Scott Abel - Beyond Metabolism

About the Author

Scott Abel has been involved in the diet, fitness, and bodybuilding industries for over four decades. His coaching specializes in physique transformation rooted in a mindset for longterm success.

This book is about your environment, your habits, and weight control and weight loss. The first section is about the biological and cultural factors that have overridden the wisdom of the body, and what causes unnatural, irresistible cravings, weight issues, and food issues.

The second section is about solutions.

How Your Brain, Biology, and the Environment Create and Perpetuate Weight Issues

and What You Can Do About It

Scott Abel

Table of Contents

BEYOND METABOLISM

SECTION ONE

Your Brain, Your Body, and the Biology of Weight Control

SECTION TWO

Solutions

Thank You + A Free Gift

Thank you for getting this book. As a free gift, you can download the Abel Starter Set, including The Mindset of Achievement and Intro to Metabolic Enhancement Training(MET) (yes, the entire books) completely free.

• The Mindset of Achievement is about reaching goals and sustaining them and building on them. If youve ever achieved something (e.g. weight loss) only to find you couldnt sustain the success, this book is for you. It has chapters on habits & routines, motivation, getting out of ruts, fear of failure, mastery and much more.
• Intro to Metabolic Enhancement Training (MET) explains the methodology behind this unique metabolic training program, and includes two full 4-day programs for fat loss, hypertrophy, and metabolic enhancement.

Just go to scottabelfitness.com/starter to get your copies from the homepage.

Introduction

I spent over thirty years studying nutrition and diet, but up until the past few years I only researched these topics in the most accepted and conventional ways. In the last decade however, I learned a valuable lessonthe usual way we approach diet and nutrition is wrong.

This is why countless people search for diet and eating solutions in all the wrong places. They attack their issues symptomatically instead of causally, and this just makes things worse. If they only address the real causes of their struggles and perceived failures, they can succeed on their diets, eliminate food-related anxiety, and adopt effective dietary habits.

Many experts have written on this in terms of the biology of weight control, but far fewer have written about it with respect to the brain and our habits. That's where this book comes in.

You Are What You Eat (sort of)

Everyone has heard the expression, You are what you eat.

Ive known many coaches who parrot the expression to clients who find it difficult to stick to a diet.

Many of my own clients have heard me turn this phrase upside down and say, As much as you are what you eat, your issues with diet are about whats eating you.

But even this statement is incomplete. The truth of the modern diet situation is this:

You are what you eat.

You are how you eat.

You are why you eat.

With this in mind, if we all know what to eat, why dont we just do it?

We know what foods are healthy and we know what to avoid. We know more about nutrition than at any other time in our history. And if we listen closely to our bodies we also know how much food is too much.

So where is all the food and diet stress coming from?

Why is there so much diet confusion?

Why cant we stop snacking?

Why cant we stick to a diet?

Confusion About Diet

The shelves of any bookstore are filled with books about diets and dieting. No other animal on the planet needs to be told what, when, why or how to eat, how to eat, and neither did we, until recently.

From internet gurus to lifestyle magazines to The Biggest Loser we are shamed, scolded and humiliated by proclamations that we need to extremely restrict our caloric intake in order to lose those unwanted, unsightly pounds, and are weak if we cannot comply. On the other side of that brittle coin, we are told by zealous vegans to eschew any animal product, by passionate paleo-dieters to eschew grain, by low-carbers to never let a grain of rice pass our lips. The truth is, with a protein shake, a multi-vitamin and a diet of Twinkies you can lose substantial weight and improve your blood lipid profile (as Dr. Mark Haub did), though I dont advocate eating high-reward, addictive junk in order to control your weight.

Perusing the aisles of my local bookstore recently, it struck me that nearly all of the books are written about the diet itselfwhat, when, where, why and how you should eat. But were smarter than that, arent we? Deep down you know there is no magic diet. True victory over food and weight issues is not about the diet. Its about the dieteryou .

Its always been about you.

When you look at evolution, youll find that human survival was based on key neural developments and adaptations that made for a sharper mind. Like most animals, we pursue pleasure and avoid pain. The psychology of diet that comes with our evolved brain is now at odds with a world of modern food abundance and food stimuli.

In this book, we will examine how some people become susceptible to food or diet influences that eventually dominate their life. You will discover how your own brain is affected by our modern environment. By addressing your brain, habits and environment you will overcome your weight and food issues. We will uncover the elements that magic diets fail to address, and highlight the underlying operating system you need in order for any diet to truly work. This is not about nutrient timing or any other complex diet regimen.

I will mention throughout this book one important message:

Almost all of these issues we will address are about the dieter.

and they are non-metabolic issues.

Many issues well look at affect your metabolism over the long-term, but they are not intrinsically metabolic. The underlying issuesthe ones we need to addresshave to do with your brain and your environment.

Abundant research suggests that modern food stimulates the reward circuits of the brain, driving people to overeat. The food industry has capitalized on this research to create and sell more and more indulgent foods. By contrast, the diet and fitness industries seem to ignore the research. Many fitness professionals will say you just need more willpower. The concept that you lack willpower is a tremendously damaging and false pronouncement that you may have experienced firsthand.

One of my clients, for instance, developed an eating disorder induced by her previous competition dieting strategies. Shed initially reached out to her former coach, confessing that she was unable to stick to her diet. She described what she was going through both physically and mentally. Her coach told her: Champions dont cheat on their diets.