Truth vs. Myth: 10 Weight Loss Beliefs Put to the Test

James Hill:

Welcome to Weight Loss And, where we delve into the world of weight loss. I'm Jim Hill.

Holly Wyatt:

And I'm Holly Wyatt. We're both dedicated to helping you lose weight, keep it off, and live your best life while you're doing it.

James Hill:

Indeed, we now realize successful weight loss combines the science and art of medicine, knowing what to do and why you will do it.

Holly Wyatt:

Yes, the “And” allows us to talk about all the other stuff that makes your journey so much bigger, better, and exciting.

James Hill:

Ready for the “And” factor?

Holly Wyatt:

Let's dive in.

James Hill:

Here we go.

Holly Wyatt:

Jim, today's episode I think is going to be fun and maybe surprising for some of you out there. We're going to play a game. We call it Myth vs. Truth. Can you tell the difference? And we're going to talk about 10 of the most common claims we hear about weight loss or metabolism or diet or physical activity, and we want you to play along and to think about, is this true or false? Is it a myth or is it true?

James Hill:

Well, I think you're going to see some of these are wrong. Some are spot on. And some, I actually looked at these, Holly, most are a little bit tricky because they sound true, but aren't the whole picture. And I think doing this will help us be able to expand a little bit about some of these and why for some, there may be an element of truth, but there's an element that may be misleading as well.

Holly Wyatt:

I agree. It couldn't be too easy, right? We had to have a little bit of a trick.

James Hill:

No, these are hard. I got some wrong myself.

Holly Wyatt:

Yeah. So y'all grab a pen, grab some coffee, or just listen and try to guess before we tell you the answer. So are you ready? Let's play Myth vs. Truth, Weight Loss Edition.

James Hill:

All right. How are we going to do this, Holly?

Holly Wyatt:

So let's go through. We already have these written down, Jim. You will we'll maybe can alternate, say one of them, but let's then pause because I really want the listener to think about, do they think it's myth or do they think it's truth before we weigh in and give our answer?

James Hill:

Okay.

Holly Wyatt:

You start with the first one.

James Hill:

Number one, you can't lose weight if you have a slow metabolism. So write it down. True, false.

Holly Wyatt:

You can't lose weight if your metabolism is sluggish or slow. What do you think?

James Hill:

Well, this one's a little tricky because your metabolism does matter. And we've talked a lot about this. And it's not that your rate of energy expenditure is low. That's pretty normal for your body size. But there are other aspects of your metabolism, primarily your metabolic flexibility, that can vary. But here's the thing. Whatever your metabolism, you can deal with that. Your metabolism may make it harder or easier to lose weight. And then the big one, Holly, is you can actually optimize your metabolism. So metabolism is important. It's not the kiss of death. Even with a slow metabolism, it may be harder, but you can do it. But the better way is to optimize your metabolism. Wherever it is right now, you can make it better. and that's going to help with weight loss, but even more importantly, weight loss maintenance.

Holly Wyatt:

Metabolism matters, like you said, but things like lifestyle and routines and rituals and how much muscle you have and your sleep and your stress also play roles. So you can optimize your metabolism and work on those other things and that does allow you to lose weight. So the question was worded, you can't lose weight if you have a slow metabolism and I think that is a myth.

James Hill:

Yeah, the other sub-myth in here is that people think your metabolism is unchangeable. You were born with your metabolism and you have to live with it. That's not true. You can make it better.

Holly Wyatt:

Right. And I think people tend to even overestimate how slow their metabolism is, right? They think that play is playing a bigger role than it's right. You know, we have data to show there's differences in metabolism, but they're not as big as I think people think.

James Hill:

So we're going to put this one down as false.

Holly Wyatt:

False. Myth.

James Hill:

Okay.

Holly Wyatt:

Definitely. All right. Number two, guys. Muscle burns more calories than fat, even at rest.

James Hill:

Whoa.

Holly Wyatt:

Muscle burns more calories than fat. So think about a pound of muscle, a pound of fat. Which is burning, you know, does muscle burn more, even at rest?

James Hill:

So, Holly, is this truth or myth?

Holly Wyatt:

So this is actually truth.

James Hill:

Ah.

