One of the most basic nutrition techniques used to expedite fat loss is eating small, frequent meals throughout the day. The effect of eating six portioned meals every 2-3 hours is so beneficial, yet so many people trying to drop body fat are completely oblivious to the concept of meal frequency.

Eating six times a day will make you much less hungry, will give you more energy, and will greatly increase fat loss all while eating a calorie restricted diet. It takes tons of discipline and a commitment to planning, but if you can successfully incorporate this technique it into your nutrition plan, you will surely see some amazing results.

To further understand the benefits (and challenges) of eating six times a day, let’s first take a look the common meal frequency of most people and why it can severely cripple the results of any fat loss nutrition plan.

How most people eat…

Most people eat no more than 3 times during a day. Sometimes people only eat twice (usually because they skip breakfast). A not too unusual eating day for many is a modest sized lunched followed many hours later by an extravagantly large dinner with maybe a couple servings of dessert and/or junk food right before bed.

To understand why this is such as bad thing, first you must wrap your head around an interesting facet of your body’s adaptive metabolic process. When you eat really large meals, your body has little ability to process the large intake of calories all at once and the majority of each meal gets stored as fat (as energy reserves). After a large meal your blood sugar is also spiked greatly, but then comes down to a normal level quickly. After a few more hours of not eating you blood sugar drops to a low level, so you begin to feel lethargic and often you start feeling very hungry again.

Now when you combine this sort of an eating routine with a “calorie restricted diet” the results can be disastrous. Since you are eating a less amount of calories very infrequently, your body’s blood sugar levels are low almost the entire day. You feel extremely lethargic and extremely hungry almost all the time. To counteract this, your body gradually falls into a “starvation mode” where the entire metabolic process slows down substantially. Instead of burning fat, your body protects it as a vital energy reserve and burns other sources of fuel (like your muscle tissue) in much larger proportion.

What your left with is a diet that puts you through periods of extreme lethargy and great bouts of hunger and a body that has decreased metabolism and a glaring inefficiency at burning fat. Yikes.

Why you should eat six times a day…

Now compare that to what happens when you eat six portioned meals throughout the day. When you eat this way, your body is constantly being fed the nutrients it needs, and your blood sugar level will remain relatively constant throughout the day . When this happens, your energy levels stay high all the time, and your hunger is thoroughly minimized.

Also, since you are not feeling the effects of a dreaded metabolic decrease from “starvation mode” your metabolism stays at a very high and efficient level. With your meals small and portioned, virtually all of the calories you intake are being used to support your body’s processes with very little, if any at all, being stored as extra fat.

The result is a nutrition plan that has transformed your body into a efficient, well-oiled fat burning machine.

The challenges of eating six times a day…

Now, even though eating six times a day sounds great, there are plenty of challenges you’ll have to deal with. Here’s an outline of some major hurdles you’ll face when developing a daily six-meal plan:

1) Eating Correctly:

The first challenge is to eat properly. Even though spreading out your meals is great for your metabolism, you still have to make healthy choices and eat less calories than you burn in a day. Don’t think eating frequently is a pass that lets you go through the McDonald’s drive thru six times daily.

Also, don’t eat too little six times a day and think you can get away with it either. If you eat too little, no matter how frequently you eat, you can still get hit with the ill effects of “starvation mode”. The goal is to put your body in a state of *slight* caloric deficiency for optimal fat loss. For help understanding this very important concept I strongly recommend Tom Venuto’s e-book, “Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle“.

2) Eating Every 2-3 Hours:

The second challenge is to actually physically eat every 2-3 hours, This can be a pretty difficult task for some. For people who travel a lot, or those that have hectic work schedules, it may even seem impossible. The key is in planning. What you should do is prepare your meals ahead of time, either daily or weekly (so go buy a bunch of plastic food containers).

Now, don’t think you have to prepare six fulls meals a day either. Protein shakes, meal replacement powders/drinks, and protein/travel bars can be substituted in for regular meals as needed. In fact, usually I only eat 3 regular meals a day, with 3 “substituted” meals in between. These substituted meals are also great because they are quite travel friendly, so use them to your advantage and make your life easier.

