Eat like a cave man to lose weight, the paleo-lithic diet

I read a lot of Dan John's and Charles Poliquin work on diet and training. These experts in the fitness field train everyone from professional athletes to stay at home mom's and spend a lot of time and energy teaching people how to lose weight and stay lean. Both of them have repeatedly stated that people should eat only what our bodies were designed to consume. For countless generations people ate nothing but food that could be pulled directly from nature without any processing and often without even cooking, this has become known as the paleo diet. Then came agriculture and our diets began to change. Now we live in a world of hyper processed foods, completely removed from the natural diet our bodies thrive on and even removed from the agricultural diet our bodies survived on.

Mix into the equation a total lack of physical activity and it becomes pretty apparent why almost everyone is either on or about to get aboard the gravy train. We went from spending all our time doing calorie intensive activities such as hunting, gathering, travelling and building to sitting on our asses in the car and computer. This lack of activity makes us extremely vulnerable to obesity, especially with our modern day "fun" diets.

The fact is we were not created to eat the food we are creating. We were meant to eat vegetables, fruit, nuts and meat in their natural state (albeit cooked). We were not meant to eat processed foods that are so far removed from nature that they are unrecognizable. If you want to be fat, just eat the foods you see on TV. Man made foods are where the profits are and corporations want you to eat their new and exciting processed foods. As I hope you are beginning to see now, your body was not meant to eat new and exciting foods. It was meant to eat the same foods your ancestors ate for countless generations from the neolithic period.

Our bodies simply cannot tolerate the massive insulin spikes of high sugar and fructose foods, or the destructive nature of hydrogenated fats that were created by modern technology. We suffer from these foods by gaining fat, becoming vulnerable to diabetes, high cholesterol or heart disease. If you want to be lean and healthy, you have to eat live a cave man, not a modern man.

Instead of processed foods, eat only natural foods like vegetables, fruits, meats, nuts and some dairy. If you can recognize where it came from in nature, eat it. If not, don't. It's that simple! Natural food is extremely nutrient and often fiber dense that will really fill you up and feed your body the nutrients it craves. The low insulin spikes that natural foods cause in your body will prevent weight gain and promote fat loss. So feast on salmon, steaks and poultry! Eat massive salads topped with olive oil! Snack on nuts between meals when you get hungry. I promise you, eating such a nutrient and fiber dense diet will make you leaner, improve your health and your energy levels. Despite what some crazy diets will tell you, nobody ever got fat eating apples!

But keep this in mind, breads, pastas and most cereals are often just as bad as all the processed food you know you shouldn't eat so don't end up getting fat eating boat loads of "healthy" carbs. Focus on meats, nuts, vegetables and northern hemisphere fruits. They won't make you fat no matter how hard you try as long as eat only these foods. Mix in some regular exercise and you are well on your way to lean-dom!