Ah yes, milk. A good source of calcium, a good source of certain vitamins, and it’s even a good source of protein. But apparently, that’s not all. Milk also happens to be THE miracle weight loss drink.

Apparently.

I’ve been seeing this commercial lately for milk, or more specifically, the web site 2424milk.com. Maybe you’ve seen it? The “2424″ stands for “24 ounces of low fat or fat free milk every 24 hours.”

Every commercial states pretty much the same thing their web site states. And, that is that drinking milk, as part of a reduced calorie diet, will make you lose weight.

Hold on. Let me repeat that.

If you reduce the number of calories in your diet… and THEN drink 24 ounces of low fat/fat free milk per day… it will lead to weight loss.

I don’t know who is behind this whole ad campaign, but I’d put my money on it being the same geniuses who brought us Special K Cereal: The Miracle Diet Food. Their whole thing was that eating Special K cereal, as part of a reduced calorie diet, helps your weight loss.

Well, guess what? Eating a McDonald’s cheeseburger, as part of a reduced calorie diet, will make you lose weight.

Banging your head against a wall, as part of a reduced calorie diet, will make you lose weight.

It’s not the milk, it’s not the Special K, it’s not the cheeseburger, and it’s not the head banging… it’s the “reduced calorie diet” part. That’s it. Consume less calories than your body needs and you lose weight.

Every food and drink on the planet could make the exact same claim that milk is making here. Really, McDonald’s would be just plain crazy not to register 2424cheeseburger.com.

And just to clarify, I’m not anti-milk. Milk is far from bad. I’m just, ya know, anti-BS. And this 2424milk thing is pure BS. Actually, mentioning anything besides “exercise” and “reduced calorie diet” when discussing weight loss is BS pretty much every time.

Oh my God, do you know what I just realized? What if you eat your Special K cereal… IN A BOWL OF MILK? Holy crap, you may drop 50lbs instantaneously! There should really be some kind of warning about combining these products. “May cause extreme amounts of weight loss… as part of a reduced calorie diet.”

Ok, I’m going to answer a series of questions with either “yes” or “no.” After all the questions have been answered, I will explain.

1. Should I lose weight first and then build muscle?
No.

2. If I want to lose weight and build muscle, should I wait until all of the weight is lost and then work on building muscle?
No.

3. I have some fat that I want to lose and then I want to work on building muscle. But, my friend told me I should just work on turning my fat into muscle. Is that possible?
Hell no.

There is a noticeable theme to these questions… the goal of wanting to both lose weight AND build muscle. I’ve noticed this to be the cause of a lot of confusion, so let’s get it all straightened out. Question #1 and #2 are basically the same question with a different wording. Either way, the answer is still no. Here’s why…

If you want to both lose weight and build muscle, there are absolutely no reasons to first ONLY lose weight, and then, when the weight is finally gone, first begin to build muscle.

On the other hand, there ARE many reasons to work on building muscle at the same time you are trying to lose weight. Some include:

• Weight loss happens when you put your body into a calorie deficit either by eating less of them, burning more of them, or a combination of both. And, huge surprise, weight training burns calories. It might not be equal to jogging on a treadmill, but it still burns a significant amount of calories.
• Not only does the actual act of weight training burn calories, but the results you get from weight training (increased muscle) ALSO burns calories. Yes, muscle literally burns calories. You know that whole calorie maintenance level thing? Well, that is the number of calories that your body naturally burns each day just functioning. The more muscle you have on your body, the more calories your body will naturally burn. You don’t even have to do anything. You just build muscle, and it takes care of the rest. Adding muscle to your body really is the closest thing to a weight loss miracle.
• HELLO… you start building muscle sooner! If you just sit around waiting until you lose weight before you finally try to build muscle, you will have wasted precious muscle building time. Both could have been getting done at the same time. (More on that later.)

So, to sum up, if you want to both lose weight and build muscle… you’d be pretty silly to not start off doing both at the same time.

On to question #3. The infamous “turn fat into muscle” idea. This, of course, is not possible. As mentioned above, you should start to both lose fat and build muscle at the same time, but you should also keep in mind that these are two separate things being lost and gained separately.

You’ve got your muscle, and you’ve got your fat. These are the only forms they come in. They can’t magically transform into the other. You can only gain and lose muscle, or gain and lose fat. That’s it. Those are the only tricks they do. Of course, you can lose 5lbs of fat and then gain 5lbs of muscle. But, one did not turn into the other. Case closed.

