So you want to make some changes, huh? Well, you’re not alone in that. Most people have something about their bodies they’d like to change.
Whether that change is losing body fat or building muscle, they both require changes to what you eat. This is what most of us refer to as our diet.
But, if you haven't before, how do you start a diet to see results?
In short, here's how to start a diet successfully:
1. Determine Your True Motivation/Goals
2. Calculate Your Daily Calorie Needs
3. Set Up Your Macronutrients (Protein, Carbs, Fats)
4. Track Your Food Intake Consistently
5. Make Sustainable Lifestyle Changes
All of these steps I'll cover with you today. That way, you'll be able to start and stick with your diet to see the best results!
In This Article:
• Why Your Motivation Matters
• Understanding Weight Loss Basics
• Your Diet Quick Setup Guide
• Setting Up Your Macros
• Tracking for Success
• Making Your Diet Sustainable
• One Extra Tip
Why Your Motivation Matters
If you're wondering how to start a diet, it's good to dig into your inner motivations first. If you want to be successful, you need to fully understand why you want to start a diet.
That might seem like a dumb thing to say, but hear me out...
We often have deeper feelings than what we readily bring to the surface and think about directly. Bringing the deep truth to the surface might help you stay motivated when things get tough.
Setting Realistic Expectations
Making sure your goal is realistic will help set you up for success. If you have unrealistic expectations, you're only setting yourself up for disappointment.
Nobody can lose 100 pounds in 2 weeks. I know that’s an extreme example, but you get the point.
If you expect something that will never happen, you’re going to destroy your own confidence. This is common, and it breaks my heart when it happens.
Too many people set unrealistic goals, go all out to achieve them, and then inevitably don’t reach them. When that happens, they tend to feel so helpless that they give up and wait a long time before trying again.
If you know someone who’s been working on the same goal for years, I’m sure this has somewhat played a role. You need realistic expectations.
So what constitutes a realistic goal?
When it comes to fat loss, a realistic goal is to lose 1-2 pounds per week (1). You may be able to lose more weight than that in a week, but it’s not sustainable long term.
If you lose 5 pounds in your first week, you have to understand that you may not keep that up. Keep your expectations moderate and realistic for the long haul.
If you want to lose 15 pounds, it might be a good idea to set the goal at 15 weeks. That’s a safe and conservative bet to lose 1 pound per week.
You might lose it faster than that, and that’s okay too. You just don’t want to get too aggressive with your time frame and end up letting yourself down for no reason.
Understanding the Basics of Weight Loss
If you want to know how to start a diet the right way, you have to understand the basics. When I say the basics, I’m referring to understanding how your body actually loses weight.
In order to lose weight you HAVE TO be in a calorie deficit. There is no way around that fact. What is a calorie deficit? That’s when you’re eating fewer calories per day than you’re burning.
As studies consistently show, a calorie deficit is the most important factor when it comes to weight loss (2). Why is that?
If you use more energy than you consume, that energy difference has to come from somewhere. Imagine your body is like a car with multiple gas tanks. As you eat food throughout the day, it’s like adding gas to your tank.
If you don’t drive around much, you won’t burn through a lot of fuel. This would be like sitting at a desk all day and not burning a lot of calories.
If you eat a lot at the same time, you’ll fill up your first tank and start adding gas into one of your extra fuel tanks. Think of these extra fuel tanks as body fat. It’s extra fuel you have saved for later when you need it.
If you start driving around a lot and add less fuel than you’re using, you’ll start to burn through your extra fuel tanks too. This is the same concept as losing body fat.
So when you wonder how to start a diet the right way, you need to make sure it’s going to put you in a calorie deficit consistently.
You can do this by eating fewer calories or by increasing physical movement to burn more. The most effective way, though, is actually doing both!
Let’s talk about how to set up your macros to put you in a position to lose weight effectively. I'll start with a quick-start guide, then go in-depth from there.
Your Diet: Quick Setup Guide
Calories:
(Your Body Weight × 14-16) - 500
• Under 7,000 steps/day: × 14
• 7,000-15,000 steps/day: × 15
• Over 15,000 steps/day: × 16
Setting Your Protein:
• 1g per pound of goal body weight (Example: 150lb goal = 150g protein)
Splitting Remaining Calories:
• Subtract protein calories from total calories (protein grams × 4)
• Divide the remaining calories between carbs (4 calories per gram) and fat (9 calories per gram) based on preference
• Pro tip: 50/50 split works for most people
Setting Up Your Macros
If you’re going to be tracking your macros, you need to have a goal to shoot for. But what are macros?
When I say “macros,” I’m referring to macronutrients. These nutrients aren’t your vitamins and minerals. I’m talking about protein, carbs, and fats.
These macros are what make up the calories we eat on a daily basis.
• Proteins contain 4 calories in every gram
• Carbohydrates contain 4 calories in every gram
• Fats contain 9 calories in every gram
Also, I should mention that alcohol provides 7 calories per gram. So, if you like drinking, just keep in mind it’s only going to hurt your weight loss efforts.
