The 3 Biggest Lies That Keep Us From Losing Weight (Part 1)
“Better Health Begins At The Cell.” -Dr. Bill Cole
(If you have or suspect you might have thyroid related problems go to ColeClass.com and watch the short video (about 23 minutes) that I made for you. It’s free… You don’t even have to give me your email.)
Hey guys, today I want to talk about weight loss. The thing that is on the minds of so many American women for sure, but tons of men too. This is because of the fact, that we are so unbelievably unsuccessful at losing weight. There are myths that we have been led to believe that are, I think, at the root of why so many people are ineffective at losing weight. And I’m going to cover them today because if you can’t understand, break, and bust these myths, then generally what I find is that people are not successful at losing weight.
From a statistical standpoint, I was recently reading a study that they started in 1985, looking at the percentage of Americans in individual states that were reporting as obese, right? The amount that states were reporting in terms of obesity. And in the beginning there were a handful of states that reported, and they were essentially showing about 10% of their citizens in those states were obese.
Today, over 30 years into the future, if you look at the map, it would blow your mind. Every state is above 25%, I believe. Most of them were in the 30–35% range of the state currently obese. I mean, think about that. From 10% to 30–35% in most states today. And it would be one thing if that were the end, but it’s not the end. It keeps getting worse.
We keep spending more money on weight-loss products, this diet and that diet, and nothing is working. Even the people that are successful at losing weight, a good portion of them, around 97–98%, end up gaining their weight back plus some. The reason being the fact that we’re really not addressing the root cause of the problem.
Let me talk about the three myths:
- The number one myth is this idea that you have to exercise to lose weight.
Look, I love exercise, I’ve exercised most of my life. But it’s not the secret to weight loss. If you talk to the average person or if you listen to the things that you hear in the media, it’s that we just don’t exercise enough. I have news for you. We exercise more than any other nation in the world, and we’re still the fattest nation in the world. We have more gyms per capita than any other nation. We have a huge population of mall walkers, right? We see these people walking at the mall, and we’re just so unbelievably unsuccessful despite the fact that we exercise.
Look, even when it comes to exercise, I have a practice that has a lot of patients in it that are hard workers. If you talk to people, they’ll say, “Well we just don’t work like we used to. Our ancestors worked hard.” Yeah, I get that. Does it play somewhat of a role? Absolutely, it did. And being sedentary is not helpful. I’m not saying that. But what I am saying is that I’ve got a practice where people like mailmen walk ten miles a day, and they’ve been doing that for decades, five and six days a week, and they’re obese. I’ve got construction workers and people that are in fields where they do a lot of manual labor, and they’re still obese.
So, it’s more than just the exercise, and even when you get down to the exercise, there’s a right way and a wrong way when it comes to exercise for weight loss. This old idea that you’re like a gerbil on a treadmill, that doesn’t work. We’ve tried that. Yeah, you can burn calories that way, but overall, long term, it actually in many people will promote the very problem that has made them heavy or obese to begin with.
There’s a right way to exercise, which if you watched some of the videos, I’ve explained and demonstrated. I’ve talked a little bit about that. But we need to get away from this idea that exercise is necessary for weight loss. It is helpful. It’ll change your body composition. There are really positive things about exercise, but some of my sickest patients who can’t exercise because they’re so sick, they’ll lose 40, 50, 60 pounds in three months without exercise. This is because we’re dealing with the root cause of why they gain weight and can’t lose it to begin with.
2. The second myth is this idea that to lose weight you have to cut calories.
How many people who have ever tried losing weight do it by cutting calories? Practically everybody, right? We’ve been trained to believe that calories in, calories out. A calorie is a calorie is a calorie. Well I want to bust that myth by getting you to think about this…
If a calorie is really just a calorie and they’re all equal, and they’re all the same, and weight loss is about cutting calories, why do we have a nation of mostly women, but more and more men, that can’t lose weight no matter what they do? No matter how much they exercise, no matter how little they eat, they simply cannot lose weight. If it was just a matter of calories that should fix it, but it’s not the case.