And now, one more related question:

1. I’ve heard that it’s not possible to lose fat and build muscle at the same time. Is this true?
   Sometimes

As someone whose goal was always to both lose fat and gain muscle, I know exactly how confusing that “sometimes” answer may appear. But, it’s really not. Let me explain.

In order to lose a significant amount of fat, you have to consume less calories than your body needs each day. In order to build a significant amount of muscle, you have to consume more calories than your body needs each day. As you can see, they are counterproductive opposites. If I currently tried to do both at the same time, I would fail at both.

However, don’t give up hope. There are two groups of people that could actually succeed at doing both at the same time, and I’m not one of them. These two groups of people are:

1. People with “assistance.” Specifically, a word that starts with “ste” and ends with “roids.”
2. Beginners. It truly is an amazing thing, and you’d be just plain stupid to not try to take advantage of it. See, when you are first starting to build muscle (aka, a beginner), very little is required for it to work. Don’t get me wrong, it will still take tons of effort and the correct information, but all of the other aspects that would cause a non-beginner to fail to build muscle does not apply to the person who is a beginner. Their body will, for the most part, build muscle either way. I’ve heard this borderline miracle described as “newbie gains,” “beginner’s gains” and the “honeymoon period.” None of these are scientific terms, by the way.

You remember that whole thing I said before about having to eat more calories than your body needs in order to gain a significant amount of muscle? And that the reason most people can’t do both at the same time is because losing fat requires consuming less calories (the opposite)? Well, this doesn’t really apply to the beginner. Yes, they will need to be in some kind of calorie deficit in order to lose weight. But, because they are a beginner, this won’t stop them from building muscle as it would a non-beginner.

And it is because of this reason that a beginner is able to both lose weight and build muscle at the same time. Amazing, isn’t it?

Obviously at some point you won’t be a beginner anymore and successfully doing both at the same time will become much harder (or near impossible). But until then, you might as well pretend you have temporary super powers and just enjoy it. In my opinion, the last thing you’d want to do is have this ability and not use it. That’s why the idea of waiting until you first lose weight before trying to build muscle is… well… dumb. It would be like Superman taking the bus to Lex Luther’s hideout.

You have the ability… use it while you can. As for how exactly to do this, it’s pretty simple. Follow The Lose Weight Diet (takes care of the weight loss part of the goal) and combine it with a proper weight training routine (takes care of the muscle building part of the goal). That’s it.

(Oh, and just to clarify something… any mention of the word “beginner” in this post refers to a weight training beginner, not a weight loss beginner. You could have been trying to lose weight for 10 years and have done all kinds of cardio and been on all kinds of diets, but unless you have been weight training consistently for the last 6-12 months, you are still considered a muscle building beginner who will most likely be able to take advantage of these “beginner gains.” Even if you worked out all the time when you were in college 5 years ago, unless you were doing it over the course of the last year, you too are still considered a beginner.)

Back when I first started learning about diet and nutrition, I heard a lot about “good” carbs and “bad” carbs. Good means complex, bad means simple. The difference between the two lies mostly in how they are digested. Good carbs (such as vegetables) digest slowly, bad carbs (such as sugar) digest quickly.

In the war between good and bad carbs, something I came across over and over again were lists of which carbs were good, and which were bad. Back when the low carb diet was even more popular than it is today, everyone and their grandma wrote their own good carb/bad carb list.

For the most part, these lists were fine and good. People learned that brown rice is better than white rice. Sweet potatoes are better than white potatoes. And whole wheat bread is better than white bread.

Wait… hold it right there.

Upon learning that whole wheat bread was the better bread, I was first in line at my grocery store the next day to pick up some whole wheat bread. No more “bad” bread for me. So, I walked down the bread aisle… white bread, more white bread, more white bread, wait, here we go… whole wheat bread!

I bought it. I ate it. I bought more. I ate more. Every single piece of bread I ate from that point on was whole wheat. I felt good knowing I was eating the “better” food.

Cut to a little while later. Whole wheat bread wasn’t on the “good” carb lists anymore. See, it had now been replaced by “100%” whole wheat bread. Oh no, it seems as if the lists I’ve been reading weren’t specific enough. Apparently, the whole wheat bread I was currently eating may not have been 100%. Who knew there was anything less than 100%?