Holly Wyatt:

I know. Muscle does burn more calories than fat. Maybe not as much as people think. A pound of muscle burns around six to seven calories a day, just at rest, basically. You can burn more calories if you're moving using your muscles, but just at rest, versus fat burns around two. Do you agree with those numbers, Jim? I was trying to remember, but...

James Hill:

Yeah, that's probably true. But I would say these are pretty significant. Muscles burning three, four times more than fat. And if you look through your whole body, bottom line is you'd rather have more muscle than more fat.

Holly Wyatt:

Absolutely. But you also then just, you know, it's pound of muscle. People don't have as many pounds of muscle as they think. So that's the overall impact, maybe not be as much, but definitely you want more muscle. It increases your metabolism, even at rest. The more muscle you have, the more total daily energy burn and the better metabolic health you have. And I think this leads us really to this kind of whole idea of needing resistance training.

James Hill:

Yeah, we always push for a little bit of resistance training. I'm basically a cardio guy. I think most of our exercise needs to be cardio to get our fitness level up. But I think there is a really important role for some resistance training. Because again, as you're losing weight or trying to keep weight off, what resistance training can do is minimize your loss of muscle. May not gain muscle, but you can prevent losing muscle, which in the long run is helping a little bit in terms of increasing your energy expenditure, which means you can eat more without gaining weight.

Holly Wyatt:

Especially if you think you're one of those people that have a sluggish metabolism, right? A sluggish metabolism. One way to help that is either try to put on a little muscle or at least don't lose the muscle you have, right? So I always say if you think your metabolism isn't functioning optimally, we talk about increasing physical activity and doing stuff to help it there. But also resistance training, I think, is an important thing for you to add to what you're doing.

James Hill:

All right. Number three. Oh, this is a good one, Holly. Carbs make you gain weight.

Holly Wyatt:

I've heard this so many times. So myth or truth?

James Hill:

So what we're getting at is carbs are more fattening than other nutrients, right?

Holly Wyatt:

Mm-hmm.

James Hill:

Okay. So is carbs the problem in weight gain? Truth or myth?

Holly Wyatt:

What do you think, Jim?

James Hill:

Myth.

Holly Wyatt:

I agree.

James Hill:

This is one near and dear to my heart. I hear this all the time that carbs are the problem. And that is just not true. Do low-carb diets produce weight loss? Of course they do. All kinds of diets produce weight loss when you eat less. One of the big reasons that carbs can cause a problem is when you're sedentary. When we move our bodies, carbs are the major fuel for that. You look at elite athletes, they're burning carbs like crazy. So if you're sedentary, carbs can be a problem. But when you're active, carbs really fuel your activity. And it's not all carbs either. Whole grains, fruit, legumes, these are good kind of carbs. It's mostly the refined carbs that are the problem. So I just absolutely hate demonizing a food group. Carbs are bad. Absolutely not. We see, actually, when we study people in the National Weight Control Registry, people that are very active, they're increasing their carb intake. Carbs are a problem if you don't move your body, but if you move your body and you have to move your body for weight maintenance, carbs aren't the problem.

Holly Wyatt:

Yeah, carbs are a problem if you overeat them, if you have too many calories than any really.

James Hill:

Right.

Holly Wyatt:

Any food's a problem if it causes you to eat more calories than you're burning, and then you're going to be gaining weight. But carbs inherently aren't necessarily worse, in my opinion, than any other macronutrient.

James Hill:

And you and I have studied low-carb diets for weight loss for many, many years, and there's no question that you can lose weight with low-carb diets and you can actually keep it off with low-carb diets. But the problem is people have trouble adhering to these over the long term. It's just not for most people. There are exceptions. But most people can't go long-term avoiding carbohydrates.

Holly Wyatt:

And so I definitely feel like this is a myth. I think the one thing to talk about is if eating carbs or eating sugar, basically, stimulates your appetite, makes you hungry, and therefore you tend to eat more calories, more other types of food, you know, not just carbs, but it makes you eat more food, then that is a mechanism or pathway in which you might gain weight. And in that case, watching the carbs you're eating, cutting back on them, or the types of carbs that you're eating might be important for you. But just saying that carbs make you gain weight, I think that's a myth.

