Please End The Cult of WeightLoss

There are 240lb people with 28 inch waistlines. I’ve been there. There are 100lb skinny-looking people with over 30% body fat composition.

Weight matters, sure. You don’t get a bigger set of lungs as an adult if you weigh 300lbs versus 150lbs. You don’t get bigger effective knee joints. You don’t get a beneficially larger pancreas or adrenal glands. You will get a bigger heart and liver (but these size increases correlate to a DECREASE in effective function). So, yeah, weight matters, insomuch as you are forcing certain structures to do more work than they can or need to. And that reduces your relative work capacity, structural integrity of organs and tissues, enjoyment, and/or lifespan.

But here’s the thing: if your composition doesn’t improve, and your physical capability doesn’t improve, WHO CARES ABOUT WEIGHT?

This is precisely what happens by the way. People who train capability on average maintain better weight and composition. People who train for weightloss on average have worse comp and ability in the long term.

Lean tissue loss and strength loss IS aging. Work capacity is life. Remind me again, where does a few pounds of stored body fat fit into this equation?

I guarantee that the average weight loss resolutionist would benefit dearly from a 10-20lb weight gain in hip extensor and overall back muscle/tendon/ligament/skeletal/fascia density.

With THAT change in comp, fall risk decreases, orthopedic pain and injury decreases, the effective burden of total bodyweight decreases, and so on. Work capacity improves. LIFE improves. Guess what: potential for weight loss improves, because they can do more.

On the flip side, EVERY SINGLE PERSON who puts strengthening on the back burner in order to “focus” on weight loss ends up accelerating deterioration. I only have a sample set of 12,000 to 20,000 people I’ve observed, assessed, or directly worked with in my 15 years of professional experience. But I don’t have ONE EXAMPLE of someone who gave up focusing on improving strength ability and is better for it on 2, 5, 10 year followup.

However, I have hundreds of examples of people who focused exclusively on ability and their composition was improved 2, 5, 10 years later.  

Please end the Cult of Weightloss. Please.