So, I went back to the store. White bread, white bread, whole wheat bread, ah, here we go… 100% whole wheat bread. NOW I got the right one. Screw you white bread, and screw you too ordinary whole wheat bread, you’ve both been replaced by the much more healthy 100% whole wheat bread.

Cut to a little while later. This was when I learned the point of this post. Just like there are “good” and “bad” carbs, there also happens to be “good” and “bad” whole wheat bread… and the “100%” has nothing to do with it.

In order to understand the difference, the first thing you need to do is ignore that “100%” part. Just ignore it completely. It means nothing to you. Think of it more like a marketing slogan than a nutritional fact. You know what, just ignore the entire front side of the package of bread altogether. There’s nothing important there anyway.

What you need to do is turn all of your attention to the back. Specifically, the ingredients. This is where you will find out if you really have selected the “good” whole wheat bread.

To help show the difference between “good” and “bad,” here is the list of ingredients on a package of Arnold 100% Whole Wheat Bread:

“Whole Wheat Flour, Water, Gluten, High Fructose Corn Syrup, Yeast, Cracked Wheat, Salt, Partially Hydrogenated Soybean Oil, Molasses, Raisin Juice Concentrate, Ethoxylated Mono-And Diglycerides Calcium Propionate (Preservative), Honey, Soy Lecithin.”

Here is the list of ingredients on the back of a package of another Arnold brand bread, this time called Arnold Natural 100% Whole Wheat Bread:

“Unbleached Enriched Wheat Flour [Flour, Malted Barley Flour, Reduced Iron, Niacin, Thiamin Mononitrate (Vitamin B1), Riboflavin (Vitamin B2) Folic Acid], Water, Cracked Wheat, Whole Wheat Flour, Yeast, Barley, Honey, Fructose, Wheat Gluten, Partially Hydrogenated Soybean Oil, Salt, Wheat Bran, Malt, Ethoxylated Mono-And Diglycerides, High Fructose Corn Syrup, Calcium Propionate (Preservative), Caramel Color, Whey, Soy Flour, Calcium Carbonate, Soy Lecithin, Nonfat Milk.”

And now, here are the ingredients on the back of the package of whole wheat pita bread I ate today:

Stone Ground Whole Wheat Flour, Water, Yeast, Salt, Calcium Propionate

Catch any differences? I bet you did. Some of the ingredients that stand out the most in the first two are High Fructose Corn Syrup and Partially Hydrogenated Soybean Oil. Both are junk. The second bread also lists Unbleached Enriched Wheat Flour, which is almost like saying “Borderline Fake Whole Wheat Bread.”

These are things you do NOT want to see anywhere near the list of ingredients of the whole wheat bread you buy. This of course will eliminate about 90% of the whole wheat breads on the market for you, because 90% of them contain one or more of these ingredients. And, as you can see from the first two breads, the fact that it says “100% whole wheat bread” or “natural” on the package means very little.

In fact, I was in my grocery store yesterday, and knowing I was going to blog about this today, I took a minute in the bread aisle to check ingredients. Literally every single 100% whole wheat bread in the store contained High Fructose Corn Syrup.

So, now that you know all about the “bad” whole wheat breads, you may be wondering what brands make up the 10% of the “good” breads. Interestingly enough, I don’t have any brands to list for you off the top of my head. The brand I eat is just some small local brand that you won’t find anywhere else except for a few small stores in my neighborhood.

Now, while it’s possible that you may be able to find your own “good” small local whole wheat bread brand near you, there is one place where you’re almost guaranteed to find one… a health food store.

Most (if not all) of the breads you find in your grocery store will contain one or more of the “bad” ingredients mentioned before. The breads in a health food store are made specifically to be the complete opposite of those junky breads.

You’ll still want to double check the ingredients of the whole wheat bread before you buy it, but your chances of finding a “good” bread in a health food store are MUCH higher than finding one in a grocery store.

And, just so you know, your bread’s ingredients do not have to identically match my bread’s ingredients in order to be “good.” For example, some organic whole wheat breads will have a huge list of stuff in it that mine doesn’t have and it will still be perfectly fine.

You’re mainly checking to make sure certain things are NOT in it. Specifically, High Fructose Corn Syrup, Partially Hydrogenated Soybean Oil, and any mention of the words “Unbleached” and/or “Enriched.” If you do spot something on there that looks a little funny, feel free to come home and look that ingredient up before you buy it or eat it. Or, leave a comment here with the ingredients and I’ll take a peek at it.