James Hill:

And a lot of the refined carbs are high in energy density. And I know, Holly, we've got a podcast coming up about energy density. And the reason is you get a lot of calories in a little bit amount of food. And that's a problem for any kind of food. So it's not carbs per se.

Holly Wyatt:

Right.

James Hill:

So this is a myth.

Holly Wyatt:

Right. So if we could substitute fat makes you gain weight.

James Hill:

Yes.

Holly Wyatt:

I would say myth.

James Hill:

Right.

Holly Wyatt:

It's just, you're oversimplifying. It's not really the problem. And I don't think it helps people when you make statements like that and you think of it like that. All right. Number four.

Holly Wyatt:

If you're not losing weight, you're not trying hard enough. Myth or fact? If you're not losing weight, you're not trying hard enough.

James Hill:

What's the answer?

Holly Wyatt:

Definitely a myth.

James Hill:

Oh, yeah.

Holly Wyatt:

I want to make sure people understand this, that it's not all about willpower. We know that weight is regulated and it's not just effort-based, that there are definitely things that can make it very difficult for weight loss in some individuals. There's medications, there's hormones, stress, sleep, metabolic adaptations, all of that matters. And it's not just about willpower. Willpower can be important. We talk about, you know, using willpower at certain points, but that's not everything. things. Sometimes it's about other strategies that you need to use. And I think that this myth can cause shame and blame. And it's a myth we need to break. It's not helpful.

James Hill:

There's clearly a genetic and a biological component to weight. And we see this with the new weight loss medications, right? People that struggled and struggled, the weight loss medications helped. Now, we're not saying that willpower isn't important. It is important. But let's face it, biologically, genetically, it's harder for some people to manage their weight than others. That's just a fact. And it's not a reason to blame people or to say they're not trying hard enough.

Holly Wyatt:

Right. So if you're struggling or losing weight slower than somebody else, I don't want them to think, oh, it's because I'm not trying as hard as that other person. That's not true. Really, that's what this is about. There's so much more to it, and you can't think of it that way. And it's not helpful. It doesn't put you in the right mind state to think of it that way.

James Hill:

All right. The next one. Oh, Holly, this is an interesting one.

James Hill:

You need to exercise a lot to lose weight. Okay? You need to exercise a lot to lose weight. Truth or myth? All right. This is a little bit tricky.

Holly Wyatt:

All right.

James Hill:

This is a myth. We have lots of studies to show that you can lose weight just by eating less. You don't have to be active. You can be totally sedentary. And you can lose weight without exercising. The data are a little clear. Sometimes exercise may help a little bit and a little bit more weight loss. Sometimes you may lose a little bit less muscle. But the bottom line, and you and I talk about this all the time, food restriction is the major driver of weight loss. So it's a myth that you have to exercise to lose weight. But, here's the tricky part. You have to exercise to keep weight off. So you don't have to exercise to lose it. But what we've seen in studying many, many people who are successful, it's the rare individual who can keep weight off with food restriction. They can lose it with food restriction, but they cannot keep it off with food restriction. Exercise is essential for weight loss maintenance. But this is a myth that you have to exercise to lose weight.

Holly Wyatt:

Yeah. And I think people get confused about that. And I think when you're losing weight, I always say, let's increase the activity for other reasons.

James Hill:

Absolutely.

Holly Wyatt:

You know, it's helpful for other reasons. But you can lose weight without exercise. But you need to set yourself up to be ready for that weight loss maintenance. So that's a reason to kind of start that movement even when you're losing weight. So you're ready to be in a good place.

James Hill:

Lots of other reasons to exercise too. Exercise is good for mental health. It actually helps restore your metabolism, but you just don't see it in weight loss. And again, the reason you and I have talked about this for years, weight loss is a very different process than weight loss maintenance. Weight loss maintenance is, this is the forever part. This is the really important part. And that's when exercise is essential.

Holly Wyatt:

Right. All right. Are we ready for number six?

James Hill:

Go for it.

Holly Wyatt:

All right. Number six, weight loss medications reset your metabolism permanently. Weight loss medications reset your metabolism permanently. Myth or truth? All right. I'll take this one on first, Jim.