But how do you set up your macros to put you in a calorie deficit? To figure that out, you have to know how much you’re burning.
The only way to do that is to hook yourself up to a machine, but there is a good way to estimate. It does require a little bit of math, though.
You can break down the number of calories you burn per day into 3 categories:
• Your Resting Metabolic Rate (RMR)
• Daily Activity/Movement
• Thermic Effect of Food
Calculating RMR
Your resting metabolic rate is the amount of calories your body burns at rest. So if you laid in bed all day and did nothing, you’d pretty much just burn whatever your RMR is.
A good estimate for this is taking your body weight and multiplying it by 10. There is about 10% room for error on average, as everyone is different.
If you have more muscle and less body fat, you may have to add up to 10%. If you have low muscle mass and more body fat, you may be better off subtracting 10%.
For me, I’m about 200 pounds. 200 x 10 is 2000, but I have more muscle and less body fat. So most likely, my RMR is around 2100-2200 calories.
No matter where I set my macros, I can always keep in mind that the least amount I’m likely to burn is 2100-2200 calories.
That’s my floor (AKA as low as I’d ever need to set my calories to know I’m in a deficit). I’m always going to be moving around and burning calories, so I never need to go below that number.
Calculating Maintenance Calories
After that, we have to factor in daily activity. This encompasses everything from walking to the mailbox to a full-on brutal workout. Any movement is included here.
It’s highly unlikely we’ll ever be able to accurately measure this on a daily basis. And no, your smartwatch/fitness tracker is not giving you accurate calorie measurements.
Just like we used a 10x multiplier to find the RMR, we’re going to use a multiplier to determine your maintenance calories.
Your maintenance calories are a rough estimate of how many calories you’re actually burning daily. If you ate this amount every day, the thought is that your body weight would stay the same.
The multiplier for your maintenance calories is 14, 15, or 16. To figure out which number to use, I decide based on your daily step count.
Most people have smartphones or smartwatches nowadays that track their steps. So check the health app on your phone if you’re not sure where to find this number.
• If you average 7,000 or fewer steps per day, I would multiply your body weight by 14 to get your maintenance calories.
• If you average 7,000-15,000 steps, I’d multiply by 15.
• If you average over 15,000 steps per day, then use 16 as the multiplier.
I’m not factoring in your workouts because the amount of total daily movement matters a lot more than a 1-hour workout. You’d be surprised how much walking can help with fat loss, too.
Let’s say I average 10,000 steps per day. I would multiply 200 pounds by 15, which would equal 3000 pounds.
Therefore, a good estimate for my maintenance calories is 3000 calories per day. In theory, I should stay between 2200-3000 calories to ensure I’m in a calorie deficit.
A pound of fat equals roughly 3500 calories. So if I want to lose 1 pound of fat per week, I would want to have a 500-calorie deficit every day.
500 calories x 7 days = 3500 calories (1 pound of fat per week)
For that reason, I should probably eat around 2500 calories to be in this calorie range.
What about the thermic effect of food, though? What’s that?
Thermic Effect of Food
The thermic effect of food is the amount of calories we burn when eating and digesting our food. It would be a nightmare trying to calculate this out.
There are so many variables, and it depends on genetics as well as what types of foods you eat. One thing I would keep in mind is the thermic effect from protein is much higher than carbs or fats.
So, if you eat more protein, you’ll burn more calories from it. That’s not the only reason protein is important, though.
Now that we’ve figured out how to start a diet with the right calorie range, let’s figure out your protein goal.
How Much Protein Do You Need?
When calculating your macros, ALWAYS start with your protein goal. This is because protein is the most important macronutrient when it comes to fat loss.
I’ll tell you why.
There’s a difference between “weight loss” and “fat loss”. Weight loss can be from anything: fat, muscle, water, etc.
Fat loss is specifically the weight lost from body fat. If you want to make sure you’re maximizing fat loss, you need to minimize muscle loss.
Because our muscles are mostly made from protein, we need to eat enough of it to make sure we don’t lose it. When we eat less food, we tend to lose muscle.
So, the best solution to this problem is to eat more protein!
Studies show that when in a calorie deficit, you lose significantly more muscle eating the RDA of .8 grams of protein per kg bodyweight (3). You lose significantly less muscle by eating 2.2 grams of protein per kg bodyweight (3).
2.2 grams per kg is the same as saying 1 gram of protein per pound of body weight. At a minimum I don’t recommend going below 1 gram of protein per pound of your goal bodyweight.
So if I’m 200 pounds and want to lose 10 pounds, I should eat between 190-200 grams of protein per day.
That’s where our diet starts. We already know our calorie amount, so let’s figure out the other 2 macros.
How Many Carbs & Fats Do You Need?
Now that we know our calorie range and protein goal, we need the other 2 macros. This is going to involve a little math, but it’s mostly based on preference.
Why would preference matter? Isn’t there some science backing up the right way to set these up?