In conclusion (it took me 5 minutes to come up with a phrase to start this sentence with, by the way), whenever you see 100% whole wheat bread on some kind of healthy food list, just keep in mind that this is the additional explanation that is meant to go with it.

GNC is the leading retailer of nutritional supplements, vitamins, and other health food products. They have over 5000 stores in the US alone, and many others throughout the world

Chances are you’ve heard of GNC already. Heck, you probably even have one (or two) located not too far from where you live. And, since (I assume) you’re into diet and exercise, GNC is a store you may actually be thinking of going into at some point if you haven’t already done so.

However, before you take your first (or next) step through the doors of your local GNC, there are 3 very important things you should know.

1. Most of the people who work in GNC know NOTHING about diet, fitness, bodybuilding, weight loss or health, nor do they know anything about any of the supplements, vitamins and other health products they sell.

These are not doctors, nutritionists, dietitians, supplement specialists or personal trainers. There is no real training. There is no testing. There is no certification or license. There is as much knowledge required to work at a GNC store selling you supplements as there is to work at shoe store selling you shoes.

That’s not to say that the people who work there are stupid, but it is to say that the guy assisting you in buying shoes knows just as much about nutritional supplements as the guy assisting you in buying nutritional supplements.

So, if you walk into a GNC expecting to get anything even close to qualified advice and information, you will be very let down. But that’s not even the big problem. The big problem is… you won’t even know it.

That’s because the people who work at GNC care about one thing, and one thing only… selling as much as possible. They won’t say “I don’t know” when you ask them something they really don’t know. They will just do their very best to put on whatever act they need to put on in order to get your money in the register.

And as far as the supplements go, they don’t care if you need it, if it works, if it’s safe, or if it even does what you want it to do… they just know how much it costs and that you should buy it.

If you are fat, they will push whatever the popular fat burning supplements of that week are. If you are skinny, they will push the popular weight gain and muscle building supplements. That’s it… that’s the extent of their knowledge of nutritional supplements.

The fat person probably wants a supplement with words like “fat burner” or “ripped” on the label, and the skinny person probably wants something with words like “huge” or “mass” or “gainer” on the label.

Of course, it is entirely possible that someone working there has picked up some type of useful knowledge on their own time. Maybe they workout. Maybe they’ve lost weight. Maybe they’ve gained muscle. Maybe they have personal experience using some of the supplements you are looking to buy. While rare, I will admit it’s possible. But unfortunately, the rare GNC employee who actually knows something will sound exactly like the majority of the employees who know absolutely nothing.

I can fill a seemingly infinite amount of blog posts with hilarious tales of the misinformation I’ve heard first hand in a GNC store, not to mention the countless posts I’ve read on various diet and exercise forums from people who have experienced the exact same thing at their local GNC.

2. The only thing a GNC employee is trained to do is get you to buy things. More specifically, they are REQUIRED to do everything in their power to get you to buy their own brand of multivitamins, no matter how much they have to lie to do it.

Those of you who have already been inside of a GNC store are probably nodding in agreement right now. “Yeah… come to think of it… GNC seems to really push their Mega Man/Woman Multivitamin. What’s that about?” Let me tell you…

I have known people who work/have worked in GNC, and one of the more interesting things they’ve told me is that there is actually a quota they have to meet in regard to the sales of GNC’s own brand of multivitamins. Last I heard, a certain amount needs to be sold per hour. Seriously.

This is why when you walk into a GNC, there is usually a 100% chance someone will at some point do their best used car salesman impression and try to get you to buy their multivitamin. No matter what you came in there for, no matter what type of shape you’re in, no matter what you tell them… someone in that GNC store will practically demand you buy their multivitamin.

You can go in there for some protein powder, and an employee will actually say “You know, you should really buy our multivitamin if you’re going to buy this protein powder.” When you ask why, they will, with a straight face, lie their way through an explanation about how the protein powder won’t be as “useful” or “effective” without a multivitamin.

I’ve been a part of this exact conversation more than once.

The same thing will take place no matter what product you are in there to buy. No matter what it is, a multivitamin will somehow make it better. And not just any multivitamin, GNC’s brand of multivitamin. If you say you already take a multivitamin, they will ask what brand. If your answer isn’t GNC, they will then go into their speech about why their brand is somehow better than every other brand in existence.

