I Studied 1000 Meal Plans, This Stops Fat Loss

Is your meal plan the real reason you can't lose fat even though you're eating healthy? Recently, thousands of people submitted their meal plans to be reviewed by me on this channel, and honestly, most of them were making the same handful of mistakes that are silently killing their fat loss progress. In this video, I'm gonna review 3 real submissions, break down exactly what's going wrong, and show you how to fix it step by step with exact strategies I've used with tens of thousands of online coaching clients so that you can finally start losing fat and building muscle, seeing the results that you want to see. For our first submission, we have Ronnie, and she is a 44-year-old female weighing 126 pounds, looking to get down to about 110 pounds. She's been stuck at the same weight for 8 months and can't seem to drop any additional body fat. And I know for some people you might look and say, 126 pounds, that's nothing already. But Ronnie is only 5 foot tall, so she is what we call vertically challenged. And I know after working with thousands of vertically challenged clients, that 15-pound difference of body fat that she's looking to lose can make a massive difference. She's currently walking 8,000+ steps a day, which is great. She's eating about 85 grams of protein per day. And as you can see on screen, this is what her normal day of eating looks like for her meal plan. Now, on top of this being her normal day of eating, she did mention she eats out once per week, and this tends to be a higher calorie meal than what she would normally have during the week. Now looking at this at first glance, you might think, damn, this looks like a pretty solid plan. She's eating pretty clean 6 days a week with just 1 meal out that's higher in calories. But here's the problem. This 1 or 2 higher calorie meals that she is having can be enough to cancel out the other meals during her week to make her not be in a weekly calorie deficit, which would mean that she is spinning her wheels in maintenance without even realizing it, which it sounds exactly like what she's doing because she mentioned she hasn't lost any weight in 8 months. And on top of that, she's only eating about 85 grams of protein per day, which we would like that number to be a little bit higher. And by the way, if you need to know what your calorie deficit and protein goal per day should be, there'll be a free calorie and protein calculator in the description of this video. And the reason we would want to get her protein higher— because the more protein, the more full you are, the more calories you'll burn, and the more muscle mass you can potentially build. So what are we going to do to fix Ronnie's problem? Well, first we have to stop relying on eating healthy alone. We have to make sure over the course of the week she is eating in a weekly calorie deficit. And we can do this by planning ahead for a potential higher calorie meal. I'm not saying she can't go out to eat and have a higher calorie meal, but what I am saying is she might have to pull back a little bit more on her meals during the week to be able to make room for that weekly calorie meal that's higher in calories and still be in her calorie deficit. So for example, she might change from 18 grams of avocado to 10 grams of avocado Avocado to save some calories. And maybe she would decrease the amount of mangoes and peaches she's having in her snack to save 50 to 75 calories there. And then maybe she would do a half serving of rice instead of the regular full serving. That would save her anywhere from 100 to 200 calories per day, which then would mean she'd eat 100 to 200 less 6 days during the week. And that 1 day a week where she eats out and has a higher calorie meal, she's She would then have room in her weekly calorie deficit to have that meal out that's higher in calories, but still be in that weekly deficit to still lose fat. And the third thing would be to increase her daily protein intake. So maybe instead of having just one egg at breakfast, she would maybe do 2 eggs and 3 to 4 egg whites. Or maybe she would add a little bit more portion size of grilled chicken at lunch, and maybe she could throw in a protein shake with the snack. And all of this works because fat loss is a weekly game, not a daily game. You can be perfect 5 or 6 days a week, but if you're not hitting your overall calories, you will not lose fat and you'll be stuck in a plateau like Ronnie has been. And by boosting the protein intake, she'll burn more calories, she'll be more full, and it'll help her with her workouts and building more muscle as well. So if this sounds like you, number 1, you need to start tracking your calories, weighing your food out, and knowing how many calories you're eating. If you've never done this, you will be shocked the first time you do it. Number 2, if you are gonna have some meals out, you need to plan ahead for them and make sure they're still fitting in your weekly calorie deficit. And again, number 3, use the link in the description below to know what your calorie goal and your protein goal will be. And to find your weekly calorie deficit, just take your daily calorie goal times 7, and that would be your weekly calorie deficit. So if your number comes out to 2,000 calories per day, 2,000 times 7 equals 14,000 calories. Let's just say Ronnie's goal was 2,000 calories per day. She would need to make sure from Sunday to Sunday she is eating 14,000 calories. All right. Now that we've fixed Ronnie, we're going to go to our next submission, Dan. And Dan is a 33-year-old male currently weighing about 280 pounds, looking to get down to 200 pounds. And by the way, if you want to apply for a free review, click the link below in the description if you want me to review your plan for free. Now, Dan is getting 8,000 steps per day, which again is awesome. Great job, Dan. He's consistently tracking his calories, hitting about 2,200 per day with 140 grams of protein, and he's eating pretty healthy on a normal day. As you can see here, his breakfast, his lunch, his dinner, his snacks— he's doing pretty good. But again, his problem is he feels like his progress is very slow with things barely budging. He is going out to lunch with his coworkers sometimes. That is, although he doesn't say the calories, usually when you're going out to eat, you're eating more calories than what you would if you were to make your own food. This doesn't mean you can't do it, but it does mean we have to be smart about it. And again, the common theme: although 140 grams of protein is good, given Dan's body weight of about 280 pounds, we would like to see him increase. That protein number. So here's a couple of the issues I see. If Dan's going out to eat occasionally with his coworkers for lunch, although he is trying to still stick to some lower calorie options, it