What You Need to Know About Calories In Vs Calories Out

Weight loss is one of the most common goals of people living in the western world today. Websites and advertisements for weight-loss related products dominate the web and infomercial time on TV. Diet and weight loss topics have entire sections to themselves in many bookstores.

Innumerable strategies, cures, and fads have come and gone claiming to provide the magic solution to weight loss.

Despite all of this, in its most basic form the magic secret to weight loss has always been there. It’s all about calories in vs calories out. We simply need to use up more calories than we take in. Like any idea that seems too simple to be effective there is a subtle difference in terms of how best to use up our energy output and limit our energy input, but at its core it really is that simple!

On the contrary, if your goal is to gain weight then we would flip the equation, and to maintain where you are, we would want to equal these two variables. Let’s look at the three options of calories in vs calories out in more detail.

What Does Calories In vs Calories Out Mean?

Caloric Deficit

In our first scenario and probably the most popular one if your goal is weight loss, then we want to obtain a caloric deficit. That means that we are taking in less calories than our body is burning in a given day. Our bodies burn calories every day to a certain extent, however our activity level along with our level of stress will generally determine how many calories we are burning. Likewise, our caloric intake is exclusively impacted by the food, supplements and liquids we are taking in.

Thus, the first step to weight loss or achieving a caloric deficit is to learn to modulate our intake based on our activity or anticipated activity. For example, if your day is likely to consist of a great deal of sedentary activity, such as meetings and desk work or sitting in a classroom for most of the day, you shouldn’t eat the same amount that day as a day where you exercise, do physical work or play with the kids outside.

Secondly, even though we may be reducing the caloric intake and achieving a caloric deficit, one of the differences would be related to the quality of the calories we are consuming. Our caloric deficit will be much more effective for weight loss if our calories come from vegetables and lean protein as compared to chips and ice cream.

Caloric Surplus

While perhaps less of a common goal, in order to gain weight, the goal is to achieve a caloric surplus, or consume more calories than we burn. This in some cases can be as challenging as weight loss as it may require a great deal of food to overcome our natural state. For some body types with higher metabolism and an active lifestyle, achieving a caloric surplus will require eating a near superhuman amount of food.

For others with lower metabolism and/or low activity, it will be a fairly easy task. As with caloric deficit, this will be dependent on your activity level. This is also where supplementation tends to be more common as they are a quick and easy way to pad the caloric intake stats as opposed to eating massive amounts of food. Protein and mass-gainer shakes and powders can be a great source of calories that don’t require a full meal.

In addition, at times eating for a caloric surplus can initially spike our metabolism as it works harder to process more food. This can complicate the process, because in order to achieve a caloric surplus, it must be implemented over time to avoid massive metabolic spikes.

Caloric Maintenance

This is where most of us would ideally like to be. If we are in a place where we can focus on caloric maintenance, it means that we have achieved or don’t need our goal of weight loss or weight gain and are right where we want to be.

The greater challenge is staying there, and this comes back to our familiar theme of matching our caloric intake to our activity level or output. If we have a spike in our activity, we can enjoy more food to match that. If we splurged on a massive meal, such as a Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner, we need to get out and exercise soon after to burn the extra calories.

How To Track Calories In Vs Calories Out

The ebb and flow of calories in vs calories out, and your ability to manage it, is critical to a healthy lifestyle. It’s important to have a healthy relationship with food. Just like in any relationship, neither side should have the upper hand. There should be a sense of balance and respect without that negative hold that food can sometimes have on you.

You can easily monitor what you eat with an app like My Food Diary. It makes nutrition tracking easy. You simply record your food and exercise, and this handy app will crunch the numbers for you.