Generally, a person’s energy expenditure becomes less as they get lighter – meaning that they will inevitably hit a weight loss plateau. The amount of food intake that once lead to weight loss, will now only maintain.

Whether or not you are using a calorie cycling diet, Always try to aim for a “Fat Loss” daily calorie level. The “Extreme Fat Loss” level is effectively a rock bottom calorie level, quite different to using a calorie cycling fast weight loss strategy. Do not attempt to immediately drop your calories to this level hoping for the quick fix – this may ultimately backfire.

Again, this is why calorie cycling is better for your body in both the short and medium term. If you are using a calorie cycling diet, you need not have to deal with exhaustion, cravings and hunger pains as you lose weight.

It truly is better to burn the fat than to starve it, and calorie cycling is a powerful way to help you do this.

Avoiding The Weight Loss Plateau Using Calorie Cycling

Calorie cycling helps to overcome the weight loss plateau

When we reach a weight loss plateau, options to boost metabolism include; increased cardio, weight training, ‘cheat’ meals (i.e. occasional high-calorie meals), calorie cycling.

You often find that the nearer you get to your goal weight (or body fat percentage) – the harder things get! It is easy to give up when your weight loss seems to have hit a dead end, and this is why a calorie cycling diet can be a more effective weight loss strategy in the medium term.

Continually dropping calories only serves to lower metabolism even further – the moment you return to ‘normal’ eating – the weight comes back on. But in a calorie cycling diet, you are eating ‘normal’ foods anyway, but are just varying the quantity and order you consume them in.

Minimum daily calorie intake on a calorie cycling diet.

It is difficult to set absolute bottom calorie levels whether or not you choose to use a calorie cycling diet, because everyone has different body composition and activity levels. Health authorities do set some baselines – these are 1200 calories per day for women, and 1800 calories per day for men. This doesn’t really make too much sense – are you are sedentary person with little muscle mass? Or someone who is tall, muscular, and exercises a lot? Absolute levels don’t work – but do give us a starting point.

Regardless, what you don’t want to do on a calorie cycling diet, is to drop well below these healthy recommended levels. It is unsafe and counter-productive. And the point to a calorie cycling diet is that you don’t need to starve yourself to lose weight fast.

In order to keep losing fat and toning your body, calorie cycling is an essential part of the program. As a matter of fact, recent research points to the fact that you lose weight faster (up to twice as fast) by using calorie cycling than simply by dropping your daily calorie intake.

When calorie cycling:

Try not to lower your calorie intake by more than 1000 calories below maintenance. Doing so may invoke the bodies starvation response, which can lead to a weight loss plateau, as we have discussed earlier.

When you are on a calorie cycling diet, don't drop your daily calorie intake too low.

Try to gradually lower calories on your calorie cycling diet. A sudden drop (such as 500 calories or more) can cause your metabolism to slow. Learn to eat slowly, and have smaller portion sizes more frequently – research shows that faster eaters are heavier people.

Eating too few calories also leads to tiredness, and extreme hunger, which is really miserable.

Calorie cycling is a powerful weight loss technique you can use to circumvent this situation.

What happens when calories are too low on a calorie cycling diet?

Below are some compelling reasons why you should not drop your calorie intake too low on a calorie cycling weight loss plan.

1) Muscle mass rather then fat is broken down for energy (catabolism). Not good news, and completely avoidable on a calorie cycling diet.
2) Metabolic rate will begin to drop (typically) after 3 days of very low calories – this is related to, and compounded by the loss of muscle mass. If you use calorie cycling rather than the traditional low calorie diet, you negate this situation.
3) With very low calories you risk sluggishness, nutritional deficiencies, fatigue, and often irritability. You are completely set-up to regain fat if you suddenly return to your previous eating patterns. These are all issues a calorie cycling diet is designed to avoid.

Lose Fat AND Build Muscle on a calorie cycling diet?

Most people lose muscle mass when restricting calories on a typical low calorie diet. It takes great effort to maintain muscle tone – and it is even more tricky actually building muscle while losing fat.

