How Does the Keto Diet Work?

There are so many diets developed and recommended by nutritionists, doctors and fitness coaches to achieve your goals – whether it is general health improvements, fat loss or muscle gain. Detailed information about such diets are now available to everybody everywhere – in magazines, in programs offered by your local gym, in your doctors’ cabinet and all over the internet, of course. Every person who wants to adopt a new diet and eat better and healthier food for their bodies can easily access this information in just a second by searching on google.

According to Mr. Keto, the ketogenic diet is one of the diets that manages not only to help your body lose fat faster, but also improve your overall health and help you gain muscle in a healthy and safe way.

Why certain foods are so important to your body?

Now, we all know that the key to success in your fitness goals is defined 20% by exercising regularly and 80% by a healthy diet. So, if you want to have toned and strong muscles – you must increase the intake of protein daily, and if you want to see a decrease in your body fat percentage – you must decrease the intake of carbohydrates.

Proteins are essential to your muscle growth, and every time you hit the gym and workout in the beast mode – the micro tissue of your muscles will literally “break” – hence you feel muscle soreness – and for your muscles to restore faster, a higher intake of protein is recommended.

Carbohydrates, on the other hand, are essential for your body to maintain a relatively high energy level. Theoretically, this is their main role in your body as they contain many calories – so when the intake of carbohydrates is transformed to energy which is not fully used during the day, it is stored in your body as fat. Therefore, the lower is the level of carbohydrates in your diet – the more fat you will be able to “burn”.

What is the Keto Diet?

“Keto” is the short term for “Ketogenic”, and its aim is to change the way your body burns fat. The diet itself consists of a long meal routine, including mainly natural, non-processed foods containing low levels of carbohydrates and high levels of natural healthy fats. The amount of nutrients needed in this diet has the rate of around only 5% carbohydrates, 70% of fat and approximately 25% of protein.

Some examples of these foods are: low-carb vegetables (broccoli, avocado, etc.), seeds (Chia seeds for example), nuts (almonds, walnuts, etc.) and natural oils (coconut oil, extra virgin olive oil, etc.) People who manage to follow this diet for long periods (minimum 1 month) manage to make their bodies concentrate on transforming their own stored body fat into energy.

Ketogenic Diet: The process explained

Most of the people think that, the more fat you eat – the more fat you gain. But we should look at the two sides of the coin in this case. Yes, if your fat intake comes mainly from French fries cooked in a lot of oil – then your body will store it around your stomach really quick. But if you get fat from GMO-free natural foods like fresh avocado or raw almonds – it will only improve your health. It means that if you eat the right foods rich in fat, but with a lack of carbs you will be able to burn the fats already stored in your body in a much faster, healthier and more efficient way.

Why it is recommended and what are the benefits?

The result of this diet sounds almost like magic, as besides helping you lose fat much faster than in other diets, it is also proved by the scientists to have a great influence on your overall health.

Some of the benefits you get are the following:

• Improves brain concentration for longer periods of time and reduces tiredness (due to a high amount of healthy fats from foods such as seeds, dark chocolate or nuts)
• Helps the body digest the food easier and faster, preventing bloating and intestinal problems (due to a high amount of fiber found in low-carb vegetables recommended in the diet and the lack of GMO or processed foods)
• Increases your energy levels (because of the high intake of natural fats and proteins)
• Reduces the recovery time of the body provoked by muscle soreness (due to a high amount of proteins that help your muscles restore faster and grow stronger)
• Keeps you away from diseases such as hyperglycemia, diabetes, skin infections, etc. (as the diet reduces the level of glucose in the blood)
• Improves your overall mood and sleep (also due to lower blood sugar levels because of the low-carb intake)

As a conclusion, the ketogenic diet is a safe and healthy diet that works for most of the people. Adopting such a “keto lifestyle” might be difficult and require a lot of ambition (everyone loves French fries!) – but it’s just like working out: you need to be consistent, organized and always focus on your main goals.

Therefore, if you want to lose fat in a fast and healthy way while gaining more muscle and improving your health – this diet could be just right for you. It seems to be a way to “re educate” your body and set it to the beast mode – where it has to actually use the energy (fat) it stored for such a long time and trust that you will give it a good portion of healthy fats regularly. It is about ignoring temptations and starting to give your body what it actually needs: healthy, natural foods with a lot of fat, proteins and little carbs.

The diet is meant to improve your overall health and help you be less stressed; have a better performance whether you’re in the gym or at work; focus better; sleep better and generally feel better. At the end of the day, our bodies are going to be our homes for the rest of our life – so why not do our best and feed it correctly? The human body is brilliant – so let’s give it what it deserves!