3) Normalize Sleeping:

The next challenge is to create regular sleep patterns. You need to setup your sleeping routine so you have enough time to eat six times a day. Your body’s metabolism is the lowest when you are sleeping, so make sure you’re not snoozing more than 8 hours a night. This keeps your metabolism up and gives you plenty of time to eat all of your meals. If you find it difficult to get your sleeping habits normalized, try taking short naps throughout the day (in between meals) as needed.

And while we’re on the topic of sleeping. I’d like to point out that an advanced fat loss technique when eating six times a day is to make sure your last meal of the day is no later than 3 hours before you go to bed (and that the ratio of carbs in this meal are cut drastically). This helps make sure your final meal doesn’t get stored as fat during your slowed down nighttime metabolism.

4) Social Pressure:

Finally, the last challenge you’ll face when fueling your body constantly throughout the day is social pressure. It’s quite absurd, but it’s something you’re going to have to deal with over and over again.

The issue is that most people, as mentioned before, stuff themselves only 2 or 3 times a day. So if you are out eating with friends or relatives, usually they’re going to look at you crazy when you fill your plate with only a 300-400 calorie portion. They’ll make remarks, they may ask you why you are on some “crazy diet”, they may even make fun of you (especially true if you’re a guy). If you’re in the most unlucky situation, with Mom or Grandma cooking, they may even insist aggressively that you “need to eat more”.

Dealing with these situations constantly can be exhausting. Of course, you need to have a tough skin and not budge an inch.

Sometimes when I’m put in these situations, to combat the pressure I’ll just just give an explanation (”I just ate 2 hours ago, I’m not that hungry”) or sometimes i’ll challenge people directly (”I’m actually not on some diet, I’m just eating every 2 to 3 hours to stay fit. You should try it, eating like you are right now is very unhealthy”).

Or sometimes, if I’m not in the mood to deal with it, I just let the comments go in one ear and out the other. Whatever strategy you choose, just remember you’ll be faced with this situation a lot, so you should anticipate it (and not get too emotional when it happens).

Now go do it…

So as you can see, eating six meals a day has some amazing benefits and it will allow you to burn fat much more efficiently and more comfortably.

Remember though, it’s hard and you’ll still have to eat correctly and then overcome the challenges of preparing six meals a day by planning ahead. You’ll also need to get your sleeping habits in check. Finally, you’ll need to be supremely confident in yourself, so that nothing, even undue social pressure could knock you off track.

So with that said, what are you waiting for? It’s time to eat!.

Structure is often a very underrated and overlooked component to a successful physical transformation. Often people speak of workout/diet “routines”, however I think term structure has much more weight and holds deeper meaning then then that often used “r” word. A routine is simply a set of habitual tasks whereas structure, by very definition of the word means “the manner in which in something was created and exists.”

You see, your desire for physical change is actual an “intangible” entity at this point. It’s a vision for something better. To begin your transformation process, your first step is to convert that intangible desire into a concrete, tangible plan. In other words you must structure your fitness vision and bring it to life.

Now you may think I’m simply substituting words here just to make myself look smart, but really what I’m trying to convey to you is how important it is to mentally engage yourself in the transformation process. Once you structure a transformation plan it will drastically change your life. It will control your actions and it will dictate how you think, act and feel. It becomes so ingrained in your consciousness that it really, truly becomes alive and lives within you.

Whether you see it or not, this type of structure is the key component of any process that produces substantial results. Want examples? Just take a look around. How about the company you work for. Companies have very defined structures. They have rules, boundaries and limitations for all employees. But just imagine if they didn’t. What if employees had no bosses or there weren’t any tasks that employees had to complete. Would the companies make any money?

How about education? How would a semester of French III go without a lesson plan, teachers or any homework assignments. Would students learn any French?

What about the military? What if soldiers could do whatever they wanted, whenever they pleased? Would we win any wars?