As mentioned above, tricking the body by using calorie cycling can be extremely helpful – particularly for those who have hit a weight loss plateau. In a calorie cycling plan, rather than eating “diet food”, or minimal calories you simply vary the amount of high quality, nutritious  food you eat.

Carbohydrate cycling on a calorie cycling diet
To extend the concept of calorie cycling even further, carbohydrate cycling is an option especially for those who have hit a weight loss plateau.

This involves manipulating your daily intake of carbohydrates in order to maximize fat loss, and it helps to keep you in the right ‘headspace’ when you have 1-2 days of restricted calories, which is the case on a calorie cycling diet.

The Fat Loss For Idiots weight loss plan is an excellent example of a calorie cycling diet which can lead to fast weight loss.

Fat Loss For Idiots is the calorie cycling diet I have used and recommend. You can read my full review of the Fat Loss For Idiots calorie cycling diet here … Fat Loss For Idiots Latest Review

Fast weight loss is the eternal hot topic for millions of women worldwide, and there is no shortage of advice about how to achieve fast weight loss.

Unfortunately, a great deal of fast weight loss advice is both dangerous and counter productive.

In fact, many popular fast weight loss diets are best described as ‘crash diets’, which will certainly enable you to lose weight fast, but are so restrictive and punishing, they are not sustainable, and the dieter will immediately re-gain their lost weight as soon as they go off their diet.

This fast weight loss cycle is absolutely frustrating and demoralizing, and is as bad for your mind as it is for your body.

The reality is, the principles behind fast weight loss are actually very simple.

And if you are looking for a powerful and healthy way to achieve fast weight loss, the weight loss diet you choose should embrace these principles.

1. Eat smaller portions of nutritious food regularly (e.g. 4 small meals per day) on your fast weight loss diet.

This will ensure you will not feel feel hungry and lethargic most of the time. Feeling extremely hungry and lacking in energy are common when you follow most FAST WEIGHT LOSS diets, because you are consuming fewer calories infrequently.

Ideally, you want to be eating smaller but more regular portions of healthy food on your fast weight loss diet to avoid hunger and tiredness.

This strategy also serves to boost your metabolism which is key to your success on a fast weight loss diet.

2. Drink a minimum of 10 standard glasses of water per day on your fast weight loss diet.

This is such a simple thing to do, but so often, it is underestimated as a fast weight loss strategy. Water is important because it regulates our temperature, cushions and protects our vital organs, aids digestion, transport nutrients to working muscles and organs, helps dispel waste and can help prevent us from over-eating. Obviously this is vital while you are on a fast weight loss diet.

Whether or not you are on a fast weight loss diet, water is consumed or expelled from our bodies, which means that it needs to be continually replaced, but even more so when you are on a fast weight loss diet.

When the temperature of our body rises, during exercise for example, we lose higher amounts of water through sweat. In one hour of intense exercise, our body can lose up to a litre or more of water.  When we fail to replace lost water and our body can’t cool itself properly, we enter a state of dehydration.

Sometimes we can mistake mild states of dehydration for hunger, which will easily derail our fast weight loss efforts.

When we don’t drink enough fluids, our body gives us signals which resemble hunger pains. When this happens, many of us start eating unnecessary calories because we have misunderstood what our body is trying to tell us. Obviously, this is bad news if you are on a fast weight loss diet.

By staying well-hydrated throughout the day, we minimize the chance of unnecessary eating and maximize our chances of achieving our fast weight loss goals.

3. Exercise for 30-45 minutes each day on your fast weight loss diet.

Just like staying properly hydrated whilst on a fast weight loss diet, exercising daily is a powerful but simple strategy that most people underestimate.

Like all elements of a fast weight loss diet that actually works, the exercise you choose should ideally be something that you enjoy, and that you can fit in to your daily routine without too much drama.

So often, when people embark on a fast weight loss diet, they feel the need to punish themselves with starvation and torturous gym workouts. Neither of these things is healthy, enjoyable, or sustainable.

So find an exercise you love and commit to it. To be honest, a brisk 30 -45 minute walk each day is enjoyable, won’t cost you a cent and is accessible to everyone. So give it a try.
4. Never eat until you are completely full on your fast weight loss diet, only ever eat until you are just satisfied (leave a little room for more).

