Fixing 3 Strangers Fat Loss Meal Plans

Is it possible the real reason you aren't losing fat and building muscle is because you're actually doing too many workouts and eating too few calories? Recently, thousands of people applied for me to review their fitness plans on this channel, and most of them were making the same couple of mistakes. So in today's video, I'm breaking down 3 real submissions to show you what these issues are and exactly how you can fix them. And just so we're clear, these are the same solutions I have given to tens of thousands of online coaching clients to help them lose fat and build muscle. So I know these will work to help you see progress faster too. So let's dive into the first submission. Now up first, our first submission is Richard. Richard is a 47-year-old male. He's currently weighing around 251 pounds, looking to get down to 225. And before we go into exactly what his day looks like, we're gonna first touch on his biggest problem, which is sticking with his plan. And by the way, if you want to apply for a free review of your plan, there will be a link in the description below. Right now, Richard is getting 4,000 to 6,000 steps per day. He sometimes tracks his calories around 2,500 calories per day, 150 grams of protein per day. He eats out a couple of times a week, and this is what his daily normal day of eating might look like. He also currently does not have a set eating schedule, just kind of eats whenever he wants, and he's training 4+ times per week. So right off the bat, I see a couple of problems with Richard's plan. First, eating whenever I want. We're going to talk about why this is a problem in a second. But the second problem I'm seeing is Richard might be eating a little bit too clean and healthy on a normal day of eating. Number 3 would be his daily steps, and number 4 would be his workouts throughout the week. So for eating whenever he wants, the reason this could be a problem for Richard is because if you're eating at all different times of the day, your body's hunger hormones have no rhyme, reason, or structure. So that means you'll usually end up being more hungry all throughout the day. Second, when it comes to eating too clean and healthy, this can lead to being very fucking boring and you saying, fuck this, I'd rather be fat, and not sticking with your plan, which Richard said he was struggling with. Third is the daily step goal Only at about 4,000 to 6,000 per day, this is going to lead to decreased calorie burn, making it harder to be in a calorie deficit and lose weight. And number 2, from a mental standpoint, I have seen people who are not as active throughout the day struggle more with boredom eating, with emotional eating, and just staying on track with their plan becomes more difficult. And last but not least, working out 4 times a week, Plus, which means probably at least 5 times per week. You might be thinking, Eric, if you work out more, wouldn't you see more progress? And the answer is actually usually no, especially if you're trying to be in a calorie deficit, because when you're doing a lot of high-intensity exercise, that is a lot of stress your body is trying to recover from. And if you're not recovering from that stress, that's what then leads to burnout. It leads to higher cravings, higher hunger, and it leads you to go off track with your plan. And because you're trying to be in this calorie deficit and you're eating less, you generally aren't going to have as much recovery to go around to work out 5, 6, 7 days a week intensely. So to fix these problems that we're having here, number one, Richard, and maybe you have to start getting on a meal structured schedule. So if let's say he eats at 6:00 AM, 9:00 AM, noon, 3 PM, and 6 PM. Those are his structured eating times. He cannot eat unless it is those times. And of course, you might give yourself a 30-minute buffer range, but that is the times of day you're eating. I'm not saying you can't eat things. I'm just saying you have to eat around those times. This will train your hunger hormones to be hungry at those times, and it'll help you stay on track more and decrease cravings. Throughout the day. Now the second thing he's going to do for eating too clean and healthy, if Richard was a client of ours, I would tell him incorporate 300 to 400 calories per day of treats, of things that you enjoy eating. Like, this is all fine and well and healthy, but holy shit, it looks boring, Richard. So I would incorporate 300 or 400 calories of ice cream or chips or chocolate or whatever it is that you enjoy. And I know this might seem counterintuitive to a lot of people because you think, how? You're eating— telling him to eat chocolate and lose weight? Well, yeah, because if 300 calories of chocolate is gonna help him be more consistent and hit his calorie goal, he will lose more weight eating 300 calories of chocolate per day. Number 3, to fix his steps, he's either going to— he's gonna increase his daily steps. How he does that, he can go on more walks, he can take mini walks, Something I do a lot because I sit at a desk all day as well. I'll take little 5 or 10-minute walks throughout the day to have my steps add up