looks like again he could be eating way more food than what he is realizing, which would throw off his weekly calorie deficit. And if he's undereating on protein, this means he's not burning as many calories and using his metabolism to his advantage. And he might be losing muscle in the process, which is going to slow down his metabolism even more. So what we're going to do to fix Dan's problems are: number 1, he doesn't need to stop going out to lunch with his coworkers, but he does need to make smarter choices around it, where maybe he looks ahead at the menu and pre-tracks what he is going to eat to make sure he's still within his calorie deficit. Or number 2, maybe some days he brings his own food with him where he can still go out with his coworkers, but he's gonna eat his own meal, which by the way, that is okay to do. Or number 3, if the menu doesn't have the exact calories, look up similar meals that have calories for it and plan around that to the best of his ability. And then number 3, I think we have an opportunity to start working in some high protein snacks because it looks like his main meals are breakfast, lunch, and dinner. So I like to always include a snack between lunch and dinner. This way, heading into dinner time, you get more protein and you're less hungry and have less cravings. So this could look like a protein shake, A Greek yogurt, tuna packet, edamame, hard-boiled eggs, turkey breast, beef jerky, meat sticks, whatever you like. But inserting a high-protein snack in between lunch and dinner can automatically increase that protein intake. And why does this work? Because if he has a rough estimate of how many calories he's eating when he's going out to eat, then he will know if he's staying around his calorie deficit or not. And if he's not, he can then make adjustments to his meals Later in the day to be able to stick within his calories for that day. And then again, like we talked about with increasing the protein, he'll burn more calories, he won't lose muscle, he'll have less cravings, and it will accelerate his fat loss that much quicker. So if this sounds like you, number one, when you're going out to eat, try to estimate the calories to the best of your ability. Even if it isn't perfect, you just want a rough range So you can know if you are staying within your calories that day or not. Number 2, aim to get a high protein snack between lunch and dinner. And number 3, get your protein goal set. Again, if you need a free protein calculator, link is in the description below. Now we're on to our 3rd submission, and here we have Aaliyah. Aaliyah is 23 years old. She's currently weighing 208 pounds, looking to get down to 160 pounds. And remember, if you want me to do a free review of your plan, click the link in the description below. Ali is currently getting 8,000 steps per day, which is awesome. Again, she sometimes tracks her calories and she's between 2,000 and 2,200 per day. She currently is only eating about 20 to 30 grams of protein per day, which you might know what I'm going to say about that. And she's currently ordering takeout 3+ times per week. So the problem here is twofold. Number one, we have inconsistent tracking and we don't know exactly what she's consuming because she is ordering takeout quite a bit throughout the week. This makes it very hard to know if you're actually in a calorie deficit. And number two, she's eating far too few protein throughout the day. Now, it's not all bad because again, Aaliyah is doing great with getting at least 8,000 steps per day, and her breakfast actually looks really, really solid to start the day off, which is awesome. So what we're gonna do to fix this for Aaliyah is number 1, commit to a 7-day streak of tracking her calories no matter what. I don't care how many calories she eats. But she needs to commit to seven full days of tracking. No matter if she orders takeout, no matter if she goes out to eat at a restaurant, I don't care. You need to track to the best of your ability, even if it is just guesstimating, and that will help build the habit of being mindful of your food and realizing how many calories you're actually eating. And number two, we're gonna look to bump up this protein intake. By things that we can control. So for example, we might look to add more protein with these overnight oats, or we might look to do adding in some egg whites with her avocado toast to bump up the protein. Or again, we might look to incorporate that in-between lunch and dinner high protein snack to get that protein intake much higher. And number 3, I'm not going to tell her to Stop eating out altogether because that's just not realistic for her right now, and I don't think she needs to stop. But I would set a limit to no more than 3 times per week. And number 2, when she does eat out, we already talked about she needs to track it to the best of her ability, but she also needs to get the highest protein option when she goes out to eat. And that will kill 2 birds with one stone. It'll help her calories and it'll help her protein. This works because you can't improve something if you don't know what's currently going on. So when she starts tracking her food intake consistently, automatically she's going to improve her calories and start losing weight. And number 2, increasing the protein intake is going to do all the things that we've already talked about. And I don't know if you saw this, but she mentioned, I love to eat junk food and takeout. What I have seen coaching thousands of clients by now When we increase protein intake and we make sure we track no matter what, those two things often lead to you not craving junk food as much or craving going out to eat as much because the protein will help with your fullness and your satiety. And tracking your food is going to make you aware and kind of almost like second think about if you actually want to order out or not, or if you might be able to cook from home and have more options available to you at home. It just makes you more aware. And if this sounds like something you're struggling with, I would number 1, commit to tracking for 7 days straight no matter what. Number 2, pre-log your restaurant meals and track the food you're eating when you go out to eat. And number 3, work on increasing that protein intake. And if you want to work with my team one-on-one to help you with your meal plan and fitness plan, click the link in the description of this video below. And now here's the thing. Even when you fix your calories and protein and eating out, the next thing that could stop you from losing fat and building muscle is having the wrong workout program. So to make sure you aren't doing that wrong in order to lose fat and build muscle and look more defined, watch this video here as I break down exactly how to set up your workouts the correct way for losing fat and building muscle.