James Hill:

Okay.

Holly Wyatt:

This is definitely a myth.

James Hill:

Oh, no. You don't get to reset your metabolism. Bummer.

Holly Wyatt:

You know, it doesn't change anything permanently, whether it's your physiology and your hormones or your metabolism. And I think some people think that it's like taking a pill fixes it, permanently fixes it. And that's not how these new medications are working. They do make changes to your appetite, which is part of your metabolism. They do make changes, but they don't fix it to make it change permanently. They only affect it when the medication is on board. It's like other medications we've talked about. You take a blood pressure pill, it decreases your blood pressure. You stop taking that pill, your blood pressure goes up. Same thing with these weight loss medications. You put them on board. They change your appetite metabolism, your physiology, but not permanently. And once you're off the medication, your appetite returns, the metabolism returns to exactly what it was before the medications were on board. So, I think that's so important because I don't think a lot of people understand that. They think it's going to solve the problem. They're going to be able to stop the medicine and everything will, you know, remain the same.

James Hill:

You know, thinking about it, Holly, I don't know of anything that sort of resets your metabolism permanently. Even exercise, which I love, I think it affects your metabolism. But when you stop it, your metabolism is going to return to the way it was. So I'm not aware of anything that can permanently affect your metabolism. But the drugs do it while you're taking the drugs. So they work. And that's why if you stop taking them, you regain the weight.

Holly Wyatt:

I think some people think of it like an antibiotic. So an antibiotic is a medication that you take. It actually kills the bacteria and the bacteria is gone and you can stop the medication and everything's okay. But that's just not how these medications work. But I think some people kind of think of that in the same way as they think of an antibiotic or certain other medications that do get rid of the problem. These don't get rid of the problem.

James Hill:

All right. Number seven, eating late at night makes you gain weight. We hear this a lot.

Holly Wyatt:

Yeah. Stop eating at 6 p.m.

James Hill:

Eating late at night makes you gain weight. Truth or myth? All right, Holly, you gave me a hard one because this is tricky.

Holly Wyatt:

I took the one before on purpose because I wanted you to answer this one.

James Hill:

So I would say this one is part truth, part myth. I'm going to hedge my bets a little bit. So I think eating late at night for some people can disrupt circadian rhythms and can increase hunger the next day. But it's not just when you eat. It's what, how much, and why. So I think people that are eating late at night, they're not going out eating what we would call healthy stuff. They're eating unhealthy stuff. And oftentimes eating late at night is a little bit more mindless and you consume things that are calorie dense. Timing can matter, but it doesn't trump total food intake. I think where late night eating becomes a problem is when you're eating in such a way that it really increases your calorie intake. So it is about calories, but timing can make a little bit of a difference. And I think some people are more susceptible to this than other people. So I would say it's part truth and part myth. If you're a nighttime eater, a nighttime snacker, it's an opportunity to maybe make an intervention. It might make a difference for you. So part truth, part myth on this one.

Holly Wyatt:

Yeah, I agree. You know, how many people eat a Billy Big salad, you know, at midnight before they go to bed?

James Hill:

It's like, I'm going to go and find the broccoli, have a binge on broccoli at midnight.

Holly Wyatt:

Yeah, it's ice cream and, you know, pizza and all of that. And so if eating at night, you're eating more calories, which I do think it increases that likelihood you're going to eat more calories, then it's a problem. But if you didn't eat more calories and you're eating at night, probably not an issue. However, I think the new stuff makes this even more nuanced. Like you said, the new stuff about the circadian rhythms. And is it important to have a period of time where you're not consuming food so you have that time when you're going to sleep? You know, is there, does that help out with body weight regulation? So that's why I think this is complex is because there's even some new data kind of coming in is having a period where you fast important. And typically a period where you fast would be in the evening right through when you sleep and then get up and you usually eat something. So this is a hard one. That was a hard one.

James Hill:

Yeah. But if you are someone that eats a lot late at night, it may be an opportunity to change if you want to lose weight and you're looking at where you might look at behavioral strategies, it's one to consider.

Holly Wyatt:

Yeah, I agree. All right. Number eight, weight loss slows down as you lose more weight. Weight loss slows down as you lose more weight. Truth or myth? All right, this is a truth.

