“But I just want to lose weight.”

“But I just want to lose weight.”

Many people think that, if they just want to lose weight, dieting, crash dieting, fasting,or some other reduction of food intake will do the trick. In fact, dieting without exercising can be counterproductive, especially for women, who have less muscle and bone in proportion to their body weight than men have. If you stop eating or take in extremely few calories each day to lose weight, the opposite soon happens. Your body thinks it is starving, reverts to its natural defense against famine, and holds on to what it has as if it’s a matter of life or death.
In contrast, exercise helps control weight. Scientists, nutritionists, and physiologists studying the relationship between diet and exercise have drawn conclusions that point to exercise as a weight-loss enhancer, not a detractor. When you exercise, you build muscle and become both fitter and leaner. More on this in Chapter 6, “Tune Up That
Muscle Machine.”