This is a big one. Consistent over eating (i.e. eating until you are uncomfortably full) is one of the main reasons why people gain excess weight. While you are on a fast weight loss diet, re-train yourself to eat slowly and enjoy your food. Make sure you don’t eat in front of the TV or computer, but sit at the table, serve up small portions of food (on some fast weight loss diets, there is no specified portion size, so you can always go back for more if you are still genuinely hungry). Chew every mouthful 20 times, and savor your food.

5. Get 8 hours of sleep every night on your fast weight loss diet.

Researchers say that how much you sleep and quite possibility the quality of your sleep may silently orchestrate a symphony of hormonal activity tied to your appetite.

While doctors have long known that many hormones are affected by sleep, it wasn’t until recently that appetite entered the picture. What brought it into focus was research on the hormones leptin and ghrelin.

First, doctors say that both can influence our appetite. And studies show that production of both may be influenced by how much or how little we sleep.

In fact, have you ever experienced a sleepless night followed by a day when no matter what you ate you never felt full or satisfied? If so, then you have experienced the workings of leptin and ghrelin.

This is why getting a good nights sleep is so critical to your success on a fast weight loss diet.

6. Allow yourself a couple of ‘free days’ every 11 days or so, where you can eat whatever you feel like whilst on a fast weight loss diet.

This way you do not need to feel that you are depriving yourself of your favorite foods all the time.

Look for a fast weight loss diet plan which factors in some free days for you to enjoy your favorite treats without guilt or resentment.

7. Be organized to stick to your fast weight loss diet.

Plan your meals in advance, and be ready to pack lunches etc to take with you to work so that you are never caught short without something healthy and nutritious to eat.

This will help you to stay on track on your fast weight loss diet.

8. Rotate your calories whilst on a fast weight loss diet (also known as ‘calorie shifting’) so that your metabolism is tricked into burning the calories you feed it faster and more effectively.

This is a strategy which ensures that you are still getting all of the nutrients you need, but your metabolism is cranked up a notch so that you can achieve your fast weight loss goals.

9. On a fast weight loss diet, eat your food as plain as possible.

Avoid adding heavy sauces and dressings to everything you eat, and use herbs and spices to flavor fresh ingredients. Creamy sauces and dressings are usually loaded with empty calories that will stop you from achieving your fast weight loss goals.

10. This is the big one…be consistent on your fast weight loss diet.

Stick with it. And reward yourself when you reach your weight loss goals.

Most importantly, enjoy the healthy way your body will look and feel after you have achieved your fast weight loss.

My favorite fast weight loss diet that incorporates all of these principles is this one …

Fast Weight Loss

In weight loss terms, Calorie Shifting is a weight loss strategy designed to combat the natural slowdown that occurs in your metabolism whenever you are restricting your calorie intake.

Calorie shifting has been developed to combat the most common reason why we hit a weight loss plateau in our diets (which means we are unable to lose weight for weeks and sometimes months on end) is because our bodies are designed to preserve fat stores. And any time those fat stores are threatened, our metabolism slows down in order to compensate. Calorie shifting is a weight loss concept which combats this.

Our bodies have not quite caught up with the 21st century yet and the fact that we are mostly sedentary and aren’t out chasing our food to ground. As hunter gatherers, calorie shifting was a natural part of the way we ate, according to the availability of various foods.

Today, we also have an over abundance of foods available to us 24/7.

Most of us don’t want or need this extra fat. When you are  trying to get rid of excess body fat, it would be nice if nature cooperated a little bit more, but clearly we have got to work with what we have got, and find ways to get around that. Calorie shifting is one of them.

It is important to understand that a calorie shifting diet is not  a crash diet.

You  don’t have to eat weird or unappealing foods, or embark on a radical diet change, such as a raw diet or a vegan diet when you use calorie shifting to lose weight.

On a calorie shifting diet plan, people can eat most of the nutritious food they like to eat. The only foods that are off limits are high calorie, greasy fast foods. Obviously, this is going to be part of any effective weight loss diet, an over indulgence in these types of foods is what leads to excessive weight gain and obesity in the first place.

