Ask Ash: “Fat loss? Thirty hit me really hard!”

Oooo gurl. Okay.

Things that promote fat loss:

Calorie deficit. There are a lot of ways to go about this; I personally choose to track my food in an app, and adjust as need be. Want to figure out your daily calorie goal? Take your weight (in lbs) and multiply it by 11, then take your weight and multiply it by 12. That’s your calorie range. If you prefer to have high/low days, you can mess with how many you have each day but your weekly total should be the same. I like to focus on my protein intake (shooting for your body weight x .8 AT LEAST) and let my fats/carbs fall where they lay (lazy macros but hey, life is too short to meticulously count this stuff).

Eat your dang veggies.

Don’t like counting calories, or become obsessive doing so? Use the hand portion guide (I like this infograph from Precision Nutrition).

Either way, focus on getting the bulk of your food from lean meats like turkey or skinless chicken or fish, and fruits and vegetables (but more colorful ones like greens and less of the starchy ones like potatoes or corn). CARBS AREN’T BAD (in fact it’s the preferred fuel of the brain and muscles)—we just USUALLY eat too much of them.

Second, start lifting weights. Weight training WILL NOT MAKE YOU BULKY. What it does is build muscle, which marketers everywhere have dubbed “toning up” because apparently women are afraid of building muscle? Muscle takes up less space than the same amount of fat. Know what else muscle does? Gives you defined shape. So I’m not sure why building muscle is a bad thing. Nobody wants pancake ass—everyone wants a curvy booty (ok, maybe there are some out there who want a flat butt but they’re probably not the type to read this so…). You GET that shape by lifting.

Built by lifting weights, not by cardio (actually like no cardio 😂)

Another solid reason to lift weights while you’re in a caloric deficit (but also eating your protein, because that’s your building blocks for your body)? You’re helping preserve that muscle, and direct the nutrients to them.

Oh, and muscle is what we call “metabolically expensive.” It burns more calories just to maintain than fat. So, you can actually boost your metabolism (slightly) by lifting weights. Not an excuse to eat like an a-hole but it’s a nice perk.

Toss in some metabolic workouts (check out Jordan Syatt’s 101 metabolic workouts–they’re FREE, you’re welcome) and you’re golden pony boy (girl?).

In all honesty, the hardest part is sticking to it. There’s no real secret to what we need to do—the trick is finding ways to stay with it when we’re no longer motivated (motivation is just a mood, and it passes pretty fast).

That’s why I usually suggest hiring a coach if you’re really struggling to make it happen—they offer guidance and accountability (plus while I love the whole free info thing and think fitness should be accessible to EVERYONE regardless of financial situation, people tend to find paying for it to be an added bit of motivation/accountability).