I could go on and on, but what I’m trying to show you is that structure is essential for results. Without it nothing substantial can be achieved. So you have to create structured plan to transform your body. Then you have to believe in your plan, and you have to take it as serious as you would your regular job or a college French III midterm. This is how you succeed.

Creating A Structured Plan

So how do you actually create an effective physical transformation plan? The good news is that it’s not that hard, you just have to take some time to think things out, research topics you are less than knowledgeable about and most importantly, completely believe in what you are doing.

Here are the steps:

1. Set Your Goal / Set The Stage

You need to define how you want to you transform your body. Not only descriptively (”lose weight”, “get ripped”, “build muscle” etc) but also numerically (215 lbs, 8% body fat, 32 inch waist etc).

The reason you have to do this is because it determines the principles your plan will be based upon. Most physical transformation goals (that are not athletic/performance based) fall into one of two categories:

• Build muscle (gain weight)
• Lose fat (lose weight)

Your entire plan will depend on which category you fall into, so look at your goals and make a decision.

Also another benefit of setting a goal (especially of the numeric variety) is that it allows you to track progress. This lets you know if you are on track and provides valuable data that lets you make adjustments throughout the course of your journey.

2. Pick Your Time Frame

This an important consideration you’ll need to make. Many people are of the “I want it now” mentality which often leads to the buy in of “fad” diets and TV infomercial hype. In reality, physical transformation is a very slow process and you need to be very patient. If you think you are going to transform your body in two weeks, it’s just not going to happen. I recommend 90 days as a good starting point for someone who wants to see substantial transformation.

If you are very ambitious, for example losing 100-150 pounds, understand that you need to give yourself much more time that. Anything is possible, but only if you allow enough time for a healthy transformation process to take place.

3. Create Your Nutrition Plan

Here’s where the meat of your structured transformation process will take place (no pun intended). This is also one of the two areas where you will need to do some significant research if you aren’t very knowledgeable on the topic. The absolute bare bone principle is that you need to either eat more calories than you expend daily (for muscle building) or eat less calories then you expend daily (for fat loss).

Beyond that there is so much more information that you really should know. Rather than try to cover it all, I’ll just list some good resources that will help you create a sound nutrition plan for your specific set of goals.

For Building Muscle - Nutrition Information:

• Muscle Building Truth Comprehensive Program
• Muscle Building Made Simple (Blog Article)
• Bodybuilding.com Mass Gain Diet Section

For Fat Loss - Nutrition Information:

• Burn The Fat - Nutrition “Bible”
• Bodybuilding.com Fat Loss Diet Section

After you’ve done your research and feel comfortable with nutrition principles you will need to put your nutrition plan in writing. Once your plan is writing it will become your definitive guide for the course of your 90 day (or more) journey. You will be held responsible to adhere to it completely and genuinely. I highly recommend placing your plan in a high visibility area. The front of the refrigerator is the perfect spot.

Create Your Exercise Plan

This is the other area were you’ll have to put in significant research if you are not already knowledgeable on the topic. The basics for training for muscle gain is to use resistance exercises to systematically breakdown muscle fibers to allow them to grow back larger. The basics for training for fat loss is to use high intensity cardiovascular exercise to burn calories and increase metabolism.

Just like with nutrition, the topics of weight training and cardiovascular exercise are so extremely broad and and in-depth I won’t even attempt provide advice here. Rather I’ll again point you to resources that cover the topics in entirety:

For Muscle Building - Resistance Training Information:

• No-Nonsense Muscle Building Program
• Muscle Building Made Simple (Blog Article)
• Bodybuilding.com Training Articles

For Fat Loss - Cardio Training Information:

• Burn The Fat - Nutrition “Bible”
• Bodybuilding.com Cardio Training Section
  

Set Your Limitations

The final step of structuring your transformation is to set your limitations. A lot of people have vices that can and will negatively influence your fitness transformation plan. It’s a very good idea to completely abandon or at least severely limit these things to achieve maximum transformational growth. A list of negative influences could include smoking, drugs, alcohol, partying, caffeine, over use of medicines etc.

