So here’s how to lose body fat without ever stepping foot in a gym. The mainstream media would like people to believe that they must exercise to lose body fat, but that’s simply not the case. I guess this is a good way to sell gym memberships, but I’d rather tell you the truth.
What a back injury taught me in 2003
I hurt my back in 2003 and couldn’t walk let alone run. This was the first time in 15 years that I couldn’t exercise. This was really bad timing too. I had just bought tickets for a trip to Mexico with 4 other friends and we rented a beach villa in a prime location on the Gulf of Mexico. I was 5 months away from the trip and I was injured so much that it hurt to stand up.
Since I couldn’t exercise, I went on a heavy diet.
I had about 10 pounds of fat to lose, but I couldn’t lose this body fat with any type of exercise. I simply had to create 100% of my calorie deficit through diet. To be honest, I was skeptical that this would work. In the past I lived on the treadmill before a vacation or for the summer. I am great at losing weight through cardio and have never done it through diet alone.
I dieted to 8% body fat in 3 months
Losing body fat is one thing, but losing body fat when you’re already pretty skinny is tricky. It gets even more complicated when doing this with diet alone. So how did I achieve this? I had a protein shake for breakfast, another for lunch, and then a salad with chicken and rice vinegar dressing for dinner. It was a mild way of eating, but it worked fine. I allowed myself a Fuji apple for dessert if I was still hungry, but not every night.
You can create a greater calorie deficit through diet than through exercise
The biggest thing I learned from going through this experience is that you can create a really big calorie deficit with diet alone. If my daily calorie maintenance level is 2,000, I can simply eat 1,200 and create a massive 800 calorie deficit. It takes a lot of exercise to burn 800 calories a day! I’m just using this figure as an example, you don’t need to expose yourself to such a large deficit.
Obviously, exercise will help keep the muscles
The only downside to using the diet solely to lose body fat is that you won’t keep all of your muscle mass. To be honest, you won’t shrivel up, but you will lose a bit of muscle if you don’t train for at least a while on a strict diet. So the above is an extreme example of how to lose body fat without exercise.