Fat and Tired

@silverflame The goals are fine to have but be realistic about the time frame. What’s your mile time currently?

30% body fat I’d be focusing on cutting that down to atleast 18% before I’d consider bulking/building muscle. You will gain strength in the process of your cut especially if you are new to training.

As far as 2000 calories a day that seems low for your body weight and height. It could be contributing to your binges on other days. You need to be sustained for life and training. Focus on Whole Foods. Avoid processed and fast foods except for a rare occasion.

Now the biggest thing is learning discipline. I’m sure you try to instill this value in your students and teachers. Motivation is easy to find but can quickly fizzle. It’s the discipline that will keep you going on those mornings that you just aren’t feeling it. Focus on the weekly accomplishments. Like I said the long term goals are great but focus on the weekly/daily progression. You won’t regret this journey. You’ll never regret waking up and getting that work out i
 
@parent69
30% body fat I’d be focusing on cutting that down to atleast 18% before I’d consider bulking/building muscle

I respectfully disagree with this. OP won't be able to bulk while in a calorie deficit, but they can definitely build a bit of newbie gains and recomp their body if they don't lower their calories too much. When you're obese and lose a lot of weight with no weight training, your body ends up looking a lot more "mushy" and "skinny fat" than when you incorporate decent weight training from the very beginning.

I recently went from 305 down to 280 with mostly weight training, and crazy enough, my body shape has changed in a way that is indicative of weight training instead of just sedentary or cardio weight loss. I don't look like I'm in my 280s. I look like I'm 270 or even high 260s. I especially love the way my traps and ass are growing lol. Obese people should do weight lifting or calisthenics from the very beginning of their journey.
 
@parent69 That’s on the road. I did a lot of running previously and found that cadence running got me down to where I could hit a 6:15 mile at 230 lbs.
My intent it to get down pretty well - I’d love to eventually run a sub 20 min 5k…
 
@silverflame hey man,

I was in your exact shoes several years back. I also tried all different things.

here's what I learned:

1) you can't outrun / out-lift a bad diet. The most important workout you will do is choosing what and how much to eat in the kitchen

2) It's easier to skip a piece of cake or have a smaller portion of a meal, than to indulge and try to burn it off later.

3) losing weight is not a linear process

4) losing weight first feels sooooo much better. focus on that.

5) figure out the difference between Motivation and Discipline. The former will wax and wain. The latter can be built, slowly, over time.

I'd recommend couch to 5k, plus weight lifting, but all overlaying a serious calorie deficit.
 
@smm Thanks fellow Ben! I appreciate the encouragement to focus on the weight loss first and the reminder that it will feel REALLY good. I’ll set that as my first/major goal!
 
@silverflame Dirty secret: At the beginner stages building muscle and losing fat is the same thing.

This is one thing that the fitness advice industry keeps flubbing on. They give plenty of advice for athletes, and most of it doesn't apply to "Joe Average just trying to look and feel a little better"

Try this:
  1. Pick a workout program. Starting Strength, Stronglifts, even Simple & Sinister are great for beginners. No bizzare routines of "do 15x3 Romanian offisde pistol lifts followed by 22x4 Kevichian toe climbers".
  2. Commit to walking your 10,000 steps (that's about 5 miles). a day. This is your main workout, and it's cardio. There are plenty of knock-on benefits as well including connecting with the neighborhood and tree-bathing.
  3. Three times a week (non-consecutive days), do your routine.
  4. After 3-6 months, re-evaluate. Maybe you want to take up swimming. Or want to switch routines. Or take a karate class. Point is, you aren't fixed on this routine. Just commit to 3 months (maybe more) and see if you like the results.
Don't worry about supplements or other forms of training or goals at this time. Your goal is to "get better". Daily walks. 3x weights.
 
@silverflame
I’m 36, 6’ tall, 245 lbs and 30% body fat

...

I eat about 2000 calories a day (though some days far more!)

You would not stay at 245 lbs if you were eating only 2,000 calories most days. Your TDEE (how many calories you eat per day to maintain your current weight) is 2,296 calories if you're a woman, and 2,495 calories if you're a man. This means that eating just 2,000 calories would put you in a caloric deficit, and you would end up losing weight if you consistently ate 2,000 cals per day.

Buy a digital food scale and start measuring everything you eat and calculate calories based on the scale weight. Eat normally for a week and log and weigh everything you eat per day, and then tally up the calories to see how many calories you're really eating.

I am a high school principal so I’m often busy and find that I use food to cope with stress pretty often

I work in a public school as well, and I recently started helping out with the basketball team's practices (I'm 2 years younger than you and 40 pounds bigger than you, just for reference). These kids are wearing my fat ass out, and I'm enjoying every minute of it! I will personally do all of the exercises I make the b-ball players do, plus I scrimmage with them. Trust me, practicing with the sports teams will get you some good cardio, conditioning, and agility training. Plus, you'll get to "bUiLd reLatiOnshIps" with the kids.

I feel like I am just looking in too many directions and that I could really use some help picking a target and going for it.

