Weight Loss, Weight Maintenance and Cheat Days

Whoever discovers an easy way to lose weight becomes an instant millionaire! Almost everyone wants to lose weight and knows that doing so will greatly benefit their health. Patti and I have tried probably 100 ways to lose weight over our 62 years, and although we have lost a fair amount, we are still not down to where we want to be. So, we don't have all the answers. However, below are a few things we've discovered along the way.

Tidbits We Have Learned

Resolve emotional issues, and emotional eating and learn to love yourself. Hearing God's Voice and Prayers That Heal the Heart will help you accomplish this. Since one of my lifetime beliefs was, "There is never enough," I would eat fast and lots. Accepting God's rhema to me that there is "more than enough" was an important part of weight loss for me. One cannot lose weight if living with stress or a belief you are not safe.

A morning saliva pH below 7 will hinder weight loss.

One great insight was given to us by Jon Gabriel, who lost over 220 pounds. This was after failing every diet he had ever tried. Jon says dieting doesn't work as it puts the body into a stress mode which triggers fat storage. Vision is powerful. You can speed up weight loss by visualizing processed food as dead food, lifeless cardboard, poison from satan. That should produce a repugnance in your heart toward it so you shy away from processed food.

If you eat processed food, which is rich in calories, but poor in nutrients, your body will think it is starving and activate “the fat mode.” So instead, add real, healthy food, which displaces the bad food. Jon says the key is to focus on including three key things into every meal, and by doing that, the unhealthy eating habits will fade away. The three things he says should be in every meal are 1) live food, 2) protein (we do whey protein from BioTRUST) and 3) Omegas (we use this).

I like this approach because it focuses on bringing in the good, rather than removing the bad. In my Christian life, I discovered that the only principle that worked to allow me to step into Christian spirituality was to focus on bringing in Christ's light, rather than me trying to attack and remove my sin. Then the light of His glory caused my sin to fall away naturally. So I love Jon Gabriel’s focus to include three key life-giving things in every meal you eat. We do that and have found it very helpful. For the protein, we do whey protein in our two daily meals which are drinks and are described here. 

Pre-digest your food by chewing it well, and we take digestive enzymes and probiotics with each meal. 

Cutting calories by 1/3 has been proven in numerous studies to increase life span greatly. Making better food choices and eating smaller portions are essential. Replacing poor foods with great tasting alternatives is crucial. We use stevia rather than sugar, water rather than pop, Kind Bars rather than candy bars.... Well, you get the idea. Artificial sweeteners are a killer, so avoid them. Unhealthy sugar, fructose and sugar substitutes have been added to many if not most foods, and each has been proven damaging to your health. 

The University of Western Australia has found that people who did interval workouts - alternating short bursts of high-intensity exercise with brief recovery periods - ate less post workout and consumed fewer calories the next day than those who exercised at a continuous moderate pace. Plus other research shows that intense interval exercise increases metabolism for 36 hours. This is in addition to all the other benefits of interval workouts. Click here for a blog which describes the 12 minutes of interval exercises we do daily.

Not eating after 6:00 PM appears crucial for weight loss, as whatever you eat after 6:00 is kept as fat. If you add to this making your morning meal a protein drink, then you are largely limiting your eating from noon till 6:00, which can be effective for weight loss.

Cheat days prescribe taking one day a week off and eating whatever you desire (in reasonable amounts). It is even suggested this is mandatory if you want to lose weight. We do that. Also, we are not legalists in that we would say, "I will never eat that." If we crave something, we eat it. We don’t want to have food control our lives. 

One great site for weight loss and weight maintenance is "Beyond Diet." Check it out here. I suspect each person needs to experiment and determine what eating regimen works best for them. This website is recommending a plant-based diet which is what God recommended in Genesis 1:29 and what Daniel chose in Daniel 1:12.