What’s in a name was inspired by a couple things this evening. The first inspiration was that on Weight Watchers app, there is no listing for charcoal steak which caused me to have to Google to see if there was another name for this cut of steak. Turns out it is also called a Flat Iron Steak which is in the app. Go figure, I wonder how many other food items have multiple names which are not listed in their app.

This steak and green bean dinner was a quick, easy and cheap meal I prepared this evening after coming in off the road for the night from my semi. To show that it is quicker and cheaper to eat healthy whole foods at home I pictured my dinner plate with the price tag from this delicious 13 ounce steak. If you pay attention while grocery shopping, there are always good deals to be found. $2.96 for the steak is super inexpensive and the green beans came from a small can which was about .55 cents. A good filling dinner for $3.50. I ask, what restaurant can you find this deal in?

As for preparation time, this meal took me all of ten minutes to fix from freezer to plate. I came in and after setting down my road gear, I opened the freezer, and removed the steak and then grabbed a individual serving size can of green beans from my pantry. I weighed the steak as my non stick skillet heated and then placed the steak on the fire and emptied the green beans into another pan. Once the steak had seared good on one side I flipped it in order to sear the other. Being as the steak was seared but still somewhat frozen and raw in the middle, I poured a little water in the skillet and placed a cover over it to quickly cook it to medium rare as I prefer them. After about 4 minutes I removed the cover to let the water finish boiling off , seasoned the meat and once again let it sear a little more on both sides before plating. So, not only was this dinner cheap and quick to prepare, it was 525 calories of delicious goodness and 74.7g of protein, 4g of carbs and 23.8g of fat. Note, I never avoid fats, and even add it to my protein drinks as our bodies require fats for proper absorption of nutrients and vitamins.

Once I had finished my dinner and cleaned up my dishes, I went for a good brisk walk through the Leavenworth VA grounds. I walked 3.5 miles at a 3.6 mph pace which was enough to elevate my heart rate a little for a good fat burning walk without any worries of it interfering with tomorrows weight training. Walking is the most beneficial and restorative exercise a person can do for themselves. I really do not like to run on my non weight training days as a run will take away from my ability to squat strongly which is a bigger focus for me. Running on my off days will interfere with my body’s ability to recover from heavy weight lifting and it really just becomes a way to major in the minors when weight training is my main focus. Weight training done right is cardiovascular in nature and I will run after a good weight training session so as to not hinder my ability to properly recover.

While out walking, enjoying the evenings peacefulness, I pondered how so many on Weight Watchers Connect have so many problems with losing weight while racking up all kinds of Fit Points which goes back to the title of this piece, What’s in a Name?

Let me now kindly ruffle some feathers with a few uncomfortable truths instead of giving you an uncomfortable lie. I can sense the gnashing of teeth and hissing already, but here goes; If you never had control of your diet and joined Weight Watchers in order to lose weight, yet still want to eat your cakes and cookies, you are only kidding yourself if you think you can control what you never had control over in the past. Sure some people do gain control, but there are more examples on Connect of folks losing control over actually maintaining control over their appetite for sweets. As the old saying goes, insanity is defined by doing the same thing over and over while expecting different results. If you are not willing to change your ways then you are only tossing good money after bad when you pay your fees. That is a hard reality. You have to be willing to change your ways of thinking of your relationship with food. It really needs to quit being the main focus of your day. This is easy if you would be willing to completely give up sugar in all that you eat. Know that it is quite difficult to out exercise a poor diet.

Next, is I exercise my ass off yet only count about 75 to 90 Fit Points in a week by heavy weight training and intensive running. You must not over estimate your intensity of exercise. If you build points that are not truly justified in order to eat your cream puffs or ice cream, you are only hurting yourself. Make sure you actually read the intensity descriptors before clicking on it for points.

Here is a simple reality. If your exercise is not raising your heart rate, it is low in intensity and really means little other than a small amount of movement is more beneficial than sitting your ass on the couch while staring at the boob tube. If you went out and bought a Fit Bit or any other fitness tracker in order to track your steps while doing the same house work you were doing while getting fat in the first place, you are sadly mistaken or delusional if you think you can track those new found points in order to increase the points given in your dailies and weeklies in order to eat more. If you do this you are only gaming the system and you will lose this game by not losing fat or maybe even gaining more. Unless your house work is truly intensive by having your heart rate elevated and you are working up a sweat, it is not doing shit for you. Just because you can track some points from the steps you got in does not mean you have truly exercised your body to allow for eating more cup cakes. No matter the point system Weight Watchers has created, it is still a basic fact that your body has a Base Metabolic Rate that requires a set number of calories to lose weight, stay the same or to gain weight. Points do not equal any certain number of calories, they just lead you to a high protein low carb diet without telling you this is what you are doing if you follow the true intent of their program. Calories in verses calories burned. If you eat 500 more calories a day than your base metabolic rate allows for you, then your ass is going to gain 1 pound a week if you do this every day. and it does not matter a bit if you are remaining in your point allowance. If you track steps as exercise which did not raise your heart rate, then you are adding up Fit Points you did not truly earn, and are only hurting yourself. Think about this every time you begin to log your Fit Points. If you did not do anything with a bit of true effort, you should skip those points no matter how many steps you took. Giving a basically meaningless movement the name exercise is an effort in futility. And you should know this every time you step upon your scale and the number has either not budged or has gone up. Think about all of this every day and consider what kind of example you are setting for your children or grand children. What message does it send them when they see a parent or grand parent cheating themselves? Think about the example you are setting for the youngsters in your life. Of the things that are important to me, at the top is that I will always be the man my wife, kids and grand children think I am. It is imperative to me as my family patriarch to set the example in a positive direction as how am I ever going to advise them with credibility when I do not practice what I preach?

In closing, I am going to be offering up online coaching for weight training via video. I am only interested in helping folks who are serious about learning the basics of weight training along with nutrition and rest. Rest and nutrition are equally important as the actual lifting of the iron. So far, I have had one trainee whom I have working with for the last six months. Brenda is a 61 year old lady who asked me to give her advice in strength training and I got her going. In the beginning, Brenda was pretty weak, her first squat with 35 pounds was so wobbly I had to wonder if she would stick with me. now, here we are in June and I am quite proud of how far she has come. Brenda had never seriously trained with weights and now at almost 62 years old, she can squat 110 lbs, bench press 75 pounds for reps, overhead press 55 pounds for reps and she dead lifts 115 lbs for reps with ease. I am going to say her one rep maximum dead lift is 135 lbs. This is pretty impressive for a lady her age and then when you consider there was a disruption when her home was wiped out by a tornado. For anyone serious about learning to lift and have my coaching via video, I can be reached at david63ks@hotmail.com where we can discuss what will be needed for equipment, the program I would have you doing and costs. Know this, by being placed on an established program you will have far more success in meeting your goals than you will experience through random lifts in the gym. The largest reason folks fail at weight training besides the fact it is hard work is people do not know what it is they do not know. I will place you on a program where there is measurable progress every session.