating healthy is the best way to get healthy.
Some tips I found useful:
- If you're hungry but you are on a cut (losing weight), drinking water or tea will help cut the hunger.
- If you can't eat enough all at once, eat smaller meals through out the day. eg: instead of eating 3 big meals you can't finish a day, split it up into 3 big meals you can finish and 3 snack periods.
- At first it will be difficult, but with time you'll get accustomed to it.
- Use this as a calculator for your cuts, detract 200-300 calories.
- Use this on a bulk (gaining weight).
Protein
Protein is important, probably the most important macronutrient you could need for healthy muscle development. Now take your bodyweight in lbs and eat 1g of protein for each pound. (eg: you weigh 180 pound you should eat 180g of protein each day, but if you are 200lb and your ideal weight is 160lb, you should eat 160g of protein each day) I'll list some reasons to eat protein:
- It helps you build muscle.
- It helps you lose fat.
- It supports muscle over fat making you lose more fat and less muscle on a diet.
- It will make you recover better from exercises, it also decreases soreness.
- It keeps off weight loss.
Somebody told you that eating a lot of protein is unhealthy? And if you eat too much you'll get sick? That's all groundless nonsense, you can eat as much protein as you want, you can eat 500g if you'd like, but it won't help eating over the amount needed, you can also eat as much protein in one meal as you'd like, there is no limit.
Protein rich foods:
- Fish
- Poultry
- Eggs (Also, eating more eggs a day has no effect on health or cholesterol, but that only applies if they are boiled, as scrambled eggs contain oil used to cook them which does increase cholesterol.)
- Red meat
- Milk
PS: Eating enough protein would be advised but it won't kill you if you eat less although it would probably slow muscle development.
Count your calories
If you want to gain muscle, you should eat more of everything.
What to eat: Vegetables and Fruits
If you want to lose weight, you should eat less of everything.
And you can't choose both, at first you should focus on what's advised (if you're skinny eat more, if you're fat eat less) and then decide whatever you want to do.
Bulking (gaining muscle) : If you want to gain weight, try eating (16-18 x [bodyweight in lbs] ) calories every day, for as long as you can.
Gaining 3-5 pounds per month would be your target, gaining any more than that wouldn't help you much as it's mostly fat.
And if you say that you eat a lot and you don't gain any weight, you're not eating enough, simple as that.
Cutting (losing fat) : If you want to lose fat, try eating (10-12 x [bodyweight in lbs]) calories per day and keep that protein intake as high as you can.
You need to keep exercising while cutting, otherwise it will not be effective, it will be uncomfortable but you need to bare with it for the results.
You should not resort to surgery as it's not safe, there are huge risks compared to exercising where you can lose all the weigh you want with no risks at all.
If you can't gain weight or lose weight, you're most likely not counting well, try to adjust the number of calories the next day.
Gaining more than 1 lbs per week is not recommended as what you gain after that is mostly fat also losing more than 1 lb per week is not recommended either as you'll be starting to lose muscle.
There are many ways of counting calories, there are some great calculators out there on the web, I usually use WolframAlpha or Cron-o-meter.
What to eat: Vegetables and Fruits
Your parents told you to eat vegetables and fruits, not because they're delicious (which they are) but because it's healthy. Here are a few reasons to eat veggies and fruits:
- It protects you against diseases.
- They are rich in every essential micronutrient.
- For the amount of calories it has, it fills you up so it makes you less hungry.
Now about what kind of vegetables/fruit to eat, it's all up to you, although some pretty effective and delicious vegetables and fruits you could eat are:
- Broccoli - It is high in fiber and low in calorie.
- Tomatoes - Prevents cancer and it's delicious.
- Spinach - You know why Popeye eats a ton of spinach? Because it prevents muscle and bone loss AND prevents cancer and heart diseases.
- Carrots - Huge amount of vitamin A.
- Oranges - Vitamin C and magnesium help fight diseases, also don't buy orange juice as it's usually mostly sugar, eat them raw or make the juice yourself.
- Apples & Berries - Rich in antioxidants that prevent cancer, heart and eye diseases.
Eat whatever you find as a vegetable/fruit, as they are high in fiber and low in calorie they are the ideal type of food to eat on a cut.
What to eat: Grains and Cereal
Nuts - Any nuts are good, high in protein, vitamin E, magnesium etc. Also high in calorie so they're perfect on a bulk.
My favorites are: Almonds and cashews, but you can choose anything.
Oats - Amazing breakfast food, fills you up, full of carbs to power you up.
Quinoa - High in protein and fiber, free of gluten and tastes great.
Lentils - Cheap, tasty and literally booming with protein, probably the cheapest source of protein out there.
Rice - Just like oats, full of carbs and extremely tasty.
Pasta - I know that these are not grains, although they are made out of them so I though of putting it here, delicious high carb/protein food also relatively cheap.
You can basically eat anything, just be careful about it's protein/calorie count if you're cutting, always check the label.
Supplements
Choosing supplements is complicated if you have no idea what to get as most of them are useless, I'll make a small list about supplements that work save your money.
Fish Oil - Fish oil is great, omega 3 especially, it makes you smarter, stronger and improves your general health. EPA and DHA are the essential omega 3 fatty acids you want, ALA is less effective.
Eat about 1-3g of EPA/DHA per day.
Vitamin D - If you don't get enough you should supplement it, but only if you don't get enough as having too much vitamin D could be dangerous (check with your doctor if you need to supplement it). Vitamin D is one of the most important vitamins out there, is is involved in everything so not getting enough will make it worse for you everywhere.
Protein Powder - If you're not getting enough protein out of your meals, protein powder would be the answer, the type of protein powder doesn't really matter so just get whatever is cheapest.