On a Calorie Shifting diet you can even drink soda and coffee. Most other diets restrict sodas and a lot of them ban caffeine, too.

As a matter of fact, on a calorie shifting diet, you may even find yourself eating more than you are normally used to, but the way you consume your calories is ‘juggled’ around so that your metabolism is ‘shocked’ into speeding up.

For example, a typical calorie shifting plan will have you eating more complex carbs (in the form of wholewheat bread, fruits and vegetables) with just a single portion of protein and fat on one day, the following day you will have a portion of protein at every meal, with only a single serving of complex carbs. This type of pattern is continued in a random manner on a calorie shifting diet so that your metabolism has to speed up to adjust to these daily changes to your dietary input.

No exhaustion, starving or cravings on a calorie shifting diet.

One of the most important calorie shifting diet guidelines is that you eat at least 4 times every day. No snacks are allowed in between, and each meal consists of a complete meal.

Calorie shifting ensures that you maintain your energy levels, and you don’t tend to experience extreme hunger pains. Because you are not cutting out entire food groups from your diet, you also don’t experience intense food cravings on a CALORIE SHIFTING weight loss program.

It is when you eliminate an entire food group (e.g. carbs) that your body lacks energy, and begins to crave the food that is forbidden. This is just not the case on a calorie shifting diet.

Calorie shifting diets such as Fat Loss For Idiots combines these principles, into a web based meal planning program which generates custom meals depending on your favorite foods. The program uses the principles of calorie shifting to design a fat loss diet which contains all of the healthy, nourishing foods you already enjoy. All you have to do is follow the program. It is really too simple.

On a calorie shifting weight loss program, there are no limits to the amount of food you can eat, no calorie counting, and no extreme exercise. A brisk walk every day is highly recommended for best weight loss results on a calorie shifting diet. The only condition is that you never eat until you feel full, just satisfied.

When you use the principles of calorie shifting to lose weight, it is important to eat your food as plain as possible.

While you are able to eat delicious seasonings such as herbs, spices and even mustard, and vinegars, it is not recommended that you eat lots of heavy sauces and ranch style dressings on your food on a calorie shifting diet.

You do not have to count calories on a CALORIE SHIFTING weight loss program (which is one of the best things about it), but you must be aware that adding extra sauces and toppings will add to the calorie content of your food.

Drinking plenty of water is also essential to lose weight on the Fat Loss For Idiots calorie shifting diet, and this has a whole range of other health benefits as well. Drinking water greatly affects the weight loss process on a calorie shifting diet, and the power of water to help your body burn fat fast cannot be over stated.

Following the Fat Loss For Idiots calorie shifting diet, it is possible to lose up to 9 pounds (4kgs) in 11 days.

Having said that, a healthy rate of loss to aim for on a Calorie shifting diet is between 1 – 2 pounds (.5 – 1kg) per week.

Even using calorie shifting to lose weight, you ideally want the process to be healthy, safe and something you can stick to in the long term, so that you achieve your fat loss goals.

This is something that is entirely achievable on a calorie shifting weight loss program.

If you have struggled to lose weight on other diets, you may want to consider giving a calorie shifting weight loss program a go.

You can find out more about the Fat Loss For Idiots calorie shifting program here …

Calorie Shifting the Idiots Way

To be frank, anyone who has excess weight to lose aspires to fast fat loss. When you finally make the decision to lose weight, isn’t it true that you really want to see the fat loss happen quickly?

After all, most traditional FAST FAT LOSS diets involve hunger, deprivation, cravings and extreme exercise programs. Who wouldn’t want to achieve fast fat loss and get the whole unpleasant ordeal over with as quickly as possible?

And this is the reason why so many fast fat loss diets fail. Well, let me clarify that; most people who strictly adhere to a fast fat loss diet will almost certainly lose weight if they stick to it.

But because the fast fat loss diets are uniformly so punishing and difficult to maintain, the majority of people cannot stay on them for either the short or medium term.

Most typically, people on a fast fat loss diet will experience a rapid weight loss at the very start of their diet, but this very quickly plateaus (sometimes in just a matter of days) as the cravings and hunger kick in, and the motivation starts to fade.

