Calories and Weight Loss – Do Calories Really Matter?

What are calories and why are they important for weight loss – or are they even important at all? Now and then, you will hear people talking about the need to cut your calorie intake if you are hoping to lose weight. Whereas this might be true, the biggest assumption that is made here is that everyone understands what calories are.

It might sound crazy, but yeah, very few people actually understand what calories are. That is why I will start this article by first letting you know what calories are and later letting you the role that calories play in our bodies, more so when we are planning to lose some weight.

Calories are used as a measure of the amount of energy the food we eat gives us and how much of this energy is essential for our survival. The food we take is digested and metabolized by our bodies to give out energy and some other products. It is this energy that allows us to carry out basic processes such as breathing and functioning of our hearts, just to name a few of the physiological processes in our bodies.

So why do medics and nutritionists advise that we take a cut in our calories intake? Let’s find out.

On a scientific point of view, it can not be plainly said that this is the amount of calories that human beings require. This is so because, factors such as gender, your age and type of work that you involve in determines the level of calories intake that your body requires. If someone takes more calories than the body requires, the excess calories are stored as fat. This is what leads to weight gain.

It is therefore very clear that our calories intake have everything to do with our weight gain or loss. It is therefore very important that the amount of calories that you take should not surpass the amount of calories that your body burns to produce energy.

To burn the excess fats, you need to have a way of making your body utilize the stored fats. This can be done by creating a difference between the amount of calories your body burns every day and the amount of calories that you take every day. If you want to lose a lot of weight, you need to make this gap bigger as the more deficit you create, the more of your stored energy is consumed by your body for metabolism and for energy.

To increase this deficit is very simple. What you need to know is to take a very significant cut on your daily calories intake, while at the same time increasing your physical activities.The physical activities will mean that your body will require more energy. Your body will, therefore, be forced to burn more of the fats stored in your body to meet this huge need for more energy. This will lead to significant loss of weight, hence healthy living.

It is important to note that, although exercises play a big role in weight loss, it can never work in isolation as the food we take determines how much energy we have for the activities we involve in. It is therefore clear that calories intake and diet are very important factors to consider while working on a weight loss plan.