Magnesium - usually you don't get enough of this, consider supplementing.
Zinc - same story as magnesium same for Vitamin C.
Vitamin C
Multivitamin/minerals - It would help if you're not getting enough of these from your meals, not much but it would.
Creatine - Contrary to popular belief, creatine is safe and helps with muscle development a little, eating about 5g of it everyday would be recommended, also consider buying it in monohydrate form only, much cheaper and just as effective.
PS: You find creatine in red meat too, in about 2-3 pound you can find 5g of protein, but eating 2-3 pounds of red meats everyday would not be recommended.
That's pretty much it, anything else is garbage and you should avoid it, also the only necessary supplement would be Fish Oil, you should avoid everything else if you can't afford them.
- It protects you against diseases.
- They are rich in every essential micronutrient.
- For the amount of calories it has, it fills you up so it makes you less hungry.
Now about what kind of vegetables/fruit to eat, it's all up to you, although some pretty effective and delicious vegetables and fruits you could eat are:
- Broccoli - It is high in fiber and low in calorie.
- Tomatoes - Prevents cancer and it's delicious.
- Spinach - You know why Popeye eats a ton of spinach? Because it prevents muscle and bone loss AND prevents cancer and heart diseases.
- Carrots - Huge amount of vitamin A.
- Oranges - Vitamin C and magnesium help fight diseases, also don't buy orange juice as it's usually mostly sugar, eat them raw or make the juice yourself.
- Apples & Berries - Rich in antioxidants that prevent cancer, heart and eye diseases.
What to eat: Grains and Cereal
Nuts - Any nuts are good, high in protein, vitamin E, magnesium etc. Also high in calorie so they're perfect on a bulk.
My favorites are: Almonds and cashews, but you can choose anything.
Oats - Amazing breakfast food, fills you up, full of carbs to power you up.
Quinoa - High in protein and fiber, free of gluten and tastes great.
Lentils - Cheap, tasty and literally booming with protein, probably the cheapest source of protein out there.
Rice - Just like oats, full of carbs and extremely tasty.
Pasta - I know that these are not grains, although they are made out of them so I though of putting it here, delicious high carb/protein food also relatively cheap.
You can basically eat anything, just be careful about it's protein/calorie count if you're cutting, always check the label.
Supplements
Choosing supplements is complicated if you have no idea what to get as most of them are useless, I'll make a small list about supplements that work save your money.
Fish Oil - Fish oil is great, omega 3 especially, it makes you smarter, stronger and improves your general health. EPA and DHA are the essential omega 3 fatty acids you want, ALA is less effective.
Eat about 1-3g of EPA/DHA per day.
Vitamin D - If you don't get enough you should supplement it, but only if you don't get enough as having too much vitamin D could be dangerous (check with your doctor if you need to supplement it). Vitamin D is one of the most important vitamins out there, is is involved in everything so not getting enough will make it worse for you everywhere.
Protein Powder - If you're not getting enough protein out of your meals, protein powder would be the answer, the type of protein powder doesn't really matter so just get whatever is cheapest.
Magnesium - usually you don't get enough of this, consider supplementing.
Zinc - same story as magnesium same for Vitamin C.
Vitamin C
Multivitamin/minerals - It would help if you're not getting enough of these from your meals, not much but it would.
Creatine - Contrary to popular belief, creatine is safe and helps with muscle development a little, eating about 5g of it everyday would be recommended, also consider buying it in monohydrate form only, much cheaper and just as effective.
PS: You find creatine in red meat too, in about 2-3 pound you can find 5g of protein, but eating 2-3 pounds of red meats everyday would not be recommended.
That's pretty much it, anything else is garbage and you should avoid it, also the only necessary supplement would be Fish Oil, you should avoid everything else if you can't afford them.
My favorites are: Almonds and cashews, but you can choose anything.
Oats - Amazing breakfast food, fills you up, full of carbs to power you up.
Quinoa - High in protein and fiber, free of gluten and tastes great.
Lentils - Cheap, tasty and literally booming with protein, probably the cheapest source of protein out there.
Rice - Just like oats, full of carbs and extremely tasty.
Pasta - I know that these are not grains, although they are made out of them so I though of putting it here, delicious high carb/protein food also relatively cheap.
You can basically eat anything, just be careful about it's protein/calorie count if you're cutting, always check the label.
Fish Oil - Fish oil is great, omega 3 especially, it makes you smarter, stronger and improves your general health. EPA and DHA are the essential omega 3 fatty acids you want, ALA is less effective.
Eat about 1-3g of EPA/DHA per day.
Vitamin D - If you don't get enough you should supplement it, but only if you don't get enough as having too much vitamin D could be dangerous (check with your doctor if you need to supplement it). Vitamin D is one of the most important vitamins out there, is is involved in everything so not getting enough will make it worse for you everywhere.
Protein Powder - If you're not getting enough protein out of your meals, protein powder would be the answer, the type of protein powder doesn't really matter so just get whatever is cheapest.
Magnesium - usually you don't get enough of this, consider supplementing.
Zinc - same story as magnesium same for Vitamin C.
Vitamin C
Multivitamin/minerals - It would help if you're not getting enough of these from your meals, not much but it would.
Creatine - Contrary to popular belief, creatine is safe and helps with muscle development a little, eating about 5g of it everyday would be recommended, also consider buying it in monohydrate form only, much cheaper and just as effective.
PS: You find creatine in red meat too, in about 2-3 pound you can find 5g of protein, but eating 2-3 pounds of red meats everyday would not be recommended.
That's pretty much it, anything else is garbage and you should avoid it, also the only necessary supplement would be Fish Oil, you should avoid everything else if you can't afford them.
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