James Hill:

Yeah, it is. This is a good one because we know this is true, and I think it's a big misconception out there. People expect their weight loss to continue at a high rate, and in fact, the more successfully you lose weight, the more your weight loss will slow down.

Holly Wyatt:

Yeah. There's several reasons for this. But part of the reason, as you lose weight, your metabolism, the amount of calories you burn decreases.

James Hill:

Right.

Holly Wyatt:

You know, partly because you're actually your resting metabolic rate goes down because you're not as big. You don't have to keep, you know, your body alive. It doesn't take as much energy just to keep your body alive at rest. And you're now smaller. So even moving, you know, you may be walking three miles and then you lose 30 pounds and you still are walking three miles, you're going to burn less energy than you did before, right? It just takes less energy to move less mass over that distance. So you're naturally going to be burning less calories and that's going to result in less weight loss over time unless you keep adjusting your energy intake down or you either increase your activity even more. And then I don't know how you feel about it. I think that's definitely one of the things that happens. So it's going to get harder and harder to be in a negative energy balance to lose the same amount of weight. And then, Jim, what do you think about metabolic adaptations kind of coming in at this point?

James Hill:

People talk about metabolic adaptations, that your energy expenditure might decline more or less than would be expected from your body composition. My reading of that is those things may be true on a short-term basis, but over the long term, I don't think they're very important.

Holly Wyatt:

Okay. So it's more just the biology of you getting smaller.

James Hill:

Yeah. So a great example. Let's say you burn 2,500 calories a day. That would be pretty typical. Now you say you want to lose weight. So you start eating 2,000 calories a day. You have a 500 calorie deficit, right? A week later, you're not burning 2,500 calories. You're burning 2,400 calories because your body is lower. So now you only have a 400 calorie deficit. The following week, it's even less. And that's why you're not going to lose weight continuously. You reach a plateau. Even on the meds, people expect, well, the weight loss medications, I'm just going to continue to lose weight. No, you reach a point where your energy expenditure, your body weight is lower. Your energy expenditure now equals your energy intake and you stabilize. You don't lose weight forever.

Holly Wyatt:

Right. And it makes sense. And it's normal. And that's how it works.

James Hill:

Absolutely. All right. Number nine, is that what we're on?

Holly Wyatt:

That's what we're on.

James Hill:

You have to be perfect to keep weight off. Well, Holly, that's a myth. And we know because we study a lot of these weight loss maintainers. And I think people have the idea it's an either or. You're successful or not successful at long-term weight loss. And what we find is that even people who succeed, they're not perfect. They bounce up and down. They may gain a little weight and they go back and lose it. What we see is they develop healthy rituals and routines, but occasionally they mess up and they have to recover. And we find that perfection may not be the important part here. It's having what we call a healthy mind state, being flexible, self-compassion, planning. So consistency, trying to be as consistent as possible when you get off track, get back on track. So it's not perfection. You don't need perfection. You need consistency. You need a healthy mind state, and you need to have a long-term approach to this. This is forever. Weight loss maintenance in short term, it's forever. You're going to have good times and bad times. The idea is you get through the bad times, you get back on track, and you try to be as consistent as possible.

Holly Wyatt:

Yeah. I think we saw this in the National Weight Control registry. Consistency beats perfection.

James Hill:

Yes.

Holly Wyatt:

And I think it's about the, you know, a lot of people think they're either all on or all off. They're on plan or they're off plan. Very, very. And that's not, I think, what is helpful for weight loss maintenance. It is that gray zone, but knowing what to do when you start to kind of get off plan and being able to come back on plan and having those consistent behaviors. Not perfection, but some consistency and, like you said, some belief that I can do this and you know what to do. That's what's associated, I think, with keeping weight off, not perfection. It's a big myth.

James Hill:

That's true of all life goals. If you think about all your important life goals, it's not that you have to be perfect to do them and you're not going to be on top of them all the time, but you stay with it. You try to be consistent. When you're off track, you get back on track.

Holly Wyatt:

But so many people, I hear this all the time, oh, once they think they make a mistake, once they feel like they haven't been perfect, they just throw up their hands and everything goes south. And so this is definitely important for people to understand. So many people think, are perfectionists in every aspect, or try to be, or think that they need to really master perfection to be successful at weight loss maintenance.

