episode 167: a simple skill to lose weight without a diet
Today’s episode is a follow up from last week’s where we talked about the concept of “fattening” foods and what that actually means.
In episode 167 I’m getting into how the idea of calorie density and nutrient density connects back to fat loss. We’ll revisit the grid concept from last week and talk about how to use that as a tool to figure out what foods you need to be incorporating into your day to day routine to lose weight without counting calories.
You’ll hear a little bit about the good/bad mindset around food and how to shift away from that and where you actually need to focus your time, energy and attention if you want to lose weight without a diet.
In other big news—I am opening up 1:1 coaching spaces starting late March/early April. As part of that I am raising the 1:1 coaching rate for the first time, ever. But before that happens, I’d love offer podcast listeners an opportunity to grab a 1:1 spot at the current rate, which is $275/month. If you’ve been thinking about working together but haven’t made the move yet, then now is the time.
If you’re interested, click here to schedule a consult call before Friday March 8 (meaning the call needs to be on the schedule for this week or next) so we can get to know each other. No obligation with the consult—just a chance for you to share what’s been going on with you, learn more about how personalized coaching works and see if it feels like the right fit.
Make sure you listen to episode 166 of The Diet Diaries to get all the support you need to use today’s skill in the right way and also check out episode 160 to find out more about the most misused skill for weight loss.
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[00:00:00] Hello, friends. Thanks for listening today. It's episode 167 of the Diet Diaries. And today's episode is going to be a follow up to episode 166, which is last week's. If you haven't listened to last week's episode, I recommend you listen to it first. You don't have to, like, this will still be helpful, but it's going to tell, um, it's kind of a follow up.
[00:00:23] It's going to tell a more complete story and be a more complete picture of how to use these skills. Um, but before I get into that, I wanted to kind of drop a special announcement here. So this announcement is going out only to people who listen to the podcast, because I really, really value and appreciate you guys and people on my email list, right?
[00:00:41] So these are the communities of people that like I really connect with that are here, that you are, um, generously sharing your time, energy, and attention with me, and I do not take that for granted. So I wanted to let you guys know that I'm going to be I'm intaking new one to one clients starting in April and I am going to be raising my rates for the first time in almost three years.
[00:01:04] I am raising my one to one coaching rate For that intake, but I wanted to offer to you guys my podcast people and folks on my email list I'm offering to you guys if you're interested if you've been curious about one to one coaching thinking you might want to work together I'm offering for you guys to join at the current rate, um, before the increase happens.
[00:01:26] And so if you're interested, um, you can book a consult call this week or next week, right? So this is the kind of thing where it's like, I want to take action quickly, right? Because I'm going to be then kind of opening this up in about two weeks to everyone else kind of like at that, at that new intake rate.
[00:01:42] Um, so if you're interested, if you've been thinking about it, if you've been like, I really want to do this, but like, I don't know if I'm ready, I'm not sure if the time is right. Maybe this is a sign from the universe that, like, the time is right. Um, sometimes money is a good incentive, and, you know, getting a better price can help us move things along?
[00:01:58] Great, like, why not? That's as good of a reason sometimes as any to get us to take action if we've been kind of, like, slow to do so. So there's going to be a link in the show notes to set up a discovery call. So that discovery call needs to be booked for this week or next week. Um, there's a good amount of availability on the schedule.
[00:02:15] I added some extra time on Fridays, which I don't normally do so that people have a chance to book a call and then we can meet and there's no obligation with that call. That's for us to get to know each other. Um, for me to meet you, for you to meet me. for you to share what's going on with you and what you're looking for support with.
[00:02:30] I will talk through how coaching works and we can see if it's a good fit. Um, and then go from there. And then we would get started. Um, we could get started sooner than that, really. We would be able to get started more, um, like mid to late March. Um, we don't have to wait till early April. So wanted to let you know about that.
[00:02:49] And so then let's dive into today's topic. So I mentioned that it's a follow up to last week. So last week I was talking about calorie density. And this idea about like foods that are quote fattening, right? We've kind of grown up around that language. And I wanted to talk more specifically today about how that connects into fat loss and why it matters, because I did not get into that last week.
[00:03:11] Um, and I think I meant to, but then I sort of didn't. And I'm kind of glad I didn't because it's nice to break these up, these concepts up into smaller chunks so they're really digestible and you can kind of take away from them what you need to and have time to sort of start practicing and then you really start to build the skills on top of each other.
[00:03:27] So if you recall from last week, right, we talked about this grid, right, this x y axis, we had calorie density on one axis. We have, um, nutrient density on the other. And we see how those two kind of, um, features, so to speak, of foods overlap. We can have a food that's really calorie dense and not very nutritious.
