Believe it or not, I had this whole email written to you a couple of hours ago! I’d finished both writing and editing it, and I was on the verge of sending it. When I got to the confirmation screen, the entire thing had just vanished, leaving nothing more than the title! Fortunately, I had to run out to a couple of clients in between, so now my frustration has ceased, and I’m ready to bring it to you 2.0 style ;-)
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ve probably seen the posts all over social media from all of the health and fitness pages you follow because it’s Thanksgiving week. The clickbait with titles like, ‘How to Burn Those Extra Calories Before Thanksgiving!,’ or ‘The Best Exercise for Fat Loss Is…’
Please keep in mind that these articles and blog posts are probably nothing more than what I said above: Clickbait that will underwhelm you with both the content and the results of what you’ll learn upon reading them. Fortunately, I always aim to OVERdeliver, and I intend to do just that for you today!
You may remember that a month or two ago, I sent you an infographic called the Permanent Weight Loss Hierarchy. Basically, this was a pyramid/triangle broken down into three levels: Fitness, Nutrition, and Mindset — In that order of importance from least important to most important! Check it out for yourself:
While there’s nothing wrong about this hierarchy, I’ve added a fourth element to it. Sadly, for those of you who are still trying to justify the ‘Eat less, exercise more!’ theory on health and weight loss, Fitness still is at the bottom (or in the pyramid’s case, the top) of the list in terms of where your priorities should lie:
To review this all quickly, Mindset is the base of the pyramid, and for good reason! You can have the best fitness program, the best sleep schedule, and the best nutrition in the world, but if your mind isn’t in this for the right reasons, you’re more than likely going to fall off the rails and fail — HARD!
Next, we have Nutrition, which is the most important physical component of Permanent Weight Loss. In the first rendition of this message, I used Michael Phelps as an example of a world champion athlete who has endorsed one of the corporate spawns of Satan in my mind: McDonald’s. While I’m sure the team of nutritionists and trainers keeping him in peak physical condition year-round don’t allow him to eat that kind of crap very often, he does also get paid to train for hours and hours each day, which when done in massive quantities like that, can undo SOME (not all, and not even MOST) of the damage.
Sadly, unless you’re a world-class athlete, you don’t have the time, or (congrats if you do!) the endurance to train that hard for that long. You need to find exercise that fits into your busy schedule, a sleep pattern that insures your body is both fully recovered and fully operational, and you need to fuel your body with the highest quality foods. The lame comparison of our bodies to premium cars is very, very true despite it’s continued level of lameness: If you’re driving a premium car, you need to fill ‘er up with premium gas. If you put regular, or even diesel fuel into a premium engine, you’re going to run into problems!
I added Sleep to the fold due to recent research I’ve seen on the benefits of getting good quality, regular sleep, and the terrible detriments that not prioritizing this aspect would cause to both your health and to your waistline. Some of the issues that irregular, low quality sleep can cause include: Out-of-whack hormone levels, a hindrance of your fat-burning capability, impaired decision-making around food and drink, as well as reduced metabolism. Not exactly preferred conditions to battle with, if you ask me!
Lastly, we have Fitness at the top of the pyramid. When coupled with both good quality nutrition and regular, quality sleep habits, regular exercise can certainly help you to expedite the process on both your health and your weight loss journey. Sadly, if you’re starting at the top of the pyramid and you’re working your way down, you’re going to be in for a lifetime of disappointment in this regard!
So, what’s the best exercise for fat loss? The exercise of instilling good, healthy, quality lifestyle habits like the ones I mentioned above! It’s not sexy, it’s not easy, but I’ll tell you one thing — It is simple ;-)
Sincerely,Pete Weintraubpete@weightlossbypete.com
P.S. If you didn’t already see in yesterday’s message, I’m giving you a way to have your cake and eat it, too, this Thanksgiving! How? By downloading and implementing the recipes in my Thanksgiving Recipe Guide!
To get your FREE copy, simply go to www.weightlossbypete.com/thanksgivingrecipes.