This is the reason why you need to choose a fast fat loss diet very carefully.

Not all fast fat loss diets are created equal. Some fast fat loss diets are very definitely safer, healthier and more user friendly than others.

Firstly, be wary of any fast fat loss diet which requires you to skip meals. Skipping meals and forcing your body to go for extended periods without food is not only bad for your body, but will do the opposite of what you want, which is to speed up your metabolism.

When a fast fat loss diet forces your body to go without food for extended periods, it naturally goes into ‘starvation mode’ and slows down your metabolism, because it does not know when you are going to eat next. This is bad news for weight loss. And feeling hungry all the time is just plain miserable.

You ideally want a fast fat loss program which enables you to eat smaller meals on a more regular basis.

Next, be wary of fast fat loss diets which exclude entire food groups for extended periods. The most popular of these at the moment are low carb diets.

Some fast fat loss diets require you to completely get rid of all carbs from your diet, including fruit, and most vegetables. Carbs give your body energy, and this explains why these types of fast fat loss, low carb diets tend to leave you feeling tired and lethargic.

Worse, when you completely strip an entire food group from your daily diet, your body responds by craving the food group it is not getting. And nothing derails a weight loss diet faster than severe food cravings.

If you intend to lose weight, look for a fast fat loss program which combines regular servings of fresh fruit and vegetables, high quality proteins and the right types of fats, and which also encourages regular gentle exercise for best results.

Every fast fat loss diet should integrate gentle to moderate daily exercise into your day.

The human body was simply not designed to be as sedentary as we have become, it was designed for fairly constant movement.

If you want to achieve fast fat loss, you will find that going on a brisk 30 – 45 minute walk every day will speed up the fat loss process. Daily exercise will keep your body toned, fit and flexible, while you are on your fast fat loss diet.

If you are using a fast fat loss diet, be aware of how much water you drink. You have probably heard it all before, but drinking plenty of water while you follow a fast fat loss diet is critical to both your health and fat loss.

By taking in water, our body regulates temperature, eliminates unnecessary metabolic products, and carries nutrients and oxygen to cells.

Not to drink water is one of the most common errors people make on a FAST FAT LOSS diet. Water is necessary for the burning of calories. If you become dehydrated whilst on a fast fat loss diet, your metabolism malfunctions, and that means slower fat loss.

Burning calories whilst using a fast fat loss diet creates toxins (think of the exhaust coming out of your car), and water plays a vital role in flushing them out of your body.

Dehydration is common amongst people who use a fast fat loss diet to lose weight and causes a reduction in blood volume; a reduction in blood volume causes a reduction in the supply of oxygen to your muscles; and a reduction in the supply of oxygen to your muscles can make you feel tired.

Indeed, this is a very common complaint amongst people who use a fast fat loss diet to lose weight.

Research indicates that adults who drink 8 or more glasses of water per day burn more calories than those who drink less. So, try to add a glass of water at each meal or snack while you are on a fast fat loss diet.

While you are using a fast fat loss diet, make sure you get plenty of sleep. Research has shown that getting enough sleep (an average of 8 hours a night) is a critical factor in fast fat loss, and chronic sleep deprivation has been linked to weight gain in women in the first instance.

In fact, researchers have reported that women who sleep 5 hours or less per night generally weigh more than women who sleep 7 hours per night.

Think about it for a moment, your body is working hard to burn stored fat, and you want it to be able to do this as fast and efficiently as possible.

So if you are considering a fast fat loss diet, take all of these factors into consideration, before you choose a program.

Ideally, the fast fat loss program you choose should be individually tailored to you, your life style and your food preferences.

Personally, the Fat Loss For Idiots fast fat loss program ticked all the right boxes for me. You can learn more about it here … Fat Loss For Idiots

Perhaps  half of the problem when it comes to trying to achieve fat loss is that we all want to believe that the process will be easy.

But as anyone who has ever struggled with FAT LOSS will know, it is anything but.

And the sheer numbers of people in the Western world who are overweight or obese gives further proof that it is indeed a struggle for most people to achieve healthy fat loss.

