The world is full of fitness tips and tricks which are less than useless for me: "just cut out the soda" isn't very useful if you never drink soda or juice, for instance. I'm sure we can all think of many others.
However, this diary is about the one fitness tip that I think should really matter for everyone.
Start by trying to increase your general physical activity.
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It's fine to start a wild and crazy exercise program of some kind, but that alone isn't necessarily going to get you where you need to be, in terms of calorie burn, in order to lose weight. I wear a little gadget that tracks my calorie burn 24/7, so I can illustrate with examples that this is so. In order to burn enough calories, you can't just exert hard for half an hour each day and sit in front of the TV/computer like a giant potato for the rest of the time. Sedentary jobs make it extremely difficult to maintain a high enough level of general activity each day to burn the calories we need to burn for weight loss.
My recommended targets for calorie burn and consumption are currently 2250 and 2000, respectively. But I like to shoot for a burn around 2500 if I can, because apparently everyone systematically underestimates what they eat, and even though I'm pretty careful and even weigh things (especially calorie-dense foods), I want to leave myself some wiggle room. If I want to be able to eat a satisfying amount and variety of food in a day, rather than shoot for minimal food consumption and feel crappy just so I can be lazy, it's good for me to hit 2500-2600 calories burned.
My baseline calorie burn rate is about 0.9-1.2 calories per minute. That's what I burn whether I'm sleeping or sitting here at the computer typing. For ease of comparison, let's call baseline 1 calorie per minute, 60 per hour, which is about where the Bodybugg estimates it if I don't wear it for a day. If I were to lie perfectly still for the entire day I would burn around 1460 calories. But if I were to just sit at the computer all day, I wouldn't burn any too much more than that.
This means that if I want to lose a pound a week by the straight calories out > calories in formula, I have to burn more than 1000 calories per day in some type of activity in order to be able to eat 2000 calories worth of food, the US RDA for an adult.
I think I already showed y'all that I can get close to burning 900 calories through deliberate activity if I go to two straight hours of zumba classes. See? This is me being a total exercise nut for a day:
In the big picture of the whole day, this nets out to: 855 calories in 132 minutes, or 723 calories that I would not have burned just sitting still.
But, you say, who has time to exercise for two hours on a weeknight? And the graph in this image is not complete, but during this day, when I was an exercise nut, I got my burn all the way up to 3019-something once all was said and done. That is more than I technically need to do to lose weight, even if the exercise is good for me for other reasons. So there is other calorie burn coming from somewhere -- from teaching my lecture and my lab, from walking to various meetings or across the street to Starbucks for coffee. Those peaks look insignificant on the scale of a 3000 calorie day, but they add up, and relatively small amounts of activity can make or break a day, calorie balance wise.
Here's a day where I went to work, but did no organized exercise and no heavy chores -- I was getting over the flu:
I didn't quite make it to my calorie burn goal for the day. From just before 11 to 12:06, I gave a lecture; that burned 207 calories, or 135 more than the 72 that I would have burned sitting in my office.
At 1:00, I walked partway across campus to a meeting, taking about 24 minutes to make the walk and get settled, and burning 95 calories, or 71 more than default. Then, you see that large expanse of non-burning flatness for two hours? Folks, that is what happens to you when you sit in a meeting at work. It's almost like being asleep, but less enjoyable and refreshing. The walk back was quicker and downhill rather than up; I burned 65 calories in 18 minutes, or 47 more than default.
And yeah, I did eat way too much food that day too, but I made up for it on other days of the week when the numbers were essentially inverted.
Now here's a day where I went to the grocery store and Target, and mowed the lawn, with no organized exercise other than that -- also during my "getting over the flu" week:
Doing the shopping, over 2 hours and 12 minutes between 10 and noon, burned 392 calories. Had I just sat still during that time, I'd have burned 132. That's 260 calories burned just pushing a cart.
Mowing the lawn, in 3 bursts of activity over 2 hours between 2:30 and 4:30, burned 577 calories. Had I sat still at the computer during that time, I'd have burned 120. That's 357 extra calories burned just by doing an annoying household chore.
Now, here's a day that's a little more normal for me. I walked over to the Student Activity Center and taught a belly dance class in the evening (427 calories, 102 minutes = net 325 calories) and then went to a Halloween dance at the ballroom dance studio (484 calories, 168 minutes = net 316 calories).
However, despite what sounds like a lot of activity there, if I had not gone out for that deliberate brisk walk in the morning (287 calories, 1 hour = net 227 calories) I would not have made it above 2500 for the day.
The critical thing to get from all of this? You need to be aware of how much effort you're putting out and how it balances with what you're putting in. And the balance is a lot closer than you think. A 30 minute walk (or the lack of it) or a trip to do the shopping might make or break your calorie balance for the day.
Sorry this is a bit late, by the way. This morning when I woke up I discovered that my cell phone was missing. Pacing around the house looking everywhere for it (while also doing some morning chores) burned 234 calories, in 96 minutes, or 140 more than the default. I'm probably going to have to go to the AT&T store and finally get that iPhone I've been craving for years now...I'll update and let you know what that burns (besides $299). UPDATE: That would be 248 calories over 96 minutes, net 152 calories.