Let me start off by explaining what sparked my inspiration to write this article before we get into why I don't count calories. I am asked so shockingly often about calories; whether is be people on my cooking channel asking how many calories are in certain dishes I make, people who have bought my books asking how many calories are in the suggested meals or even just random questions about if I count calories and asking the best way to do it.
My answer is NO I do not count calories..like AT ALL! If anything I count nutrition and if I don't think I have gotten enough for the day..I eat MORE! I think if you're eating fruits, vegetable, whole grains and lean proteins then calories are so pointless as they don't give an indication of anything.
What I don't like about counting calories is that it restricts what you can eat, this isn't the case for everyone who counts calories but I find it to happen much too often. There's the type of calorie counter who doesn't eat a typically healthy diet but looks at calories resulting in restriction on healthy foods in order to make up for the calories in the junk foods they eat. You can't cut out healthy food in order to spare calories for junk food! If you don't think this happens, BELIEVE ME it shockingly does and way too often that it has pushed me to write this article.
Not all calories are the same; 100 calories from an apple doesn't compare to the 100 calories from half a chocolate bar because the apple provides sustainable energy while the chocolate will give you an instant energy hit resulting in an energy dip shortly after. Our bodies handle calories very differently depending on where they are coming from.
After an hour of eating a 150 calorie packet of chips you will find yourself much more hungry than if you had eaten a grilled chicken salad with the same amount of calories. This proves that calories have no bearing on whether a food is going to sustain you or not. You can eat more and feel fuller if you eat fruits, vegetables, healthy fats and complex carbohydrates in comparison to saturated fats and carbohydrates that come from refined sugar.
Back to how calories restrict what you eat; if you have had your daily calorie allowance but are still starving then you probably won't go over the allowance and will in result starve yourself. I could do a whole separate article on why starving yourself is absolutely terrible but I went into it a little bit in my newest book, 10 Tips To Tackle Temptation.
If you have any questions regarding this topic, feel free to email me at mail@jordysfitness.com and I will try my hardest to respond to everyone!
Thanks for reading ♥