Fat Loss is a Growing Struggle for Millions of People in the Western World

In fact, according to Forbes.com, 74.1% of people over the age of 15 in the USA are considered to be overweight.

Countries like Australia and Germany are very close behind.

There are currently 1.6 billion overweight adults in the world, and the World Health Organization (WHO) has projected that number to grow by 40% over the next 10 years.

Besides the prevalence of diet related diseases such as Type 2 Diabetes, Cardiovascular Disease,  Hypertension and Stroke, people who are overweight also very commonly suffer from poor self esteem.
More than any other time in history, adults throughout the Western World are struggling to achieve and maintain fat loss.
And while it has widely been acknowledged that overweight and obesity are indicative of affluence in Western Countries, elsewhere, developing countries are dealing with what many experts call a nutrition transition.

Economies that are used to dealing primarily with under nutrition are now fighting obesity.

“Obesity has become a problem of poverty,” says Daniel Epstein of the WHO Regional Office of the Americas. “Poor people have an easier time of eating junk food. People fill up on things that have a high caloric value but little nutritional value.”

“The problems of obesity rates dramatically increase in countries that are undergoing economical development,” says Dr. Frank Hu, associate professor of nutrition and epidemiology at Harvard School of Public Health.

Rural workers moving to urban areas perform less physical labor and supplant traditional low-fat diets that include local goods with processed diets that are high in fat and sugar.

And so we come to those culprits of excessive and unhealthy weight gain, processed foods which are high in fat and sugar. We can easily become addicted to these types of foods which makes fat loss particularly difficult.

What is the best way to achieve healthy fat loss?

The best way to combat unhealthy weight gain and poor nutrition, and to achieve fat loss is to eat a diet high in fresh fruit and vegetables, high quality sources of protein, such as chicken, fish, lean red meat, eggs, nuts  and cheese, and complex carbohydrates.

Fat Loss is Best Achieved by Eating a Range of Fresh Healthy Food

Many popular FAT LOSS diets, designed for rapid and maximum fat loss, promote the concept that in order to lose weight, a person must completely eradicate an entire food group (e.g. carbs) from their diet.

In the short term, this will certainly lead to fat loss, but at the same time, it will leave the dieter feeling exhausted, and left to deal with terrible cravings for the food source that the body needs for energy, but is no longer getting.

Fat loss programs which encourage regular but smaller portions of the above foods, combined with moderate exercise on a daily basis are not only healthier, but more effective to both achieve fat loss and maintain the weight loss over time.

This all makes fat loss seem easy (and truthfully, these concepts are very simple). Good nutrition aside, being mentally prepared to lose weight will ultimately be the determining factor in a successful weight loss diet.

If you can team a positive mental attitude with a simple and healthy fat loss diet, you are three quarters of the way to achieving your weight loss goals.

So what does mental attitude have to do with fat loss?

Very simply, before you embark on any fat loss program, you must be mentally prepared to stick with it.

Any type of fat loss diet will require that you make changes to your eating behavior, and in order to do this successfully, you will want to make sure that you have adjusted your mindset to succeed on your fat loss program, and not revert to old and supportive beliefs about yourself, your body, and food.

For example, many people feel that it is more difficult for them to achieve fat loss because they have “fat genes”, or they are “too busy”, or “don’t have enough money” to properly follow a fat loss diet.

But none of these statements is the truth. As soon as people are happy to accept that whether or not they take care of their bodies in order to achieve healthy fat loss is entirely up to them.

There are some forms of exercise in particular which are extremely beneficial for those on a fat loss diet. Yoga, and Pilates are great examples. Both of these exercises tone the body, strengthen the muscles, but more importantly, connect the mind to the body.

Mentally Preparing Yourself For Success On a Fat Loss Diet is Essential For You To Achieve Your Fat Loss Goals

When you are on a fat loss program, you will enjoy the experience a good deal more if you connect your mind to your body, and learn to enjoy loving and caring for your body in a healthy way.

Programs such as Fat Loss For Idiots incorporate all of these principles into a powerful fat loss diet, which easy for anyone to follow, no matter what type of fat loss you are trying to achieve.