“How Many Calories Should I Eat?” Part 2
So last week in “How Many Calories Should I Eat?” Part One we established the fact that a calorie is simply a unit of measurement, that is is neither good nor evil and that approximately 3500 of them equals about 1 pound of fat. While we didn’t get into discussing the quality of said calories, when broken down to its basest level it doesn’t matter for this part of the discussion; so…
“How Many Calories Should I Eat?”
Like I said in the last installment, this is an extremely common question; don’t feel bad if you don’t know how to figure the answer out. That’s why I’m here for you!
The way you are going to figure this out is by calculating your Basal Metabolic Rate and then adjusting for how active you are. Yes, I know you probably just wanted me to give you a number and then call it a day, but that’s not how it works! Caloric intake is highly individualized; so yes, you are going to have to do a little math. So suck it up and let’s take a look at how we are going to calculate this mess!
First up is figuring out what that mildly ominous sounding Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR) is. The basic gist of the BMR is that it is tells you how many calories your body uses to stay alive… or in other words, how many calories your base bodily functions burn while you lounge around all day reading comic books or binge watching old TV series on Netflix. Unless you are bed-ridden this is only part of the number crunching we are going to have to do, but for desk-jockeys who don’t get much exercise, it’s a good starting point. So what exactly is this magic formula? Luckily you don’t need to recall your college trigonometry class, because we have the Internet! *cue the angel’s choir*