[00:03:44] We can have a food that's really nutritious and not very calorie dense. And we can have the opposites of those things. And so this can be a really useful tool in terms of fat loss, because when you look at your grid and you even just think about these concepts, foods that are really calorie dense, um, typically tend to be Easy to overeat, um, especially the less nutritious ones are hyperpalatable, usually very processed, easy to overeat.
[00:04:09] And so are very important to pay attention to, always, even more so when you're working on fat loss, right? When you're working on fat loss, you need to be eating less calories and your body is burning. And so portions matter. So again, this is not about not eating those foods, right? We're not using that term fattening or junk or crap anymore.
[00:04:30] We're working to notice the language we use and moving away from that. We're working to be aware of portions. So foods that are very calorie dense, whether they're nutritious or not, we need to be very mindful of portions, right? So some examples of calorie dense and very nutrient dense foods would be things like nuts, nut butters, avocados, um, cheese.
[00:04:52] Those are the ones just coming off the top of my head. Calorie dense, non nutritious foods are all of like your chips, your baked goods, ice cream cookies, all of that stuff. Um, so, but in either case, right, a small amount of food has a lot of calories. Now one is going to have a lot of nutrition, which is going to play a role in fullness.
[00:05:10] This is not a calorie. It's a calorie. In terms of energy, yes. In terms of nutrition and fullness and how your body responds to the food, no. So we need to be very mindful of portions and how we're using those foods, right? So if you're eating non nutritious calorie dense foods, right, sweets, chips, baked goods, all that stuff, need to be used after you've had a nourishing, satisfying, satiating meal, right?
[00:05:37] After you've had your nutrition, after you've had like a really filling meal, they're not used to feel hunger, right? They are really used to feel a craving or desire for something sweet or crunchy or salty. When we use them in that way, and we pay attention to them when we prioritize them, again, separate episode that I will do.
[00:05:54] We set ourselves up for success, right? We don't put ourselves in a position we are primed to overeat these foods, and we are able to have them in a portion that lines up with our goals. It is totally fine, and I would even say necessary, to have dessert after definitely one meal a day on a regular basis, maybe even more depending, um, in order to be able to stay consistent, right?
[00:06:19] So those non nutritious calorie dense foods, I know that gets to be a mouthful, but I'm just trying to reiterate the concept here. Play a very important role in your diet, by diet I just mean way of eating, um, in your life, in your lifestyle, in your consistency, in your progress, right? They are what make this sustainable.
[00:06:40] And also we need to incorporate them in portions that make them. sense. So again, this just helps to shift the mindset. These foods aren't bad. They're not crap. They're not fattening. They're not junk. They're just foods that we need to pay probably extra attention to in terms of portion and use them in the right way, in a skilled way, eating them for the purpose that they are meant to, right?
[00:07:01] What is their job? Their job is to Not to fill hunger, not to give you nutrition. Their job is simply for pleasure and joy. And that's wonderful when we need to use them as such, right? Then we have foods that are less, like, less calorie dense and very nutritious. Those are foods we want to eat a lot of, right?
[00:07:20] All the time, all the time. And when we're working on fat loss, again, the skills that you use to help you feel more at ease around food are the same skills that will help you lose fat. That's why these things are not like mutually exclusive or sometimes I get confused by that saying, but you want to be eating a lot of kind of less calorie dense, more nutritious foods a lot of the time, right?
[00:07:42] That's your lean meats. That's your veggies and your fruits. And um, you know, your whole grains and beans and those things kind of, you know, they tend to be a little bit more calorie dense, but certainly not as much as something like, you know, cheese or nuts or nut butters or things like that.
[00:08:01] So we want to be eating most of our foods. That's what's going to fill hunger. Right? So when you're hungry, you want to choose a nutritious, um, food that is maybe a little bit less calorie dense, right? Kind of on this, more to the side of the spectrum so you can have more of it. Right? When we eat foods that are less calorie dense, we can eat more of them.
[00:08:21] It goes back to that peanut butter. I think my example was, was it peanut butter and strawberries, right? You can eat a lot more strawberries for 100 calories than you can peanut butter. You can eat like two cups of strawberries and you can eat one tablespoon of peanut butter. Just visually speaking, there is a huge difference in the amounts of those foods, and therefore, in the ways that they are going to fill you up.
[00:08:40] Does not make one better than the other. They have different jobs. So this is really about putting the right food into the right job with the lens of fat loss, right? So you want most of the food most of the time to be nutrient dense. You want to get a good amount of food from the less calorie dense foods.
[00:09:00] some of your food from the more calorie dense foods, and then you're using kind of that bottom right quadrant. And again, I'll link a blog post that has this visual for you. The bottom right quadrant, which is your baked goods, candy, ice cream, chips, and snacks, and all that stuff, not to fill hunger, but in smaller portions.