throughout the day. Or it could be something as simple as taking the stairs instead of the escalator or parking farther away at work. And why this is going to work and help speed up his fat loss is because sticking to the goal— I'm not telling you to go get a 60-minute walk, I'm telling you to get a 10-minute walk. That's much more doable. And the more you walk, the higher your calorie burn is going to be, and the more likely you are to stay on track with your plan. And last but not least, for the working out 4+ times per week, I would stick to the strength training, but I work out 3 to 4 times per week max. That is the sweet spot that we have found for our online coaching clients that has allowed them to make great muscle building and strength gain progress, but not do too much That it causes them to fall off track or not stick with the plan or under-recover. Because like I mentioned earlier, if you're under-recovering, you're not going to stay on track with your plan in the long run. And by the way, if you need a free workout program to follow, there will be one in the link in the description of this video. And then for you, your main takeaways: have a set eating schedule, eat 300 to 400 calories per day of treats, Get more daily steps and stick to 3 to 4 times a week workouts. Now let's go on to our next submission, and this is coming from Cheryl. And Cheryl is a 37-year-old female. She's currently weighing around 207 pounds, looking to get down to 150 pounds. She's 5'1, so she is vertically challenged. And right now her biggest struggle seems to be just dropping the weight. She's having a hell of a time losing weight after pregnancy. Which I can understand. And so it looks like right now she's getting about 6,000 to 8,000 steps per day. She sometimes tracks her calories. When she is tracking, she's eating around 1,000 calories per day. I'm going to dive into that a bit more later. And she said on a good day she's eating 60 grams of protein. Looks like she's doing some form of intermittent fasting. And then the rest of the day it seems like she's eating relatively clean or relatively healthy, just like Richard. was as well. She's pretty hungry, especially at night, and she's not losing much weight. And sometimes she has a set eating schedule, but nothing specific. And for her exercise, she's mainly doing cardio, and she's doing cardio 4+ times per week. So I have a couple of problems that I see thus far with Cheryl's plan. First, we're going to start with the number of calories that she is eating and the fact that she is Sometimes tracking her calories. And what I'm about to say, I'm not trying to be mean. I'm just saying this because I want you to win, Cheryl, and everybody else out there. Um, you're not eating 1,000 calories, and I'm not saying you're lying. I'm just saying that you're probably just ignorant to the fact of how many calories you're consuming, and not ignorant in a bad way or malicious way. Number one, you said yourself sometimes You track calories, so you don't really know exactly how many calories you are eating. And number 2, if you were eating 1,000 calories per day, unless you are the only human being in the world that defies the laws of thermodynamics, you would be dropping weight like massively quickly. And so we'll talk about how to fix this and a bit more on this a little bit later, but I want to go to the Second problem that I'm seeing, and that would be skipping breakfast. And I'm not saying inherently skipping breakfast is a bad thing, but it looks like for you, especially because you're very hungry at night and especially because your protein is rather low, it looks like those fasting and the skipping breakfast is not beneficial for you. And the third thing, I kind of just mentioned it, which is we're pretty low on the protein goal here, only 60 grams a day. And number 4, you're working out 4+ times a week And that main form of exercise is cardio. So let's talk about why these are problems and why this is bad. So number one, if you don't know how many calories you're actually eating, it's gonna be next to impossible for you to lose fat. And I know you said you're eating 1,000 calories. Like I mentioned, you're not eating 1,000 calories, and maybe you are 1 or 2 days of the week, or maybe you are earlier in the day, But when you get to the nighttime and you're hungry and you're craving, maybe you are having foods that don't align with your goals, and maybe you're not tracking it, because if you don't track it, it's not real. So maybe it's the weekends you're eating more and not tracking. But the issue is, if you don't know how many calories you're eating, you're not going to be able to lose fat. So that is the reason that this calorie number is bad. And yes, she mentioned later down here that she does have PCOS, but I have coached thousands of clients with PCOS, whether it's our client Rebecca, whether it's our client Sabrina, whether it's our client Rochelle. All of these ladies have had PCOS and have been able to lose a tremendous amount of weight. And while I understand it might be harder to lose weight with PCOS, it is not impossible. And as long as you are in a calorie deficit, you will