My Six Steps Lifestyle Planner

Bottom line weight loss occurs when portions consumed are less than the calories burned. This is not new information for most people. The problem is that cutting portions can be a struggle. No one likes to feel hungry. This is exactly what will happen unless you know how to keep portions balanced. With balanced portions you won’t feel hungry, and you naturally eat less. Smaller portions is a natural process when you live life in the Six Steps. Living by the 200 calorie rule, as discussed in my book allows this to happen without ever counting a calorie.

Desired Weight

Desired weight- This is what you would like to weight. Make sure it is a realistic number, otherwise it will be unattainable.

Desired weight (150lbs) + add a zero = 1,500 resting calories.

Resting calories is your metabolism this is the amount of energy required to maintain your body at rest. If you have experienced a life of unbalance, poor food choices and YoYo dieting, then this number can be less than the calculation. The good news is if you make healthier choices by living in the six steps then your metabolism can increase allowing you to burn more calories at rest. For starters use the rule of thumb calculation.

Add your activity to resting calories

Your resting calories are only if you lay in bed all day, you must add activity calories to the equation for the total calories needed to maintain your desired life.

Activity calories are not based on how busy you are during your daily routine, such as being on your feet all day, or busy work in a small cubicle or work space. Activity calories are determined by how far you move your body…the distance you actually take yourself. This is measured in steps or miles that you estimate you cover in ones day of activity. Most people over-estimate their activity.

One mile is a long way, and even 100 trips from your couch to the fridgerator doesn’t cover ¼ the distance. Most people who are active may be lucky enough to cover 1 mile this would be a rate of .3. Use the chart below to approximate your daily activity rate.

1 mile LIGHT         1-3miles MEDIUM        3-5 miles Heavy

        

.3-.4                   .4-.5                  .5-.6

Total calories at your desired weight becomes your portion size for the entire day.

When you apply the six step process to your portion requirement for your desired weight, it becomes easy, there are no food cravings or feelings of deprivation and you have an abundant amount of energy. You can lose weight following a diet of calorie restriction, but it will be a struggle to maintain and food cravings will eventually appear. Once again what is so magically about living balanced in the six steps is that your body will naturally regulate your portions. You will eat less without having to work at it and there are no feelings of deprivation or hunger.

Exercise

Exercise naturally regulates our bodies to be lean and healthy. This should be the focus of any exercise program. Although exercise allows us to eat more calories it isn’t a good method to use to control your weight. What a lot of people don’t realize is that the more conditioned the body the more efficient it becomes at conserving calories. In other words the more physically conditioned you are the less stress physical work has on your body. This is the bodies way of adapting to work, creating more muscles and a stronger vascular system to handle the physical stress. Which means you can do a lot more with less effort, les effort means less calories. This is a poor approach to manage your weight. You will never win the calorie battle, always trying to stay ahead of your calorie burn. Before long you will be trapped, feeling as if you have to exercise all day or work out intense at every workout just to not gain weight. The only thing that works is to understand how to balance your body so you won’t feel trapped to exercise just so you can burn extra calories, you can actually exercise because you enjoy it not because you have to.

Calories burned during exercise are based on intensity level, this is measured by heart rate. The more heart beats the harder you are working. It is measured though a formula called Target Heart Rate, Use the formula below to compute your target heart rate and then estimate approx. how many extra calories you burn during exercise. Keep in mind the real benefit of exercise is not the extra calories you can add to your day, but the gain in muscle tissue, which is the door to a healthy lean body.

Carbohydrate Reserve

When applying the six step process you know how important carbohydrate reserves are in maintaining balance. Knowing your reserves keeps you from having food addiction. Low reserves trigger out-of-control eating. Out-of –control eating results in YoYo dieting. If you are active it becomes important to maintain reserves that can support your activity level.

Use the calculations below to estiamte how many grams of daily carbohydrate you need to keep a healthy reserve.

Daily calories needed to maintain desired weight times 40%-65% =divide by 4 = number of carbohydrate grams needed to maintain desired weight

40%-65% is based on how active you are. If you are sedentary then 40% of your total calories are all that are needed to keep a balanced and healthy reserve. If your activity rate was medium or heavy, in other words you walk atleast 2-5 miles within your daily routine, then at least 50% or 60% of your total daily calories need to come from carbohydrates.

Carbohydrates added to your reserve with exercise

You have to feed your activity level, or else you will be less active. The more sedentary you are, the less energy you have, your metabolism becomes sluggish and your propensity to gain weight and store fat is increased.

Add carbs to your reserve with exercise

For every hour of exercise add 30-60 grams to your reserve for the day.

If you exercise at 65% THR add 30 grams per hour

If you exercise at 85% THR add 60 grams per hour

The more intense the heart beats during exercise the higher the carbohydrate requirement.

Protein Reserve

Adequate protein is necessary to build a healthy body and it is impossible to be lean without it. It is what keeps all the parts in your engines working. The six step process explains why too much protein causes imbalances and not enough leads to poor health. My book explains this metabolic process and how to apply it to your daily diet in the right amounts and the right combinations.

Fiber grams

Fiber is a magic bullet to great health. My book explains why we need to ensure we maintain fiber balance at each meal. Fiber not only maintains hormonal balance it cleanse our body of toxic chemicals and creates balance when combined other foods.

Recommended daily requirement of fiber 25-40 grams

Exercise goals

Exercise may start out as moving muscles in your daily routine. Not everyone is ready to sustain a heart pumping fat burning muscle building routine on the first day! The goal is to allow your muscle to progress at a comfortable rate, until you build a strong foundation to move longer durations with more intensity. My book explains how you can easily and safely progress into a exercise program that will be right for you.

45 minutes of daily HRT is recommended!

My Lifestyle Planner

  Desired Weight
  Carbohydrate Reserve
  Protein Reserve
  Fiber Grams
  Exercise Goal

Lifestyle Planner Printables

Planner reminder

Activity Vs. Resting Calories

Target Hreart Rate

Carb Reserve

Protein reminder

Shopping Card

Living balanced requires an awareness of your body and the foods you chose to feed your body. The lifestyle planner gives you an upfront look at the four main areas discussed in the book that can either put you in balance or throw you out of balance. This is about you being successful in a process that actually works, because it is based on science and how the human body works, not some gimmick or magic formula. Remember this is not a diet, this is your lifestyle what you will be able to follow for the rest of your life.