Mike Carruthers

She's a licensed marriage and family therapist, and she's author of a book called Why Do I Keep Doing This?

Unlearn the Habits Keeping You Stuck and Unhappy.

And there's a link to her book at Amazon in the show notes.

If you want to lose weight, you should exercise more.

I think most people believe that, and it's not really true.

The uncomfortable truth is that exercise is one of the least efficient ways to lose weight.

Now, it's great for your heart and your brain and your mood and your lifespan, and exercise is excellent at preventing weight gain.

But when researchers look at weight loss specifically, exercise alone produces far less fat loss than people expect.

Why?

Well, it's because the body adapts.

When you burn more calories through exercise, you often get hungrier.

You may unconsciously move less later in the day.

And your metabolism can subtly compensate.

In other words, the calories you think you burned off don't translate cleanly into fat loss.

A major scientific review concluded that physical activity by itself is not very effective for weight loss without dietary changes to go along with it.

So exercise matters, but not for the reason most people think.

And that is something you should know.

I hope you got something out of this episode.

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