Important Facts about Nutrition

What are the facts about nutrition and why is it so important to know certain things. Nutrition is the method by which the cells in the body aquire what they need to maintain them. That's the scientific explanation. Nutrition comes from the food that you eat and it's pretty obvious that the better the quality of food, the better nutritional value it will have.

An essential fact about nutrition is that our body has "famine mode", and this is a really important piece of information about nutrition you should know if you're thinking about losing weight. During times when food was scarce, which has been for the greater part of man's evolution, the body developed 'famine mode' as a defense system. However, the body also reacts this way if the food it is gettiing is of poor nutritional quality.

Famine mode is really quite simple to understand. If the body isn't getting enough calories then it begins to store what calories it does get. To do this the body significantly reduces the metabolic rate (which is the rate your body burns calories while at rest). In order to make up the calorie deficit the body then starts to convert muscle tissue into energy. Muscles are very 'expensive' to maintain as they need lots of calories, so in times of 'famine' it will store body fat and use muscle tissue.

Why should you know this? The answer is because many weight loss plans restrict the number of calories you have each day and that will trigger the body's famine mode. By going into famine mode not only will the metabolic rate diminish but it will also result in you losing muscle tissue which is the very thing that makes you look great and burn up the calories - a double tradegy!

To learn more about a healthier lifestyle go to Healthy Living.

Of course, in order to lose weight you do need to eat less calories than you burn but in order to do this without triggering the body's famine mode you need to reduce the calorie intake slowly rather than suddenly and massively. You want to have a differential of no more than 500 calories per day between the calories burned and the calories eaten this is a good ballpark figure.

Having resistance training in your exercise regime not only will alter your body for the better but will also aid in staying away from famine mode. By adding resistance training e.g. doing weights you then prompt the body to send the calories you eat to build muscle tissue rather than fat. The more calories you burn will depend on how much muscle you build.

Another way to fool the body is to eat small meals regularly. If you are continually sending food (recommended 3 hourly) into the system the body will happily burn from the fat rather than from the muscle. Of course the food must be of high nutritional value.

Do these couple of things, get your head around 'famine' mode and know about good nutrition and you will be on the way to looking and feeling great.