At first weight loss and fat loss seem to obviously mean the same thing so why even discuss it, right! Well on the surface these terms seem alike but when we dig a little deeper we see it’s not that simple. In the world of weight loss dieting and exercise it seems cut and dry, but the reality is these two terms are very much different. Knowing the difference will really help for you to define your own goals and put the claims that other people are making in their proper place.

Weight loss:

If you say that you’ve lost weighted can really be certain that this is going to get you into the shape that you’re looking for. It’s like saying it’s wet outside but by that statement you can’t tell if it’s raining or the sprinkler is watering the lawn. When it comes getting into shape you can take your clothes off and loose weight according to the bathroom scale but you’re not any closer to the real thing. On top off that you can loose other things that will give you a false sense of accomplishment, namely water and muscle. In short, the term “weight loss” doesn’t tell the whole story and shouldn’t be trusted.

Fat loss:

This is a key term, especially these days with so much information out there. Fat loss is exactly that, getting rid of fat and it accurately states what should be happening when you are trying to get into shape. People that are using this term are truly in the “know” when it comes to this subject and I encourage you to start training your brain to substitute it for “weight loss” in your vocabulary.

Why is this important, well when you are losing weight you can be losing muscle which inch for inch weighs more then fat, some say three times more. Thus the statement of losing 20 pounds of weight in two weeks is a phrase that really means nothing. Any person that claims they can loose 20 pounds in two weeks don’t factor the loss of water and muscle, and losing muscle hurts long term success in fat loss. So when we step back we see that this kind of thinking really changes the context of some of the claims you may hear.

Soooo…!

So the question is what can you do in order to know if your getting the results our looking for, namely fat loss. Well if your cloths are starting to get loss your on the right track but if you are loosing more the a pound or two a week then you are most likely losing more then fat in the number that is showing on your bathroom scale. You might be asking why I say this, well most people do not pack on the fat at 10 and 15 pounds of fat a week so why should they expect them to come off that fast. The human machine just doesn’t have the ability to do that unless your a world class athlete, but if that was the case loosing fat would really be the focus it would be the side affect.

In my humble opinion, dropping lots of fat really fast is simply not that healthy or productive for your long term success. I say this because I have an aunt that would gain a lot of fat and then when she reached a certain point she would get really motivated to eat right and exercise a lot, thus dropping a lot of fat in a matter of of weeks. But as soon as she got down to the size she wanted she would some how loose motivation and momentum. The fat would start coming right back but what was worse is the fact that more fat would return then when she originally started to working on losing it. With that said, our focus shouldn’t be to simply loss fat but to rather target fat at a steady, consistent pace that builds lean muscle. And we all know that lean muscle burns fat very well.

Three simple things you can do to target fat:

Go for a walk– this is by far one of the best ways to ensure that your body is burning fat and not muscle or anything else. Walking is what I like to call the slow, clean burn, plus when you find a walking buddy it can be a lot of fun.

Light weight lifting– don’t have a set of dumbbells, no problem, simply fill some gallon jugs with water or sand and use them to add some resistance to get those muscle working. Also it is key to push your muscle slowly and controlled.

Look at your food– Choose foods that promote muscle building since muscle is the fat burning engine, thus more muscle equals a lot more success for you.

What this all comes down too is finding something that you enjoy doing that increases your activity level and when you start looking at targeting fat and not just loosing weight you never know where it might take you. This focused direction really changes everything just as focused light in a laser can cut steal. And my hope is that after reading this you can start to envision and sculpted the body you really want.

Please leave a comment; I am interested in your thoughts about this idea that fat loss can be weight loss but weight loss can not be a guarantee of fat loss. And thanks for stopping by to give this a read, it means a lot to me.

Looking from a new perspective,
-Nick

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