Home / Blog / Podcast / Ep. #986: These Are Some of the Worst Diet Takes Out There
Written by Michael Matthews
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Do 95% of diets fail, or is the problem dieters? Does counting calories give you an eating disorder? Is it possible to be in a calorie deficit for years without losing weight? In this podcast, you’re going to hear a bunch of common, bad diet takes. Listen to this podcast and let me know your thoughts! What bad diet takes have you heard?
Timestamps:
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Transcript:
Hello and welcome to Muscle for Life Amsr Edition, and I think I’ll stick to my day job and leave the amsr to the professionals. And so what are we getting up to in this episode? This is a shortie, a little mini episode on Bad Diet. Takes. So here’s the first one. Don’t take advice from anyone who discourages dieting, any type of dieting, because they say 95% of diets fail.
So don’t even try, These people do not know what they’re talking about because. Taken collectively, yes, most dieters fail. Most people who try to diet to lose weight ultimately fail to lose weight and certainly fail to lose weight and keep it off, but that’s not because of some inherent problem. With dieting, 95% of dieters fail if that is the real number.
I don’t even know if that is accurate, but it’s up there. A large percentage of dieters fail because most diets suck because most of these people go about it the wrong way, and there are so many ways to go about dieting the wrong way. There are. Many fewer ways to do it the right way. You should also ignore people who say that counting calories will give you an eating disorder, because that’s like saying that drinking alcohol is gonna make you an alcoholic.
No. It can, but it probably won’t. And speaking of counting calories, when you hear somebody claim that they’ve been in a calorie deficit for two years now, three years now, and they haven’t lost weight, just remember that they’re someone who hasn’t actually been in a calorie deficit for two years now, or three years now.
And they may think that they have been because they. Understand how many calories they eat on average. Most people do not know how many calories they eat. Most people vastly underestimate the amount of calories they eat and overestimate the amount of calories they burn. That’s been shown in a number of studies and anybody who works professionally in the fitness space, who works with people also knows that anecdotally also.
People who have tried counting calories, they seem to have selective memory. They are very quick to remember the 1000 calorie Mondays and are very quick to forget the 5,000 calorie Saturdays. Now what about the people who say that cutting calories never helped them lose weight, but eating less sugar or less carbs that did the trick.
Unbeknownst to those people, they only found a workable method of cutting calories to lose weight. Some people don’t like to count calories, so they cut carbs. Some people don’t like to cut carbs, so they cut calories. Both of those methods can work. Neither is necessarily better than the other. I would lean toward counting calories and not cutting carbs.
For a number of reasons. But again, some people find that easy. They don’t mind a low carb diet and they know to keep their protein high and they know to train their muscles and blah, blah, blah. And so do whatever works best for you. And so I guess what I’m trying to say here is don’t let people complexify your diet.
Don’t follow their frantic and futile attempts to flee the cold light of day to flee the. Understanding that all calories matter, all calories count. You don’t necessarily have to count them, but all calories count. Don’t force yourself to learn the lesson that while you can ignore realities like energy, balance, like macronutrient balance, you simply can’t ignore the consequences of ignoring.
Your ability to gain muscle and gain strength is greatly impacted by how well your body can recover from your training and how strong you get in your training. And that’s why it’s not enough to just hammer away at the weights every week. You have to watch your calories and watch your macros. You have to maintain good sleep hygiene.
You have to avoid over-training. And you can also speed up your post-workout recovery and your muscle and strength gain with supplementation, and that’s why I created Recharge. It is a 100% natural post-workout drink that boosts muscle growth improves. Recovery and reduces muscle soreness. And the reason it’s so effective is simple.
Every ingredient is backed by peer-reviewed scientific research and is included at clinically effective levels. Those are the amounts used in studies that found benefits. Recharge is also 100% naturally sweetened and flavored. It contains no artificial food dyes, no chemical. Whatsoever and all that is why I have sold over 250,000 bottles of Recharge and why it has over 2,504 and five star reviews on Amazon and my website.
So if you want to be able to push harder in the gym, if you want to recover better from your training, if you want to gain muscle and strength faster, you want to try RECHARGE today, go to by legion.com B u. legion.com/recharge and use the coupon code muscle at checkout and you will save 20% if it is your first order with us.
If it is not, you will get double reward points on that order, so that is 6% cash back. And if you don’t absolutely love recharge, just let us know and we will give you a full refund on the spot. No forms. No return even is necessary. You really can’t lose. So go to buy legion.com/recharge. Now. Place your order.
Use the coupon code muscle and save 20% or get 6% cash back in reward points. Try recharge, risk free and see what you think. I hope you liked this episode. I hope you found it helpful, and if you did subscribe to the show because it makes sure that you don’t miss new episodes. And it also helps me because it increases the rankings of the show a little bit, which of course then makes it a little bit more easily found by other people who may like it just as much as you.
And if you didn’t like something about this episode or about the show in general, or if you have ideas or suggestions, Feedback to share. Shoot me an email, mike muscle for life.com, muscle f o r life.com and let me know what I could do better or just what your thoughts are about maybe what you’d like to see me do in the future.
I read everything myself. I’m always looking for new ideas and constructive feedback. So thanks again for listening to this episode, and I hope to hear from you soon.
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Mike Matthews
Mike Matthews is the founder and CEO of Legion as well as the author of several award-winning fitness books, including Bigger Leaner Stronger, Muscle for Life, and The Shredded Chef.
His simple and science-based approach to building muscle, losing fat, and getting healthy has sold over a million books and helped thousands of people build their best bodies ever, and his work has been featured in many popular outlets including Esquire, Men’s Health, Elle, Women’s Health, Muscle & Strength, and more, as well as on FOX and ABC.
You can find Mike on Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and Facebook.
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