lose weight. So the second part of this is the skipping breakfast part. For some people, skipping breakfast and intermittent fasting works well, but for others, this is what leads to overeating and massive cravings and hunger at night. And that's exactly what it looks like is happening for you. And that actually bleeds into the next point of having a low protein intake. If you're not eating until 3 or 4 PM, good luck eating more than 60 grams of protein per day. It's going to be pretty hard. And when you aren't eating enough protein, you're not burning as many calories. You're probably losing muscle mass, which is going to slow down your metabolism and just make your body almost work against you rather than work for you. And last but not least, you're only doing cardio. And you're doing that cardio 4+ times a week. I'm not sure if it's high intensity or low intensity, but that being said, this also sounds like another example of you might be doing too much and your body's not recovering from it. And we're not including any strength training, which means you're probably losing muscle, slowing down your metabolism, and making it harder on yourself to lose weight. Not to mention, a lot of high-intensity cardio with PCOS is usually not a good mix because it's going to increase your stress and your cortisol, which also makes it harder to lose weight. So how are we going to fix these problems for Cheryl? Number 1, we're going to learn how to accurately and honestly count calories. I have a calorie counting video on this channel if you want to check it out, or I will put a link in the description to my free calorie counting guide. But essentially, you're going to get a food You're gonna weigh your food in grams, not cups, tablespoons, or ounces. Grams. You're gonna use that to then use some sort of calorie counting app to track your calorie intake. And you need to do this for the next 7 days. That is the only— full 7 days. That includes weekends. It includes if you're going out to eat, everything. Because that's the only real way to know how many calories you're consuming. And the second thing we're going to do to fix skipping breakfast is we're going to have some food and we're going to have some nutrients within 90 minutes of waking up. So what I would— if you were our client, what I would tell you to probably start doing is within 90 minutes of waking up, have 20 to 40 ounces of water and have at least 20 to 40 grams of protein as well. And that goes right with number 3, how to fix the protein intake, we're going to eat more protein earlier in the day to increase this protein number here. And then number 4, to fix the exercise, we're going to probably pull back on the amount of cardio that we're doing. We're going to implement a strength training routine. And again, I have a free strength training program if you want to click the link in the description of this video. And the reason all of this is going to work is when you start to track your calories accurately, you'll know how many calories you're consuming. It'll open your eyes, it'll help you lose weight. Number 2, when you start to eat more food earlier in the day and you get more water and hydration earlier in the day, this will help you not be so hungry at night. Most people only focus on, I'm hungry at night, and so they zone in on that. But the reason you're hungry at night is because you're not giving your body enough protein, calories, and nutrients during the day. So if you eat more during the day, you will not be so hungry at night, and that will fix that. Number 3, when you bump up your protein intake, you are going to burn more calories. You're going to be more full, more satisfied, build more muscle, and you won't be so damn hungry at night. And that actually combines with the final point of adding in strength training, which helps you build muscle— protein and strength training are muscle's best friends— you'll start building more muscle, you'll be able to recover better, it'll work a little bit better with your PCOS, and all of those things will help you see faster progress. So for you watching this, some take-home points here: track your calories for the next 7 days, no BS. Eat and drink within 90 minutes of waking up. Increase your protein intake. And strength train 3 to 4 days per week. Now for our next submission, we have James here. And again, by the way, if you want me to review your plan for free, click the link in the description of this video. James is a 24-year-old male, roughly weighing around 200 pounds, wants to get down to 170. He's also currently already lost 100 pounds, over 100 pounds. So shout out to you, James. That's incredible. Currently getting about 8,000 steps per day, consistently tracking calories around 2,300 to 2,500, really good amount of protein per day. And this is what his typical day of eating looks like. As you can kind of see, it's, it's again pretty clean, pretty healthy. He's doing a lot of the keto bread, sugar-free Jell-O, cauliflower rice, sugar-free barbecue sauce. A lot of these Lower calorie options. Some of the issues he's having though is he sometimes binge eats and/or feels hungry. And last but not least, for his