What you give up and how much of it you give up is entirely up to you. Just remember when you create a structured plan for yourself you are creating a tangible framework for physical change. The less you are willing to give up negative influences, the more likely your frame will crack and eventually falter. If this happens you’ll be back where started and you’ll be left making little to no change to your physique.

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Once you have completed all the steps above (and you have it all in writing) you now should have what feels like a substantial guide, a structure, that your mind can really wrap itself around. The next step is to execute it genuinely and completely. If you have put in the hours of research and come up with a solid plan and you execute it fully, there’s no doubt you’ll see substantial results.

So if you’ve had difficulty changing your body in the past, remember you need a just need to create structure for your physical transformation to be built upon. Structuring a plan consists of developing these five major components:

1. A Goal
2. A Time Frame
3. A Nutrition Plan
4. A Exercise Plan
5. A Set Of Limitations

Once you create your plan, let it live and breathe and allow it to dictate and change your life. Believe in your plan, and more importantly believe in yourself. Remember, if you stay committed to what you have created, you are only a few months removed from a completely amazing physical transformation.

Three syllables that strike fear into the heart of any serious fitness buff. Va - ca - tion. Ok, maybe fear isn’t the best choice of words, I mean who could fear a week sipping on pina coladas at the beach right?

Seriously though, there is a cause for concern. I’ve seen it numerous times..people putting in hard work and discipline for months and achieving tremendous physical results. They go on vacation for a week come back and BLAM!…all of their motivation and focus has been suddenly been sapped. They start taking their nutrition and exercise less seriously and slowly, but surely they creep back to their old pudgy, unattractive bodies.

You see, people trying to get into optimal shape are creatures of habit. And there is nothing like vacation to swoop in and chaotically disrupt a meticulously planned out exercise and nutrition routine. God forbid you go on vacation more than a week, who knows if have any chance of getting back on track when you get home.

There is some relief though. If you plan ahead and you commit yourself to doing certain things on vacation you will be much more likely to not skip a beat when you get home , no matter how long your stay in paradise is.

Here’s some general vacation fitness advice that ensures you’ll jump right back on track when you get home from a long trip:

1. Enjoy vacation cuisine (to an extent)

You are on vacation for a reason…so do yourself a favor and enjoy it! The worst thing you can do is feel guilty or stressed out about your lack of poor food choices while on vacation. With that said though, you should limit indulgences to a very firm threshold. Have fun and treat yourself but DON’T GO OVERBOARD. Even alcohol, fine cuisine, chocolate and dessert can be subject to portion control so eat and drink unhealthy only in small doses.

Also, do yourself a favor complement your paradise binging with healthy choices such as fruit/vegetables and quality proteins sources whenever possible.

Remember the longer you are on vacation, the stricter you are going to have to be on your diet, so keep that in mind.

2. Hit the weights

To compensate for your less than ideal eating, you definitely need to workout, maybe even harder than you usually do.

There are no excuses for not doing this. If you’re staying in a hotel, many have weight rooms. If you’re not in a hotel or if your hotel doesn’t have a fitness center, before you head off buy a pair of high-quality, heavy resistance bands.

You may be curiously raising an eyebrow at these contraptions if you’ve never seen them before. While they won’t replace free weights, they can and will give you completely adequate resistance workout. With a single band you can do everything from bicep curls, to lat pulldowns, to rows, to tricep extensions to shoulder presses…the list just goes on and on and on.

What’s great about bands is that they’re cheap and can easily fit in your travel bag. Complement your bands with push ups, chair dips, body squats and crunches and you have a full workout waiting for you anywhere. Bummer and you thought you were going to get out of working out for a week huh?

Oh and don’t tell me you don’t have time to workout when you are vacation. That’s a hard case to make when you are laying around for 12 hours a day

3. Do your cardio

Just like with weight training, if you normally do cardio as part of your routine don’t skimp out on it during vacation. As mentioned most hotels have fitness centers. If yours doesn’t or if you’re not in a hotel…well…God gave you two feet for a reason. Pack some good shoes because you’re going to be doing a lot of running.

