I have been experimenting with lifestyle TRF for 5 years before finally finding an approach that works consistently with little effort in a modestly socially acceptable way with common food sources.
Starting from 235 pounds I lost 55 pounds since April by restricting my feeding time window to 4 hours and I only exercise once every week or two.
An eating time window larger than 4 hours did not result in any meaningful long term weight loss for me. It must be 4 hours per day or shorter. 4 hours works great.
I barely made a change in my diet to eat healthier besides cutting out foods and beverages commonly known as being bad and I only drink water and coffee. I consistently begin to plateau and this process only stops with increased water intake and exercise, but mostly water intake more than 1 gallon per day.
In terms of effect size time restriction is most critical followed by eating food that isn't obviously unhealthy (e.g. anything containing added fructose), closely followed by drinking a gallon of water per day. Exercise is a distant next step but it has a big effect whenever loss plateau begins.
As I approach my weight goal I plan to expand my eating window by one hour per day per month until I plateau.
Forgive the question, but why is exercise such a distant next step for you?
You very clearly have a lot of self-discipline, and you have your shit together. For me, exercise has always been the most rewarding part of the whole deal.
Really glad that you took the time to make the effort over literal years to find what works for your body. For most people - myself included - that's what it takes.
And most people won't stick with it and see it through.
> You very clearly have a lot of self-discipline, and you have your shit together. For me, exercise has always been the most rewarding part of the whole deal.
Not OP, but answering for myself: I don’t enjoy exercising, and not doing something is far easier than doing something extra.
I have easily removed most carbs (doing Keto), and reduced my eating window to 8h. I’ve been doing this for almost 10 years. Hell, I even got an electronic desk and work standing 70% of my work day.
But exercise is extra. I can’t just do exercise while doing something else (maybe if I enjoyed audiobooks it would work better, but I’m really into reading books), so any exercise takes effort for something I don’t enjoy unlike all other changes.
I felt this way for a very long time and have made similar choices. I simply can't get myself to consistently go out on runs, or work out on gym machines. That said, out of sheer chance I discovered an enjoyment of powerlifting and swimming and I've been able to keep those up, and even look forward to doing them. Perhaps it's a matter of finding the exercise you can tolerate.
"Perhaps it's a matter of finding the exercise you can tolerate."
This.
I was a bit of a free-weight gym rat in my 20s and never liked it (still don't), but have over the years find things I have/do enjoy, and that makes it easier to get stuff done. Some are very low friction to accomplish regularly (Kettlebells, ergs, trail-running/hiking...note, I hate running on treadmills or in urban environments, but will alternate running and hiking in an afternoon in the forest like a 5 year old kid exploring. It's actually a joyful event for me. YMMV). Other things happen perennially due to logistics or weather (e.g. swimming, rowing, Bikram yoga).
I've tried lots of other things in between, so there is some measure of "i need to figure out what works and what doesn't" and that in and of itself can be an unpleasant set of experiments, but...
There are many forms of exercise outside of a fitness center. I know a handful of guys in their 60's and 70's who are in fantastic shape due to fencing. They can still regularly place in the top 20% of regional tournaments against guys in their teens and 20's.
Sure you can do exercise whilst doing something else. I get about an hour's exercise in daily whilst moving to places I need to be.
The idea that exercise needs to be an activity in its own right is somewhat toxic. It puts a big burden on beginning the activity which needs to displace something else. Even for those that manage to get an hour at the gym or whatever, it doesn't necessarily make up for the rest of a sedentary lifestyle.
You can also just walk around while doing something else, e.g. listening to a podcast or talking to somebody on the phone (this can even be a work meeting!)
Walking is not great exercise from a time efficiency standpoint. It's like half the caloric burn in twice the time of any dedicated exercise, be it running or swimming or weight lifting. Exercise that elevates your heart rate is simply better, from a fitness perspective or from a weight-loss perspective.
Efficiency isn't the only factor. I'd say the most important factor is enjoyment. We each have a finite amount of willpower. If you're using it up on exercise you hate doing eventually you're going to hit a day where you don't have much willpower, skip the exercise and break the routine.
