Here's How we Lose (or Gain) Fat

By Gary Giamboi

In order to help us lose weight, we must understand there are certain principles which every normally functioning human body uses to process the food he/she eats and which determine how it will use the nutrients it extracts from this food.

For this article, let's focus solely on the Caloric content of the food we consume. This reduces food to just the fuel or energy for our bodies.

Consuming less energy than we burn we result in our needing to burn stored energy (sugar or fat) to make up the difference. Conversely, consuming more energy than we burn will result in our storing the additional energy in our liver or cells as either sugar (Glycogen) or fat. Glycogen is stored in the Liver and Muscle cells, while Fat is stored in Adipocytes or Fat cells.
Our body's Primary and Preferred source of Energy is Glycogen or Sugar. In fact, some processes can only use Glycogen (Anaerobic exercise, Brain, Nerve, Red Blood and White Blood Cells can only use Glycogen as fuel). Therefore, we must use up our stored Glycogen before we can start burning stored fat. However, once Glycogen stores have been exhausted, glucose will start to be synthesized from proteins in a process called Gluconeogenesis. This means we may be Breaking Down our own Muscle cells to make Glycogen. If we are restricting our intake of carbohydrates, the only way to prevent the breakdown of our muscles is to consume adequate amounts of Protein to convert into Glucose. This process continues for about 24-48 hours until our body can begin the process of Ketosis. Ketosis is a chemical process which results in the Brain being able to use stored Fat as fuel. It is designed to help save our Vital Muscle Mass, such as our Heart! We do not want to lose weight by losing Muscle, we want to Lose Fat.
Our body likes stored energy, especially fat. Our body's mechanisms and processes have not caught up to life in a modern 21st century society. It is always preparing for the famine it still believes can happen at any moment. Therefore, if we cut the Calories we consume by about 10% or more for more than 2 days in a row, our body will believe there is a Famine and it will go into starvation mode. This means our body will start to cut out processes it considers non-essential for survival and lower our overall Metabolism (the rate at which our body burns energy or Calories) by about 10%. Once we have used up our stored Gylcogen, our body will also begin to burn Fat and Muscle. It will turn Muscle into Gylcogen at approximately the same rate it burns Fat. So until we enter Ketosis, for every pound of Fat we burn, we can lose up to 1lb of Muscle.
Our body can either store excess energy primarily via the action of the hormone Insulin or it can release stored energy via the hormone Glucagon.
Our pancreas will secrete either Insulin or Glucagon. It can not do both at the same time. So we cannot release Fat in the presence of Available Blood Sugar.
When our blood sugar rises, our body produces Insulin to facilitate the uptake of the excess blood sugar and blood fats to our muscles and liver. When this happens our body will not be able to burn any energy stored as a form of Glucose or fat. So it will be impossible to lose Fat while the level of our Blood Sugar is high and this process is occurring.
In order to get our body to release stored energy, our level of Blood Sugar must remain below the level necessary to induce the production of Insulin. This will stimulate the production of the hormone, Glucagon. Glucagon facilitates the release of stored sugars (Glycogen) and fats from our cells and liver.
Eating infrequent large meals or meals containing a high percentage of simple carbohydrates will cause the level of our blood sugar to rise very high, very quickly. This will cause Insulin to be released.
There is only one natural way to get rid of fat. That is to burn it. Without going into Ketosis, there is only one place to burn fat and that is in a Muscle cell.
Keeping your body in a state of Ketosis for an extended period of time is not considered Healthy by many leading health experts. Therefore, Low Carb diets are not recommended by them.

Therefore, we can help ourselves burn fat by working with these very principles which regulate its Storage and Release in the first place. All we have to do is be Mindful of Why we are Eating, When we are Eating and How we are Eating. And do the Following:

In order to Gain Muscle and Lose Bodyfat, we also need to reduce our levels of Stress and Sleep deeper and longer. Let's look more closely at these two Concepts:

Stress:

Even Today, Our Pre-Historic body knows only two kinds of Stress: Getting enough to Eat and Avoiding Being Eaten. 100,000 years ago, this was just about All the Stress there was in our great great....grandfather's/grandmother's lives. And the only response they had to it was Fight or Flight.

In order to better prepare us to be successful at Fighting or Escaping, our body learned to do the following:

Become Mentally more Alert
Dilate our Pupils and Make Vision and Hearing more Acute
Increase our Circulation and Respiration
Inhibit our Digestion & Shunt the extra Blood Supply to our Muscles
Constrict Blood Vessels in many parts of the body
Raise Blood Sugar Levels and Release Insulin
Dilate the Blood Vessels in our Muscles
Inhibit our Tear Glands and Salivation
Relax our Bladder and Colon
Inhibit Erections
Release Adrenaline, Noradrenaline and Cortisol

The benefits for survival for most of these responses are obvious. However, the adverse affects of the Long Term Elevation of the Hormones associated with these responses is just now being understood.