James Hill:

Yep. All right. The last one, holly.

Holly Wyatt:

All right. Save the best for last. Number 10, most people who lose weight gain it all back, once again the wording is a little bit tricky here most people who lose weight gain it all back. What do you think, Jim?

James Hill:

Oh, Holly, unfortunately, that's true.

Holly Wyatt:

It is. I don't think we can lie. If we look at the numbers, the majority or most do tend to gain, at least some of it, all back.

James Hill:

That's what we're all about, though, is helping more people succeed. The fact of the matter is very few people succeed right now, but there are people who succeed. What we've been trying to do is learn from them and help more people succeed. I mean, the National Weight Control Registry, the International Weight Control Registry, we've studied so many people who are able to do it. And what we want to do is to try to help more and more people do it. It's absolutely possible to lose weight and keep it off long term.

Holly Wyatt:

So I think regain is common. I mean, that's the data. We know that data. It's common. but it's not inevitable. It's not your destiny. You can succeed. That's the message. We're going to always give you the data here, but I think with the right strategies, it is possible. We know that, like you said, from the National Weight Control Registry and plus, the people, you know, the state-of-slimmers. I know lots of people who've been very successful at keeping the weight off. You can beat those odds.

James Hill:

And one of the big ones, and we've said it over and over, you cannot do this with food alone. I still think a big reason that so many people fail in keeping weight off is they try to do it with diet alone. And you can't do it. You can't. You eat sufficiently little to maintain your weight loss because you get hungry. You need physical activity. You need a healthy diet and you need a strong diet plan. But diet alone doesn't work, you need physical activity, and then more and more we're finding that you need this healthy mind state to be able to keep consistency over the long term.

Holly Wyatt:

Yeah, I think all three of those are important, you know, and people tend to just focus on the diet, but it's the diet, it's that physical activity, and it's the mind state. You need to have all three going in the same direction, right? Helping you maintain that weight loss.

James Hill:

Yep. All right, 10. Those were tough, Holly.

Holly Wyatt:

I thought so. I didn't want to make them easy. I wanted to make people think.

James Hill:

Hopefully people learned a little from that because some of this stuff is a little complex and we're trying to simplify it, but some of it is complex. And hopefully this helped people understand at least some of the myths that they can think differently about.

Holly Wyatt:

And I think that's why, you know, in social media, they want it to be, you know, carbs are bad. That's that headline that goes out. Well, it's nuanced, right? It's nuanced. Like we discussed, you can't make a statement like that. But I think the listener can understand this. That's what I really liked about this episode. Let's give this information so the listener can start to understand what's really going on.

James Hill:

Absolutely.

Holly Wyatt:

So what about some listener questions? I think we have time for one or two.

James Hill:

All right. So, Holly, my doctor told me I have a slow metabolism. What should I do differently?

Holly Wyatt:

Oh, my goodness. We talk about this all the time. First off, you may have a slow metabolism, but you can absolutely do something about it, right? It's not your destiny, meaning you can't be successful. If I felt like my metabolism was sluggish or slow, I definitely would be increasing my physical activity. That would be number one. We know that increasing your energy expenditure can change, modify, optimize, whatever word you want to use, your metabolism. So that is what I would start with. How can we slowly start to increase movement to make your metabolism that may be a little bit different than somebody else's, maybe a little bit slower, the best it can be to optimize it? What would you say, Jim?

James Hill:

No, I agree with that. Wherever you start from, you can optimize it. You can make it better. So do not believe that you're stuck with a slow metabolism, which dooms you to failure.

Holly Wyatt:

All right, Jim, I'll ask you this next one. How much exercise is enough? Like, what's the minimum? I mean, this is what I was like, come on, Holly, don't give me the max. Give me the minimum for maintenance. Really. They even said really. They want the real answer.