The most time efficient exercises I know aren't ones you can sustain for longer periods of time. I can consistently walk for hours but only run sprint intervals for a few minutes. Sure every minute of sprinting burns more than a minute of walking but if I can walk significantly longer than I can sprint it will probably lead to a higher total calorie burn.
That doesn’t matter when you’re sneaking walking into activities you’d normal do sedentary. It’s not competing against dedicated exercise.
I have this goofy plastic As Seen On TV board that is bent in the middle. Whenever I’m watching TV or playing a game, I stand in it and waddle my body so that i’m doing a light core activity.
It doesn’t matter that sprinting is better exercise when I otherwise would be sitting in the couch.
Depends on what the goal of the exercise is. For the majority of people who need to be in better health, zone 2 cardio is what they need rather than increased caloric burn. You can't look for time efficiency with zone 2 cardio - you just have to do it for enough time to build conditioning. Depending on the person, zone 2 might be running, but for most people a brisk walk is enough.
As others have said, it's not about efficiency. Also, doing a brisk walk does elevate your heart rate (mine goes up to ~100-110 BPM). If your goal is just being healthier, and not necessarily increasing your stamina or building up muscles, than walking is great. It also doesn't fuck with your joints.
I also could never motivate myself to do exercise, like running or going to the gym. What I found that works for me are:
- Doing brisk walks, either when you are going somewhere, or if you don't need go somewhere, just around the block. And yes, brisk walking is also exercise =)
- VR gaming (e.g. Beat Saber gets your heart rate up alright, or if you need more, I can recommend boxing or dedicated fitness games, but the latter are again boring to me).
- Yoga at home (I can recommend Yoga with Adriene on YouTube) - going to actual Yoga classes never worked for me, but doing at home works amazingly well
- Hiking - being out in nature feels great and depending on the level of hike, this can be amazing exercise
Doing frequent hard exercise that builds lean muscle tissue is essential to long-term metabolic health. Just not being fat is insufficient if you want to maintain a good quality of life in your later years.
You may find it unpleasant. That's fine. Learn to enjoy the suffering.
My solution to this problem was "Couch to 5K" as it told me when to walk and when to run. Just did what I was told. I did duolingo while walking and audiobooks / music while running. Decided to go to the gym every single day for 30 mins (it's very close to my house) to walk and if it was a run day just do what the app told me. I succeeded in completing the program and I'm moving on to the 5K to 10K with the same system in place. It's amazing how the body adapts with small spaced ramp ups like that.
As someone with a mostly daily workout habit for the past 10+ years, the trick I’ve found works best is not to exercise, but do a sport (that you enjoy). Then everything else falls into place on its own.
I used to lift. That got boring fast. Then I got into boxing. That hasn’t gotten boring ever. Eventually I started running, you know, to have more stamina in the boxing. That has lead to several marathons and a motivation to beat the magic 3-hour barrier. Now I’m back to lifting because it helps with the running and the boxing.
Running has actually turned into my me time. A socially acceptable way to be alone, outside, ignore the world, and have no responsibilities. Great time to chug through podcasts and audiobooks too.
I specifically like podcasts in the context of running and only started listening because I got bored of music. Started audiobooks because podcasts got too short.
I don’t know what I did wrong but I was on a Keto type diet for over a year but I lost muscle mass and had multiple alopecia-looking hair loss spots occurring on my scalp. I looked great because I was slimmer but I fell off the keto wagon. Anyhow, I’m eating carbs again and hair is back to full health and muscles are noticeably back to prior mass. I don’t lift—-just usual busy work of activities.
Elimination diets, whether keto or anything else, put people at heightened risk of subtle micronutrient deficiencies which can cause all sorts of weird symptoms. If you're going to eat only a limited set of foods then take a detailed look at nutrition labels and make sure you're not missing something. Multivitamin pills are mostly useless for people eating normal, healthy diets but can be a convenient way to fill in the gaps for people eating restricted diets.
