How to Lose Weight

What are Calories?

A calorie is a unit of energy. Strictly speaking, a calorie is a measurement of energy produced by anything that contains energy. It is the amount of energy it takes to raise the temperature of 1 kilogram of water by 1 degree Celsius.

That is the scientific definition. For our purposes, we are only interested in how this relates to food and human energy consumption. For this purpose, a calorie is actually a kcal but you do not need to worry about this difference. Some food packages gives calorie counts in kcals and others in calories but they are the same measurement.

We use calories to measure the amount of energy in food. We also use them to measure the amount of energy the human body expends. If you take in more calories than your body uses, then your body will store the energy from the excess calories as fat and you will put on weight. If your body uses more calories than you take in, then you create a calorie deficit and your body will make up the deficit by dipping into its fat reserves so you will lose weight.

Calorie Balance - if you have a calorie balance then you are eating the same amount of calories as your body is using. Your weight will remain steady.

Calorie Surplus - if you have a calorie surplus then you are eating more calories than your body is using and you will gain weight.

Calorie Deficit - if you have a calorie deficit then your body is using more calories than you are eating and you will lose weight.

So in the simplest terms, if you want to lose weight you must create a calorie deficit. That is, your body must use more calories than you eat.

How Many Calories?

3,500 calories is equivalent to one pound of fat. To put it in gruesome terms, if you ate one pound of fat you would take in 3,500 calories. This means that to lose one pound of fat you must create a calorie deficit of 3,500 calories. That is your body must use 3,500 calories more than you eat. However, you must do this over a period of time. As already discussed, if you try to lose more than 2 pounds a week then your body will go into starvation mode and will start to feed off its own muscle tissue.

If you create calorie deficit of 500 calories a day, then in one week you will lose one pound. That is 500 * 7 (days) = 3,500 calories.

If you create a calorie deficit of 1,000 calories a day, then in one week you will lose two pounds. That is 1,000 * 7 (days) = 7,000 calories.

Having a calorie deficit of more than 1,000 calories a day is not healthy and counter-productive for dieting purposes. You will go into starvation mode.

Calories in Food

All food contains calories. The number of calories is a measure of how much potential energy is in that food. All food is made of three basic building blocks, carbohydrates, proteins and fat. Carbohydrates and protein contain 4 calories per gram. Fat contains 9 calories per gram.

Food also contains vitamins, minerals, fiber and water but none of these provide calories.

Foods are a combination of these building blocks. So if you know how much carbohydrates, fats and proteins are in any given food, you know how many calories, or how much energy, that food contains.

Next: Metabolic Rate