4. Get back on your plan immediately

Maybe the most important thing is to remember is that you need to completely refocus as soon vacation is over. Any time you digress from your nutrition/exercise plan, there’s a good chance your motivation will be decreased substantially (which could possibly lead you to quitting your plan altogether - gasp). So it’s imperative that you don’ let your mind get comfortable. The minute you get home, you need to recommit and execute your plan with even more determination and willpower than before.

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So no matter where your upcoming vacation destination is, keep these key points in mind and you’ll transition easily back to your normal routine when you come back. If you have enough self-control and workout hard enough over the break, you might even find that your vacation is beneficial to your routine. You’ll come home refreshed and reenergized and you’ll work harder than ever.

Now go book your trip and have some fun! But remember stay disciplined and exhibit some self control on your trip…you will be very glad you did when vacation’s over.

Well I’ve seen it pretty often. The pages are flipping, voices are chatting, cell phones are being dialed and ipods are being fumbled. Where am I? On a plane? Strolling downtown? Sitting in a park? NO…I’m at my local gym trying to do cardio!

Yes it’s true, the amount of lackadaisical, low-effort, no intensity working out I see on cardio machines at gyms everywhere really baffles me. Between the old ladies chatting next to me on elliptical machines, to the guy on the treadmill paying a little too much attention to the TV, to the young kid annoyingly talking on his cell phone on the bike, it seems like almost everyone doing cardio is not really doing cardio, if you know what I mean.

Look, people have a right to workout however they want to. But seriously, if you have enough focus to read an entire issue of National Geographic while you are working out, I would bet my entire life savings that you are not working out hard enough to do anything “substantial” in terms of fat loss (or even fitness for that matter).

I think this “lack of effort” comes down to a combination of two things.

1) People like doing cardio just so they can “feel better” about themselves regardless of the effort they put in.

Face it, “read a magazine” cardio and “talk to neighbor” cardio is very easy. There’s little to no work involved and as a added bonus you get to go home and pat yourself on the back for not being lazy . But in reality people who work out like this are lazy because they use the least amount of effort required to just keep the machine lights on. It’s harsh, but it’s the truth.

2) The common misconception that low-intensity cardio is better for fat loss.

This one really boils my skin. Plastered on virtually every cardio machine is the infamous fat loss “zone”, which recommends keeping your heart rate around 60% of its max for “ideal” fat loss training. The idea being that at lower intensity training your body uses a higher percentage of fat for fuel whereas high intensity training uses more carbs. While this whole ratio thing may be true, when it comes to fat loss all that matters is TOTAL CALORIES burned. The more intense you workout the more calories you will burn. PERIOD. Yeah sure, you may be burning a higher “ratio” of carbs but you are still burning more TOTAL fat than you would barely moving on the treadmill.

So, if you’re one of these people who for either of the aforementioned reasons doesn’t really give it their all during cardio exercise here are a few tips to create a workout that will have you crying for momma:

• HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training) - HIIT Cardio Training involves alternating very rigorous maximum intensity “work” intervals (usually short intervals 30 sec to 1 min) with lower intensity “rest” intervals (usually 1 to 2 min). HIIT has been scientifically proven to be more effective then steady state cardio at lower intensities for fat burning purposes. You can do hit for any cardio exercise and you may find that you can make your total workout shorter (15 - 30 min) since you’re working so hard.
• Heart rate goals: Aside from HIIT you can also use “heart rate goals” to really pick up the intensity for regular cardio. Use a heart rate monitor (some cardio machines have them built in or you can use the kind that straps onto your wrist). Now set a heart rate goal that is challenging. The level that works for you may be different than someone else, but for me personally, I shoot for at least 150 bpm for intense cardio sessions. Whatever you do, don’t let your heart rate BPM fall below your preset threshold.
• Find a competitor: If you workout with a friend or counterpart, one of the best things you can do to is compete. Pick the same machine, start at the same time and find out who’s picking up the tab for the post-workout meal. Compete on miles completed (in a set amount of time) or even calories burned (as measured on machine). Either way, you’ll find that the competition will really push you to go harder and faster.