I know the feeling lol. I'd suggest starting with something simple first. Start by doing the following everyday:
  • 20-30 squats and push-ups: Look on YouTube for proper form (sump squats work well for duck-footed people, just fyi). If you can't do a typical push-up, then do push-ups against a wall. I'll also do squats and push-ups while at school. 10 in the morning, 10 at noon, and 10 right before I leave the building. Plus you don't sweat much from doing them like this, so you won't stink at work lol.
Then do the following 2-3 times a week:
  • Using a timer/circuit app, do 30 seconds of jumping Jacks; 30 seconds of running in place where you bring your knees as close to a 90° angle as possible; 30 seconds of bodyweight calf-raises; and 30 second planks (do planks on a chair if regular ones are too much on your body). Do all 4 exercises 3 times in a row at home, and modify them or exchange them for other at-home cardio exercises as needed. This is a very short circuit, so make sure that you are doing each exercise as intensely (but safely) as you can.
Do all of this for 4 weeks straight, and you will feel a difference.

As for diet, start small by restricting yourself to 2,000-2,100 calories per day, cutting out sugary sodas and fruit juices, and or exchanging them for "zero sugar" drink products. You like ice cream? Get Rebel's Keto ice cream that uses alternative sugar and lactose-free milk. You like bbq sauce? Get the sugar-free BBQ sauces that are now sold in stores. If you like chocolate, then eat dark chocolate only (75% or more, as this tends to have less sugar than popular chocolates). You like coffee with sugar or creamer? Use monkfruit as a substitute for sugar and use sugar-free creamers. I can give you an example meal if you tell me what food dishes you really love.

The key to success is not in cutting out all delicious food dishes that you like, but rather to find low sugar and whole [real] ingredient alternatives to make your food and drinks with. Limit alcohol to the weekend, and feel free to have cheat meals on saturday and Sunday with the condition that you still stay within your 2,000-2,100 calorie budget.

Also, and this is very important, incorporate green veggies into your daily diet. Start with 2 servings of FRESH green veggies per day, whether it's cooked or raw. None of those canned or precooked veggies. And feel free to eat fruit as well. Fresh fruit does wonders for my gut health. Berries, cantaloupe, kiwifruit, apples, etc, are all good fruits to eat.
 
@silverflame TLDR: Focus on ADDING proper foods, rather than taking away bad stuff. Once you start getting regular micronutrients, cravings go way down, energy goes up, workouts get more productive.

I know there is a lot of good info here, just want to chime in on what has worked for me diet-wise that I dont think is recommended enough.

As someone who is perpetually hungry and can easily out eat a starved bear that's trying to prepare for winter, every time I've focused on cutting things out of my diet, it demotivated me further and never lasts. What always works for me is focusing on adding things in.

I started by adding in vegetables. First thing I eat at my lunch and dinner is 1/2 a bag of those steamable frozen veggies. It sucked at first, then eventually just became normal, now sometimes I eat the entire bag. (Pro tip: garlic salt is 0 calories and jazzes this up big time).

Once I started getting that nailed down I made protein a priority, aiming for 150g protein every day, roughly split between 3 meals (for me, you eat as many meals as helps you stay on track). 150g protein was my consistent goal at 5'10" and ~250lbs. You really don't need a lot, and just setting a moderate minimum goal will take you far. (I have more now, but honestly going from 150g / day to 200g is no noticable difference for me).

From there I started making almost any carbs I ate high in fiber. Beans, oats, potatoes, apples, pears, etc. Minimal amounts of rice (this is not the best fat loss food if you have a high appetite).

I eat ~30-40g of fiber per day now, and I'm still hungry, but not as much. Beans and oats also have a decent amount of protein, if that's something you struggle with. I eat enough beans and oats per day to get me 20-30g protein just from those.

Another thing that took me too long to figure out: nothing has to be, or will be, perfect. Carrots and peas have some calories, but they're still goddamn vegetables, don't let anyone convince you that if your veggies aren't broccoli and spinach that you're messing up. Same thing for protein; chicken, eggs, steak, ham, or tofu, it's all got protein. Pick some that you like. It doesn't matter if eggs have different bioavailability vs tofu, or ham, or whatever the fuck. Sustainability is the important thing for now.
 
@silverflame You have a good job and seem serious about fixing your current situation, I recommend you hire professional help and drop 50lbs in the same time it'd take you to lose 10 lurking on forums and DIY. Nothing wrong about doing your own research, but most people I work with prefer to focus on their respective careers instead of teaching themselves how to become a weight loss specialist. Biased opinion, obviously, but still.
 
@silverflame Well again... I really and sincerely don't enjoy making such self serving comments on Reddit, but I'm the head coach of a virtual personal training service that has been guiding people in muscle building and weight loss for a decade now. We have clients from busy Los Angeles to rural India. Feel free to DM me for details, but I'd rather not get into it too much here, as this is my personal account and I'm mostly using it to lurk on bike repair and gun forums (and some fitness) on my personal time. Feel free to ask fitness questions as well, I don't mind.
 
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