Keto isn't an elimination diet, it's more of a reduction diet (people choose different levels of carbs ranging from the < 10 hardcore crowd to the 30-50g crowd). You can eat a lot of veggies, certain types of fruits, meat, nuts and dairy. There's just a ton of variety available across a wide nutrient spectrum.
Any "diet", even SAD can leave one with deficiencies if you just eat pre-packaged foods. One always should look for variety in their food selection.
Not saying keto is necessary or for everyone - it's not. But it's pretty easy to not be nutrient deficient on it.
Did you do resistance training on a regular basis while on keto?
When at a deficit, your body gets rid of what it doesn't need.
The goal is to tell your body it needs the muscle (and doesn't need the fat).
Edit: just read that you don't lift.
That's why you lost muscle.
GP here, I gave up on keto after one year because it required eating a special diet which is difficult to prepare and store while traveling. 4 hour TRF worked for me long term.
The easy solve for this is choosing to live somewhere where activity is baked into your lifestyle. I haven't 'exercised' in the gym-going sense in years. BUT, I chose to live in a location that allows us to be a single-car HH. So I have 40m per day of 'activity' doing my daily errands on the bike on week days. And on weekends we typically do one or two walks, and once a week I have an indoor soccer. It takes no effort to do something 'extra' to do this once you realize that cars are cancer.
The TRE approach is closer to a natural pattern, as our ancestors - generally - also had a limited window of time in which to eat [when they did]. A notable difference between ancestral and modern habits is that eating was, as a rule, a physical activity in itself [walking and overcoming obstacles in gathering or running - and overcoming obstacles - in hunting].
Not OP, but share similar sentiments with OP about exercise, so maybe this perspective can help. /shrug
Hiking is my jam. I love it, and it's the one area of exercise where getting my ass kicked physically feels incredibly worth it. The trouble with hiking is that I like getting out into the mountains to do it (I prefer the less-traveled hikes that really get out out, up and away from everything and everyone... solitude, baby!), and I have a couple of small kids, so I can only get around to what I consider a "quality" hike once every couple of months. That'll change as they get older, but yeah.
Walks are different; I walk my dog for about 20-30 minutes every night, but it's just not the same for me.
I hate it. I’d rather exercise (which I do, just unhappily) than walk somewhere just for the sake of walking. When going somewhere by myself, I walk at a speed that some people would call jogging, but that’s for getting to a spatial goal.
There is no proven health or performance benefit to drinking extra water beyond your level of thirst. The goal should be to maintain proper hydration and electrolyte balance rather than drinking a certain minimum volume of water. The optimal amount will vary a lot depending on genetics, diet, activity level, and environmental conditions.
I lose more weight per day when I drink a minimum of 1 gallon of water. The opposite is true when I don't drink enough water because I otherwise "feel fine." Beats me as to why this is so.
I used this technique while cutting in a previous life where I lifted frequently. I'd drink a bowl of "water soup" before bed, so that I would feel temporarily satiated and be able to fall asleep more easily. (My water soup consisted of hot water, a bit of soy sauce to add saltiness, and a bit of sesame oil for greasiness... basically I was making a minimal imitation soup stock.)
Starting from 235 pounds I lost 55 pounds since April by restricting my feeding time window to 4 hours and I only exercise once every week or two.
An eating time window larger than 4 hours did not result in any meaningful long term weight loss for me. It must be 4 hours per day or shorter. 4 hours works great.
I barely made a change in my diet to eat healthier besides cutting out foods and beverages commonly known as being bad and I only drink water and coffee. I consistently begin to plateau and this process only stops with increased water intake and exercise, but mostly water intake more than 1 gallon per day.
In terms of effect size time restriction is most critical followed by eating food that isn't obviously unhealthy (e.g. anything containing added fructose), closely followed by drinking a gallon of water per day. Exercise is a distant next step but it has a big effect whenever loss plateau begins.
As I approach my weight goal I plan to expand my eating window by one hour per day per month until I plateau.