dropping lbs with no gym membership

If you're disagreeing with me maybe I misinterpreted you.

Originally Posted by Philosoph

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No, meal frequency is not specific to the individual. If a person eats 3 meals a day, or if he eats 6 a day, as long as his calories and macros are identical, he will get the same results. I'd be willing to amend my view if I saw some research suggesting otherwise, but everything I'm familiar with says that meal timing does not matter. Where meal frequency does matter is in an individual's ability to stick to his diet. Since it doesn't matter how often you eat, you should pick the schedule that allows you to consistently get the nutrition you need for your goals, whatever they are. If you break your diet on 3 meals a day, that would be a bad choice. If you find 6 tiny meals intolerable, that would be a bad choice too. Edit: said meal timing when I meant frequency
Which would be strange, because that's exactly what I said, it is a mental issue.

It's getting late...maybe we misinterpreted each other?

I thought you were saying that the effectiveness of various meal frequencies would be determined by individual physiology.

But it turns out that you're saying that the only difference is mental... so I agree with you.

Originally Posted by Shraka

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Actually, it is right.

Rubbish. Look at our closest relative, the chimpanzee. They spend ALL DAY constantly grazing on fruits and plants, and eating things like termines and ants. They are certainly grazing animals, that occasionally hunt, not the other way around. Even their source of protein (termite) is not eaten in one big meal, but rather slowly eaten over the course of an hour or so of poking around in a termite mound.

While we resembled Chimps, our diets would have been similar. Fruits and vegitables, with some meat. While meat would have been important, it would have in no way been the majority of our diet.
When we became nomadic, we needed to graze on fruits and collect them while we followed the herd. I admit our meat intake would have been higher at this time. However we are pack animals and any kill made would have had to feed everyone, not just one person. At this point we also already had tools so we'd already made a big step in intelligence.
Then, when we settled down and domesticated animals, we did it because we could plant vegitables. There's no point settling down if you can just follow a herd and kill what you need. You settle down when you start planting food in the ground.
Once civilization sprung up, wheat or rice became the backbone of our diet.

Chimps rely heavily on plant material which requires eating all day just to get enough calories, particularly if you eat things like leaves. Keep in mind our last common ancestor with chimps was about 5 to 6 million years ago, so a fair amount of time for a lot of biological and behavioral changes. Part of the changes in human evolution (particularly our large brain size) were most likely related to changes in our ancestors dietary patterns that occured about 2 million years ago, so a comparision between our pattern of eating and a chimps pattern of eating is loose at best and certainly far from an ideal model.

I'm not saying grazing didn't occur and wasn't necessarily important, but more intensive gatherering, including collection of plant material and later processing and cooking probably were very important steps for our nomadic ancestors, which would require time rather then just picking a fruit or leaf and eating it.

Originally Posted by Gradstudent78

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Chimps rely heavily on plant material which requires eating all day just to get enough calories, particularly if you eat things like leaves. Keep in mind our last common ancestor with chimps was about 5 to 6 million years ago, so a fair amount of time for a lot of biological and behavioral changes. Part of the changes in human evolution (particularly our large brain size) were most likely related to changes in our ancestors dietary patterns that occured about 2 million years ago, so a comparision between our pattern of eating and a chimps pattern of eating is loose at best and certainly far from an ideal model.

I'm not saying grazing didn't occur and wasn't necessarily important, but more intensive gatherering, including collection of plant material and later processing and cooking probably were very important steps for our nomadic ancestors, which would require time rather then just picking a fruit or leaf and eating it.
Good points! I just had a discussion with a friend of mine doing natural sciences. Unfortunately for me, you are correct! While 5-6 million years isn't that long for a mammals evolution, the first thing that usually changes is digestive chemistry.

Anyway! I am not beaten yet!

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Seems there's two schools of thought on the matter.

My advice, try 5-6 meals a day. If it really don't work for you, go back to 3.

Whether going from 3 to 5-6 meals makes a positive difference or not, there is no suggestion that it makes a negative difference. Ergo, it's worth a try, to err on the side of caution.

My view on it, however, as well as anything else you do is, do it in a manner that you're confident you can stick with. I'd rather do a 90 min workout than my 45 minute workout. However, I know that if I tried to do that everyday, it would get difficult and start to piss me off. So I have a 45 min routine, and I add to it where possible 1-2 times a week. In so doing, I make sure that I (usually) do my bare minimum, rather than skipping it entirely if I don't have the time.

Same with dieting - I know that I'm not going to always be able to get 6 small meals in a day, and I know I'm not going to cut out certain things entirely. So I take smaller steps, integrate them into my lifestyle, and add more later. This also ensures that it stays a positive thing in my life, and doesn't start to grate. Sugar in my coffee was easy to give up. But no matter how serious I get, beer and a burger with my mates from time to time will never be getting the flick, nor do I want to be one of those people who whinges about dietary requirements when picking a restaurant/meal (those with genuine health concerns are one thing, but otherwise...come on).

So to respond to the OP, make the changes you can, integrate them into what you do every day, and add to them as you find yourself able.

Originally Posted by dylanmillerr

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so winter is finally over where i live and during the winter months i realized ive put on probably 10 or so pounds noticeably in my gut i dont have a gym membership and dont really want one. i plan on cutting out all the bogus foods ive been eating and am just wondering what your tips are for some good workouts i try to run 10 miles a week and am pretty good at keeping up with that but what else would you recommend for dropping all the upper body mass
thanks

I'm in much the same position. Now that the weather is warmer I've been busting out my bicycle and riding for at least 45 minutes daily. My diet is now mostly vegetarian and I try to stay around a caloric intake of 1000 a day.