So there you have it. No more excuses and no more low-intensity, no challenge cardio. Constantly push your self to the extreme during training and you’ll find that you’ll be mentally stronger, physically more able and that your fat loss results will skyrocket to a whole new level.

It’s clear after researching sound fat loss techniques, that the hands down, no-questioned most important factor is nutrition. Eat too much and your body won’t lose any fat, eat too little and you will be kicked into “starvation mode” where your body holds onto fat, while eating away at your precious muscle (um…not cool).

The key to eating properly for fat loss is in PLANNING. Not only do you need to figure out the daily calorie level that puts your body in a state of *slight* caloric deficiency, you also need to plan on how you are going to eat 5-6 portioned meals a day (to increase metabolism and control hunger), and how eat the proper balance of protein, carbs, fats (yes, fats) & vitamins that are essential for your body’s metabolic processes.

Now this is a pretty big undertaking. But if you think nutritional planning is the tough part..when it comes to shredding the fat, there’s another even greater, more monumental hurdle. Once you start to execute your beloved fat blasting nutrition plan, you’re quickly going to meet a shady, deceitful, no good mobster named Mr. Binge.

Confused? Don’t be. Let me introduce Mr. Binge.

“Mr. Binge is a charmer and a sweet talker. He tells you that everything is ok. He reassures you. He convinces you. ‘Just this once won’t hurt anybody…right?’ He stares at you. He smiles at you. As you slowly and methodically succumb to your weak minded indulgence, he grins. The moment you collapse on the sofa rubbing your bloated belly from eating too many Cheez-Its, he slips out the back door and disappears off into the night.”

Ok sorry for the over-dramatic analogy but I think you get the point. Binging, or what I would define as a “substantial divergence” from your nutritional plan, is probably the easiest way to knock you off track and leave you cold & lonely in Fatville.

Now, I probably need to explain myself a little bit. Binging of and in itself is not horrible if you do it once every so often. The problem with binging is that it’s almost synonymous to a “gateway drug”. You do it once and you’re more likely to do it twice. You do it twice and your more likely to do it four times. You do it four times and you’re more likely to do it eight times. You do it eight times and….well you get the point.

Let’s face it, people have an extremely hard time sticking to their nutritional plan. Just look at the ratio of people on diets to the ratio of healthy people walking around and I think you’ll see what I mean. The truth is, people on diets usually don’t just fall off the wagon at the snap of the finger. It’s often a much slower process starting with the first “binge” meal that diverts them from their plan. After that meal their mind is just a little bit weaker, and eventually they falter again. Then again. And again. And again. And once more until finally they just give up looking as bad as they did when they started.

You see, binging, however innocent it may look at the time is always the first step when someone gives up on their nutritional plan. To overcome the wrath of binging, well simply…don’t do it. Ok ok, I know it’s not that easy. Seriously though, if you ever want to look good you need a serious amount of mental determination and discipline and resisting temptation is a huge part of that.

To lessen the temptation, eat a well-balanced meal frequently (5 to 6 times a day). The more often you eat, the less hungry you are. The less hungry you are, the less likely you will binge. If you really, absolutely can’t resist binges than at the very least just schedule them. Allow yourself one “cheat meal” once every two weeks…or even better once every month. Hold yourself accountable and under no circumstances let yourself cheat more than what you’ve previously allotted.

Don’t let binging be the reason you throw away months of healthy, disciplined eating. Yes I know a double whopper with cheese and supersize fries tastes heavenly. Yes I know one single binge meal won’t hurt you that much. Yes I know tomorrow you think you’ll be “more committed to eating healthy then ever”. But the fact is if you binge, you are seriously jeopardizing your nutritional plan and are very likely to destroy it completely. Consider the consequences carefully. Binge now and feel good only temporarily or resist temptation and look good permanently. It’s your choice.