James Hill:

Well, what we have is information from the National Weight Control Registry. Now, keep in mind, these people are maintaining an average weight loss of about 70 pounds, okay? Significant weight loss. And on average, they do about an hour a day of physical activity. Some do more, some do less. And so we think that's a pretty good start. And again, an hour a day, when we tell people, it's interesting how they approach it. Is an hour a day a lot or a little bit? There are 24 hours in the day. And we're saying, Holly, give me one hour, doesn't have to be all at once, can be spread out over the day, and will help you keep off 70 pounds. So you only have to do one out of 24. But most people say, oh, an hour, that's a lot, which shows how sedentary we've become.

Holly Wyatt:

Well, Jim, it also shows the mind state.

James Hill:

It shows the mind state of saying, "Oh, my gosh, an hour a day? That's a lot" versus "Oh, for only an hour a day, I get to keep off all this weight?" So, yes, I would say, again, it's individual. But if you want a number, go for an hour a day.

Holly Wyatt:

I agree. And it really shows how the mind state's interacting with activity. Is this something you get to do? Do you think of it as a chore? Just even how this listener question was worded, how much exercise is enough for maintenance, really? Like, I've got to do this. What's the least amount I can do versus what do I get to do and all the things that come with it, you know?

James Hill:

That's the victim mind state. We got to get out of that and go for a voyager mind state.

Holly Wyatt:

And the truth is the same, right? The number is the same, but how you see that number is going to impact how successful you are. That's how the mind state plays a role in your success. So it wasn't even a question about mind state, but man, really was a good one. All right. What about some vulnerability questions?

James Hill:

Okay. I'll give you one. What's a myth you believed early in your career or even fell for that turned out to be wrong?

Holly Wyatt:

Well, you know this. You know this one. I was a firm believer that carbs were bad. I ate low carb for two years, I think, while I was in my, let's see, this was my internship and residency. And it is a reason why I went into this field. It's the reason I became an endocrinologist. It's the reason, actually, Jim, that I, you know, found you and ended up doing a, you know, you were my mentor for many, many years teaching me how to do research. It's because I was really interested in carbohydrates. I was sure, absolutely sure that carbs were bad. I wanted to study it. So in a way, it drove me into this field, which was a good thing. But definitely, I learned a lot and have decided that that's a myth. And that was something that I believed early in my career.

James Hill:

Wow.

Holly Wyatt:

Yeah. What about you? What's one truth or myth that you, I guess, one truth that felt hard to accept or a myth that you believed in, but maybe changed over time for you?

James Hill:

Well, again, I think the answer to that is really what you helped me to understand the importance of mind state. I focused a lot on diet and physical activity and behavior and a little bit on psychological stuff. But I think in the past few years, as we've really investigated how to use your mind effectively, that's been a game changer. So I would say diet and exercise are important, but I don't think many people are going to succeed without a healthy mind state. And I think that may be the key difference between people who succeed long term and those who don't.

Holly Wyatt:

I agree. All right, Jim, I think this was fun. I think we should do this again. We could come up with some different myths and different questions, you know?

James Hill:

Oh, there are plenty of myths out there. We can do some more.

Holly Wyatt:

We could do some targeted ones. Guys, send some out to us if you would like for us to put them on the show, because I think we'll do this again, because this, I think, can be helpful.

James Hill:

All right. So everything you hear about weight loss isn't true. There are some myths out there. Not everything that sounds good is good. So the takeaway here, Holly, weight loss is complex, but it's not a mystery. We know a lot. And I think what we want to do is to help people as best as possible, separate truth from myth.

Holly Wyatt:

I agree. And guys if a myth you believed in just got busted, don't feel bad. Send us some more questions. Tell us what you learned and we will keep doing this.

James Hill:

Great. Well, this was fun. See you next time on Weight Loss And. And that's a wrap for today's episode of Weight Loss And. We hope you enjoy diving into the world of weight loss with us.

Holly Wyatt:

If you want to stay connected and continue exploring the “Ands” of weight loss, be sure to follow our podcast on your favorite platform.

James Hill:

We'd also love to hear from you. Share your thoughts, questions, or topic suggestions by reaching out at [weightlossand.com](http://weightlossand.com/). Your feedback helps us tailor future episodes to your needs.

Holly Wyatt:

And remember, the journey doesn't end here. Keep applying the knowledge and strategies you've learned and embrace the power of the “And” in your own weight loss journey.