Originally Posted by The False Prophet

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So to respond to the OP, make the changes you can, integrate them into what you do every day, and add to them as you find yourself able.

Yes, good advice.

I found the best way to get to 5 meals a day was just to eat slightly less for lunch and dinner, and add a morning and afternoon snack of something easy like an apple and nuts, protein shake, or can of tuna or something (although my workmates hated this one because I made the office smell like fish). I then added a protein shake right before the gym and started having dinner a little later. But it meant that I only ever ate 6 meals a day when I had a gym session.

At the moment I'm only having about 4 meals a day because I've gotten lazy.

Originally Posted by The Wayfarer

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My diet is now mostly vegetarian and I try to stay around a caloric intake of 1000 a day.

Jesus.

Originally Posted by The Wayfarer

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I'm in much the same position. Now that the weather is warmer I've been busting out my bicycle and riding for at least 45 minutes daily. My diet is now mostly vegetarian and I try to stay around a caloric intake of 1000 a day.

Good luck getting anything resembling decent performance that way...

Play team sports. Even if it's just organizing your buddies into a Sunday night basketball game at an outdoor hoop or something. I find it helps to have a set schedule and a situation where not showing up inconveniences others - it keeps you motivated to go. I can't convince myself to go to the gym but I find it easy to go play basketball or soccer.

Cut small things out of your diet like french fries or mayo. It makes a surprising difference.

I lost ten pounds over the winter by cutting pop (soda?) and french fries out of my diet and playing basketball twice a week and not really changing anything else.

Originally Posted by The Wayfarer

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I'm in much the same position. Now that the weather is warmer I've been busting out my bicycle and riding for at least 45 minutes daily. My diet is now mostly vegetarian and I try to stay around a caloric intake of 1000 a day.

OP, please don't do this. 1,000 calories a day pretty much classifies you as anorexic. I'm not exaggerating.

Yeah... 1000 calories a day is really, really unhealthy. That's about a third of what an adult male should be getting. Unless you're already a short, tiny person most doctors would probably consider that eating disorder territory.

Originally Posted by chris902

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Yeah... 1000 calories a day is really, really unhealthy. That's about a third of what an adult male should be getting. Unless you're already a short, tiny person most doctors would probably consider that eating disorder territory.

Oh yeah, I'm totally inclined to agree. I don't think it's healthy at all, I didn't mean to make sound like something I advocate for others to follow.

If someone has better advice on how to achieve what I want quickly, I am totally open to it.

Originally Posted by Saucemaster

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OP, please don't do this. 1,000 calories a day pretty much classifies you as anorexic. I'm not exaggerating.

I may have made a gross exaggeration when I said 1000. I'm really not keeping count. Just small but frequent meals throughout the day.

If I remember correctly, today I had a small salad dressed with vinegar and oil, half a can of tomato soup, an open faced peanut butter and jelly sandwich, a few Ritz crackers as a snack while working, and a medium sized bowl of homemade vegetarian chili with Morningstar "beef crumbles" in it.

I've had good results with the 'body for life' plan. I'm not going to say it's 'the best' plan - I went from doing zero exercise and eating crap to doing exercise and eating healthier, so pretty much any plan that involved me doing those 2 things would have helped me lose fat! But it worked for me even while I wasn't being too strict with it.

The basic concepts with this one are:
Exercise-
Do 'high intensity intervals' cardio 3 times a week. Walking and sprinting around your neighbourhood rather than a longer jogging session would seem to suit you?
Do some weights 3 times a week on the alternate days. You're not going to lose your belly by doing a few bicep curls in front of the TV in your spare moments. But if you really work the bigger muscles in your body they will get bigger, your metabolism increases, helps burn the fat. So if you have dumbells at home you can do squats and lunges etc. for your lower body on one 45 min session and upper body on the next. If you try and do every muscle group each session they will be long sessions and you won't really push it.

Eating-
More whole grains, less refined carbs. So brown rice instead of white rice, more oats less sugar.
More of your calories from protein (the book recommends equal protein/carbs but everone's body is different)
Less fat. You do need some fats (oily fish, olive oil etc are good) but skip the mcdonalds and pizza and ice cream
Eat smaller meals more often (the 6 times vs 3 times argument). And try to have veggies with a couple of those meals.

You said you'll stick with 3 meals not 6, fair enough. I think if you're getting the same quality nutrition and not eating chocolate and chips between the meals, you will be fine. For me, having more meals works well, because if I am trying to eat better it's easier to do that when you are less hungry (and don't have to have a whole plateful of 'boring' food).

So for example, if I try and do 6 meals my 'dinner' might be - grilled chicken breast, small portion brown rice, veggies. With some hot sauce to make it more interesting, I can do this without feeling that I'm having to make huge sacrifices to get healthy and its simple to make.

But if I was doing 3 meals? OK well I'm not very imaginitive and don't have much time for the kitchen so I would probably just scale this up. So my dinner is 2 grilled chicken breasts, big portion of brown rice, big portion of vegetables. Sounds like a boring detox diet and as someone who used to eat big plates of junk, it's hard to make a change to eating big plates of healthy stuff. If you try and make it more interesting by putting lots of salt or butter on it, you defeat the point.

I think the moving to 5 or 6 meals lets you move to eating healthier foods without having to eat large volumes of boring healthy foods. Typically I only have 3 regular meals, but they are all relatively small and healthy, then I have a couple of meal replacement shakes as morning or afternoon snacks, and maybe some fruit etc.

Well I just realised this post is way too long but good luck with it.