I would even take it a step further. When they tell you that a calorie is a calorie, even if it’s subliminal stuff that we receive all the time, this idea that extra calories is why we are so heavy. And again, I’m not saying it doesn’t play a role, I’m just saying to you that we have a nation of people today that are proving that just cutting calories does not work.
Think of it this way. In your endeavor to lose weight, if you put yourself on a 1500 calorie a day diet in which those 1500 calories come from deserts, cheesecake, brownies and milkshakes, do you think you’re body is going to respond the same to that 1500 calories as a person who eats free range chicken and organic vegetables, for instance, in their 1500 calories?
It’s going to be completely different. They’re both 1500 calories, but I promise you one of those programs can help fix the underlying problem and the other one is gonna promote the problem. It’s not just calories.
In my clinic we talk about the quality of the calories, not just the quantity. So, get that idea out of your mind that it’s all about calories. A lot of my patients eat more calories, and they wind-up losing more weight. It’s how your body looks at calories. It’s how your body responds to the type of calories you’re consuming that will ultimately have the biggest impact.
3. The third myth is that we have been trained to believe is that fat makes you fat.
Eating fat is bad for us, that’s what we’ve been told, right? Eating fat gives us heart disease. Eating fat makes us fat. Well, I will make this contention: not only does eating fat not make you fat, but if you’re eating the right kind of fat it can help you lose fat.
Yes, you have to make a distinction between bad fats (“man fats” is what I say) and natural fats (“God fats”). And yes, eating man fats can make you fat. Bad fats are making people fat because they are so destructive to our system. They damage our cells. They inhibit the ability of our hormones, and particularly for our conversation here, our fat burning hormones, to get into the cell and do their job, which is to burn fat.
You have to make that distinction. The very thing that we’ve been told, things like “saturated fat and cholesterol are bad for us”. That they will make us gain weight, and give us heart disease. Baloney. It’s the complete opposite; what we call the 180 degree solution. Whatever we’ve been told, whatever we’ve been trained, you can pretty much bank on the fact that the real truth is 180 degrees opposite of what we’ve been told.
Folks, look around. I mean, can anyone look around and say that what we are doing is working? The answer is obviously, “No”. We’re getting heavier and heavier as a nation. As it relates to fat, that third myth, we have been running from fat since the 1960s, and where are we? We are fatter than ever as a nation. Things are getting worse, they’re not getting better. I think the statistic I read was that we’ve cut fat consumption by 30% over the last 40 years or so, and yet again we’re fatter than ever. So, you have to make that distinction between the good fats and the bad fats.
The good fats, which by the way, your cell membrane is composed of saturated fats and cholesterol. If they’re from a healthy product, they can actually help you lose weight. They’ll help heal your cells. They’ll help make your hormones work better. They’ll help your brain function better. They’ll help your gut to heal. So, we want to make sure that we’re getting healthy fats. We just want to eliminate the bad fats.
Those are three major three myths in our society today when it comes to weight loss. I hope you can understand what I’m saying. It’s not about exercise. I love it, but it’s not where it’s at. It’s not mandatory. The second thing is relating to calories. It’s not about cutting calories, man. That is a dead-end street. Everybody who has ever tried to lose weight has tried cutting calories. How successful are we? Not so much. And the third thing is this idea that fat makes you fat. They say eating fat is bad for us, and it’s absolutely untrue. I think the biggest missing ingredient in the standard American diet, with a typical person that I see, is a lack of healthy fats. This is because we’ve been so brainwashed into believing that things like eating fat is bad for us, and it’s just completely untrue.
I want you to come back soon because I’m gonna have a Part 2 and 3 of this. I’m gonna talk to you about what we need to do to fix this epidemic of weight-loss resistance that we’re seeing in our society, and the other things that are related to it.
I hope this helps.
Take care, guys. God bless.