Actually, no. Your preferences matter A LOT!
The best diet is one you can actually stick to long-term. If you want to know how to start a diet and stick to it, you need to pick one that you like.
If you don’t like it, at some point, you’ll get tired of it. So the question comes down to, “Do you like to eat more carbs, more fats, or a 50/50 split?”
You might like cooking with butter or oil a lot. Maybe you absolutely love eating salads.
In that case, you might want to choose more fats.
Maybe you really love eating pasta, rice, and fruit. In that case, maybe you should choose more carbs.
Regardless of which you choose, it doesn’t matter that much. Remember, the total amount of calories matters WAY more!
So, let’s see how many calories we have to work with. At 4 calories per gram, 200 g protein is going to use up 800 calories.
2500 calories - 800 calories = 1700 calories left for carbs & fats
Let’s say we want to do a 50/50 split of carbs and fats just to keep things moderate. That’s 850 calories for carbs and 850 for fats.
850 calories divided by 4 calories per gram of carbs = 212.5g carbs. Let’s just call it 212 grams of carbs.
850 calories divided by 9 calories per gram of fat = 94.4g fat. We’ll call it 94 grams of fat.
So my macros will come out to:
Calories: 2494
Protein: 200g
Carbs: 212g
Fat: 94g
If I stick to these macros, I should lose about 1 pound of fat per week. After I lose some weight, these will need to be adjusted, but I’ll save that for another article.
Now that you know how to calculate your own macros, how do you track your food properly?
How to Track Your Food
This is a lot simpler than you think!
When it comes to tracking your food, you need measuring utensils, a food scale, and a food-tracking app.
Depending on what you’re eating/drinking, you might be able to get away with a food scale and an app. You may not always need measuring utensils.
Let’s say you go to the store and buy a bagel. If you’re going to eat the whole thing, you’ll want to weigh it out.
I know it says in the nutrition facts the macros for 1 bagel, but I have a secret…
Most of the time, those are not perfectly accurate. It may say 1 bagel (128 grams) is the serving size. When you weigh out the bagel, it could be 150 grams.
Seriously, it might even be 200 grams.
So you would then go into your food tracking app. Either scan the barcode or look up the bagel. Enter the macros, and enter the serving as 200 grams.
It’s that simple.
If you put a slice of cheese on it, weigh it, and add that to the app. If you put some meat on it, weigh it, and add it to the app.
I know it may seem tedious at first. If you’re serious about losing weight, though, this is the most surefire way to be successful.
Once you get used to it, you realize it sounds like a lot of work, but it only takes 1 minute to do. It’s quick and easy!
How to Stick to a Diet Long-Term
If you want to stick to a diet, don’t cut out your favorite foods!
Where most people go wrong on a diet is completely cutting out things they love to eat. Many times, when they get tired and hungry, they end up bingeing on that very thing.
This leads to overeating and shame. That shame can make us lose confidence in ourselves, and some people even give up.
If you want to be successful, you have to learn how to eat your favorite foods but do so in moderation. Also, portion control is your friend here!
If you love pizza, you can still have some when you’re on a diet. You just need to control your portions.
Maybe once a week you could have pizza. You can factor it into your macros that you’ll have 2 slices, and you’ll be fine.
That’s it. As long as it doesn’t cause you to go overboard on your calories, it’s not going to make a huge difference.
Just make sure you’re hitting your protein goal and staying close to your calorie goal. Allowing yourself to still eat your favorite foods will keep you sane.
As long as you feel like you’re not being overly restrictive, you’ll be much more likely to stick to your diet!
How to Start a Diet: One Extra Tip
If you came here wondering how to start a diet and stick to it, you’ve got your answer here.
You need to calculate your calories, your protein, and then carbs & fats. After that, you just have to make sure you keep track of what you eat.
That means tracking every single thing. That includes every oil you cook with, every sauce you use, and everything you drink with calories in it.
It’ll be very helpful for you to start exercising as well. Getting regular workouts and walks every week will do wonders to help you lose body fat!
I’ve been helping people lose weight for 10 years now. I’ve seen what works and what doesn’t.
People who consistently track their food and their workouts are WAY more likely to be successful. Accuracy matters, and so does consistency.
That’s why those people are more successful and see better results. What also helps is making the process easier for people.
The easier and quicker it is to track your food, the longer you’ll stick with it. It also helps to have someone with experience there to support you and answer questions.
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References:
(1) NHLBI Obesity Education Initiative Expert Panel. Clinical Guidelines on the Identification, Evaluation, and Treatment of Overweight and Obesity in Adults: The Evidence Report. National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute. 1998.
(2) Kim JY. Optimal Diet Strategies for Weight Loss and Weight Loss Maintenance. Journal of Obesity and Metabolic Syndrome. 2021;30(1):20-31.
(3) Stokes T, et al. Recent Perspectives Regarding the Role of Dietary Protein for the Promotion of Muscle Hypertrophy with Resistance Exercise Training. Nutrients. 2018;10(2):180.