strength training, he's doing 4+ times per week of strength training and sometimes has a set eating schedule. Now, again, congratulations James on all your progress thus far, but if you want to lose those last 20 to 30 pounds, I see I see some problems that we might be able to fix. Number 1, I think he's eating too clean, healthy, low-calorie, sugar-free, high-fiber tortillas. I think he's doing a little bit too much of that, and I'll explain what I mean a little bit later in the video. Number 2, we've talked about this quite a bit, but he's strength training 4+ times per week. And number 3, He sometimes has a set eating schedule. Now, the reason I think he's eating too clean and healthy and sugar-free this, low-calorie this, is because I've seen people eat so clean, so healthy, everything's low-calorie, sugar-free, you know, high fiber, whatever the case may be, and they almost do this so much to the extent that they're never satisfied. Their body is never satisfied because they're always swapping for the lower Not to mention, a lot of these sugar-free things do have sometimes a high amount of artificial sweeteners. And artificial sweeteners aren't bad, so don't worry, but when you have them in a very high quantity, sometimes they have been shown to actually increase your appetite. And I think that's a little bit of what's going on here. Not to mention, much like Richard earlier, I think he's eating so close to the Clean, healthy. He's just like getting fucking bored and he's not allowing himself to incorporate treats or foods that he enjoy. And he might feel, maybe even without knowing it, a little bit too restricted, which then leads into this binge eating or, or feeling really hungry. So that's the first part of it. The second part for the workouts, again, after already losing over 100 pounds, that means your body has been in a calorie deficit for a very long period of time, and you're still trying to be in a calorie deficit to lose these 20 to 30 pounds. So it just sounds like your body's not recovering. All the signs I see— you're feeling hungry, you're binge eating, you're at a plateau— doesn't sound like your body's recovering from the workouts that you are currently doing, which will lead to overeating, more hunger, fatigue, Fatigue, exhaustion, restriction, all these sort of things. And number 3, sometimes having a set eating schedule— you've already lost a ton of weight, and you being in a calorie deficit has probably thrown— for that long of a time has thrown off your hunger hormones a bit. So if you're sometimes having a set eating schedule and you're eating all over the place, you're not really helping out your hunger hormones, and they don't really have a set schedule to follow, which would make it harder for you to stay on track. So how do we fix the problem here? Number 1, incorporate more regular food. Like, don't get keto bread toast, just get regular fucking bread. Don't get sugar-free Jell-O, just get the regular Jell-O. Don't get cauliflower rice, just eat regular rice. Again, choosing these lower calorie options, they can be good, but if you're doing it in excess, it's not going to be good as you're seeing it right now. So just include some normal fucking foods into your day, James, and you'll be fine. And like I told Richard, I think you would also benefit from having 300 to 400 calories per day of treats that would allow you to enjoy them, feel more satisfied, feel less restricted. Number 2, like we talked about earlier, I would drop down your workout days To 3 to 4 days per week. I would keep the strength training, and you're already getting a good amount of steps. Just do 3 to 4 workouts per week. And number 3, I would give yourself a set eating schedule that you are sticking to. And by the way, let's say you're like, well, Eric, the weekends look different than the weekdays. That's fine. So you have a set eating schedule for the weekdays, and you have a set eating schedule for the weekend days. That's okay as well. You just need set eating schedule. And again, the reason this will work is you will feel less restricted when you eat normal foods and foods that you enjoy, so you won't feel the need to binge eat or be as hungry. You're going to have less stress on your body. You will recover better, which will lead to less over-restriction, less overeating, less hunger and cravings. And number 3, you will get on a set eating schedule that'll have your hunger hormones work for you to have them be on a certain schedule versus feeling hungry all over the place or getting these random cravings. So for you watching, if you're somebody who's always picking the sugar-free, low-calorie option, it might be okay just to get the regular fucking option sometimes. Number 2, you strength train 3 to 4 days a week. And number 3, have set eating scheduled times. I hope you found this helpful, and if you're interested in working with an expert coach on my team one-on-one to help build you a plan and hold you accountable to it, there will be a link in the description of this video for our coaching. Or if you'd like to learn more about why working out 3 to 4 times a week is actually better for progress, watch this video here.