Adrenaline increases the heart rate and force of heart contractions, facilitates blood flow to the muscles and brain, causes relaxation of smooth muscles, helps with conversion of glycogen to glucose in the liver, and other activities.

Noradrenaline has strong vasoconstrictive effects, thus increasing blood pressure.

So long term elevated levels of these two Hormones would seem to be associated with our Heart working much harder than it should be and certain organs receiving less than the optimal Blood Supply. It would also seem to make burning Fat more difficult since it keeps our Glucose levels higher than normal.

Cortisol is also involved in determining how the body Metabolizes Proteins, Carbohydrates and Fats. Long Tern Elevated levels of Cortisol would seem to imply our body will not be processing our Nutrients as it should. It has also been linked to Impaired Cognitive Performance, Suppressed thyroid function, Blood sugar imbalances such as hyperglycemia, Decreased bone density, a Decrease in muscle tissue, Higher blood pressure, Lowered Immunity and Inflammatory responses in the body, as well as other health consequences, Increased abdominal fat, which is associated with a greater amount of health problems than fat deposited in other areas of the body.

Being in a Fight or Flight response mode, or in a sort of Pre-Fight or Flight mode, means we are looking for, and indeed, maybe even expecting Trouble. Trouble is what is suppose to happen. That is why we are primed to look for it and that is why we are in the state we are in.

We do not need our Rational Mind, Our Heart and our Conscience to beat a Snake or run away from a Sabre Tooth Tiger. Indeed, they will probably even get in our way!

In my humble opinion, being in such a state makes it harder for us to listen to our Hearts and our Conscience or to take the time to figure things out.

So, if this affects our ability to look at the Bright Side, be Understanding or Forgiving, Generous, etc. would you be surprised?

To quote a couple of popular songs: "What's Love Got to Do with It" and "I know What I was Feeling; but, What was I Thinking."

I will even go so far as to say we are addicted to Stress. Is it Now a coincidence that Violent Movies/VIdeo Games and Scary Movies/Video Games are the most popular? When a person watches one of these movies/video games, the better the movie/game, the more he/she becomes involved in a Fight or Flight Reality more Real than their present lives.. Their responses will be proportional to their involvement.

This Cannot be Good for the Person involved. And it Cannot be Good for a Society where a Majority of it's people are living this way.

Sleep:

Sleep is when (or perhaps Where) your body repairs itself and builds new Muscle. With the Right Stimuli during our awake time, more sleep can mean more Muscle (and less Fat in the long run). It is relatively easy to make your sleep time result in Fat Loss.

Sleep is also where we work out things which happened during the day and remain unresolved (perhaps that why a lack of sleep makes us more irritable. It leaves more things unresolved and un-accepted). Thus, during Sleep, we can lower our Stress levels by waking up with less unresolved and un-accepted issues in our minds.

There have also been new studies which show that people who get less than 5 hours of sleep each night are more overweight than those who get 8 hours.

The less sleep group higher levels of Ghrelin in their blood. Ghrelin is a hormone produced in the stomach that sends out hunger signals to the brain, which then makes you feel hungry.

They also had lower levels of Leptin. Leptin is another appetite-regulating hormone. It's produced by fat cells and delivers satiation signals to the brain. The particular hormonal ratio of high Ghrelin/low Leptin was probably making the less sleep group eat more often and in greater amounts.

A University of Chicago study found that people who slept less than 4 hours actually had increased levels of the hormones Cortisol and Insulin—which are linked to a difficulty in processing Carbohydrates.

Of course, we don't know if the increased levels of Cortisol and Insulin are involved in causing the poor sleeping patterns or the result of the them.

In any case, remember, Exercising can help you sleep longer and deeper.

Practicing an Internal Art such as Yoga, Qi Gong, Meditation (Concentration), Taijiquan (Tai Chi) or I Liq Chuan can also help. They have All been shown to help reduce Stress and its accompanying Hormones, which are linked to increased levels of Body fat.

So What should I Do? I'm Glad you asked?

Learn an Internal Art which cultivates in you a Healthy Body, as well as, Mindfulness, Willpower, Love, Peace, Tranquility, Compassion, Kindness, Generosity and Forgiveness.

Yoga, Taijiquan (Tai Chi), Meditation, Qigong, True Martial Arts are all means to This End. They All Promote a Healthy Body and a Healthy Mind with a Positive Outlook.

That's What I Do. I can help You Do It Also

About the Author:

Gary Giamboi is a NASM certified Personal Trainer, an E-500RYT Yoga Instructor, holds the rank of Kyoshi (Teaching Master) in several Japanese Martial Arts from the Genbukan World Ninpo Federation and the Kokusai Jujutsu Renmei and a Master's License in Taijiquan (Tai Chi) and Qigong.

He is available for Private Training and Consultations on losing fat, toning up, athletic performance, balance as well as, Martial Arts & Yoga seminars and the 200 hour Yoga Teachers Training courses.

Other articles by Gary can be seen here. He can be reached via his website.

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