If you’re overweight, you can expect to hear “You know, you’ll burn more fat if you take a multivitamin.” And if you’re skinny, look out for “You know, you’ll gain more muscle faster if you take a multivitamin.”

Basically, you can go in there with the sole purpose of getting change of a dollar, and they will probably say “You know, these 4 quarters will be worth more than 1 dollar if you buy our multivitamin.”

Another interesting thing I’ve heard is that (at least) some GNC employees are paid commissions. I’ve heard this varies from store to store. Some claim there are always commissions, some claim there aren’t, and I’ve actually heard someone claim that there are, and that you’re told to answer “no” if anyone ever asks if you get paid commissions.

Basically what this would mean is that the more supplements and vitamins the uninformed kid behind the counter can trick talk you into buying, the more money that employee will make. So, when the GNC employee is recommending products to you, it’s very likely because those are the ones they get the highest commissions from that month. This is a good thing to keep in mind when you think you’re getting helpful, qualified advice.

3. Just about everything in GNC is overpriced and can be found online for much cheaper.

But really, if you’re planning on shopping at GNC, the high prices are the least of your concerns.

Counterpoints and final thoughts…

• I just want to make it clear that I didn’t write this to portray GNC as the one evil company that only cares about making money. Really, every company only cares about making money.
• I also realize a lot of stores pay their employees commission, and that the staff of a completely different type of store is just as unlikely to have any real knowledge about the products they sell as the employees of GNC are to have any real knowledge about the products they sell.
• I do think there is a difference though. The person in the shoe store is only selling you something you’ll wear on your feet. The person in GNC is selling you something you’re going to put into your body. Not to mention, it’s pretty hard to get a customer to buy shoes they don’t want or don’t need because people tend to know enough about shoes to make good decisions. Nutritional supplements and vitamins on the other hand are things a lot of people walk into a store completely clueless about. These are usually the same people who aren’t aware that the person behind the counter of this store may know just as little as they do.
• I’m also fully aware that a lot of the products sold in stores are overpriced and can be found online much cheaper. It’s not just GNC. They just happen to be one of the many.
• And finally, like I said, I didn’t write this to get people to hate GNC. They are a store just like any other store. However, I did feel that there were 3 pretty important things everyone should know before they decide to walk into this specific store. And now… you know them.

Stop me if you’ve heard this one… if weight loss is your goal, one of the most important things you can possibly do is keep track of everything you eat each day.

Nothing new there, right?

The reason you’d do this is because, as you know by now, the key to a successful weight loss diet is eating the right number of calories (and getting those calories from good sources) and keeping some kind of log, list, or journal of what you eat every day is the only real way of doing this.

While I fully agree with everything above, I feel there is actually a completely different weight loss food log that should also be kept.

Like I’ve mentioned other times in this blog, most people fail to lose weight because of the mental aspect of weight loss. Knowing what to do and deciding to start doing it is easy. It’s the motivation, dedication, and will power to keep doing it, and doing it correctly, that causes most of the problems.

Keeping the type of food log I mentioned above and knowing exactly what you’re eating every day is really one of the keys for making the physical aspect of weight loss happen.

But, it does absolutely nothing for the mental aspect.

That’s why I’m proposing that everyone who’s ever had a diet setback due to a lack of will power or motivation should start keeping a SECOND log…

A log of everything you didn’t eat.

Everything you wanted to eat that day, but didn’t. Every bag of potato chips, every candy bar, every french fry, every cookie, every fast food hamburger, every can of soda, every food you wanted to eat but didn’t because you know you shouldn’t.

Each food in that log is one victory for your will power. Looking at a daily/weekly/monthly/yearly log of every piece of junk food you were mentally strong enough to keep out of your body would be nothing but motivating.

The next time your favorite junk food is just sitting there calling your name, instead of eating it, write it down. Write them all down. If you’re up to it, you can even take the time to figure out the nutritional information of it (calories, grams of fat, etc.) just to get an even better idea of the junk you just avoided eating.

As motivating as that would be, it will be even more motivating when you watch this log become smaller and smaller over time as your desire and interest in eating these types of foods gradually fade away.

Not to mention, the actual act of writing/typing the food down rather than eating it could act as enough of a distraction to make the desire to eat it just pass.

So, while adopting this idea won’t actually cause you to lose any weight, it will serve as a way of improving your will power and keeping you motivated. And, without that, you probably won’t be losing any weight anyway.