[00:09:19] As a way to, um, enjoy craving, like satisfy cravings, um, eat, you know, for pleasure, um, and all that kind of stuff. So this is really just about getting, again, a little bit more objective around food, right? These are skills that help you strip away some of the emotion, the good, the bad, the guilt, the out of control, I have no willpower, all of these stories and narratives.
[00:09:47] And these labels, which are all very emotionally driven and looking at food more objectively. What is the job of this food? Am I using this food in the right job and in the right amounts, right? So there's a job and then there's the amount. And those things have to, we need both of those things to go together.
[00:10:05] If you pick the right food for the job, like let's say you're really hungry and you're like, great, I'm going to have like some proteins and veggies, but you don't have enough. you're going to be hungry later on and then you might be looking for more snacks. You need, and to that point, if you're hungry and you go and start to use like snacky food to try and fill that, you're going to overeat that very quickly.
[00:10:25] You're going to eat that in a portion that's way exceeds what you actually need and certainly what your body needs from an energy standpoint, from a caloric standpoint, right? And I know sometimes talking and hearing about calories, Can be triggering and I get that and also We have to learn how to look at these things a little bit more objectively right calories.
[00:10:44] This is this is science Right, and we've been taught to have all these emotions and negative feelings about it But part of living in a human body is understanding this science, understanding how to feed ourselves in a way that lines up with how we want to feel and what our bodies need. And no different than knowing that we need to exercise, or that fruits and vegetables are nutritious and candy is not, or that like we get our, our blood pressure could be up or down, or we get our blood work back and our cholesterol could be high.
[00:11:12] Like, We, we look at these things and we have to know, we have to have this information so we can take care of ourselves. Um, and so that is what I am trying to do kind of with kind of this series of episodes. And, you know, I think I really, I think I'm going to keep this one short. Um, I'm looking back over it at my notes here.
[00:11:32] You know, actually I do want to mention a couple of other things. Just, they're kind of building on what I've already said, is that when you're working on fat loss, right, and you're eating a little bit less than your body needs, You're going to get hungry. That's your body's normal response. It's what it's supposed to do.
[00:11:49] That's normal. What helps mitigate and offset that hunger is protein and eating lots of veggies, eating lots of less calorie dense foods. Lots of veggies and some fruit. Again, so that's why understanding and having this concept is important. Eating lots of calorie dense foods is not going to help you, right?
[00:12:07] You're hungry, and if you go to eat that stuff, that's going to Uh, kind of negate you being in this caloric deficit. This is why protein is so important because protein is very filling and lean, lean proteins are not very calorie dense. Again, you can eat like six ounces of chicken breast or even like chicken thigh for not like a huge amount of calories, right?
[00:12:28] So you get a good amount of volume and you get the protein, which is satiating, right? So it's really important to think about what are the roles that these foods are playing in hunger? What foods are filling? What foods are not? How much do I have to eat of this food to get full? I have to eat a lot of fucking potato chips to get full, right?
[00:12:44] You don't have to eat a lot of chicken thigh or a lot of broccoli to get full, right? They work differently. Doesn't make chicken and broccoli good. Doesn't make chips bad. Again, I will keep saying that until I die. It just means that they have different jobs and you have to put the right food in the right job.
[00:12:59] And then I spoke, I spoke about this already, but just going back to this idea of like the frequency of these foods, right? How often am I using these foods? Am I primarily getting most of my food from the more nutritious, kind of less to moderately calorie dense foods? Or am I getting most of my nutrition from really calorie dense foods?
[00:13:18] Am I eating a ton of cheese? Am I eating a ton of nuts and nut butters? Am I eating a ton of oil and butter. If you are, it's going to make fat loss a lot more challenging, right? And again, it doesn't make those foods bad. We just have to learn how to, quote, balance them out. I'm not even going to say it.
[00:13:35] Take that back. So strike that from the record. I won't edit it because I'm a human and it's a lot of work. And also I'm allowed to say things that I disagree with. But you add more, not balance it out, add more of. the more nutritious, kind of slightly more moderately to less calorie dense foods so that then you don't have to eat as much of those, right?
[00:13:58] It's really subtraction by addition, right? Let's eat more, more protein, more veggies, more fiber, and then we don't need to rely as much on the other. Types of foods right on the more calorie dense foods. That's a really big part of this So I think that really captures all of it I'm gonna keep this one again.
[00:14:22] Now. I'm ready a little bit short and I will be back next week Um, I think I'm gonna do another follow up to this. Yes. I mentioned this earlier on in this episode next week is gonna be kind of quote, a part three, where I'm going to talk about, um, kind of how you're eating, when you're eating, where you're eating, and well, it'll build on and kind of go in conjunction with all of these skills.
[00:14:46] So thank you for being here, and as I'm recording this, getting a text message from Ben that I have to go pick him up, so I'm gonna run, and I will talk to you guys soon.