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Anecdotally, I think this underestimates the impact of physical activity. It's much easier to lose weight when I'm physically active. I suspect that this is part of the bodies conditioning response.

Too much fat, particularly fat above the bodies carrying capacity - leads to steep declines in athletic performance. If you suddenly need to shed heat for regular high intensity aerobic work, or pull yourself up a mountain - then its in your bodies best interest to lose the excess weight (up to a point). Our bodies seem to be extremely good at maintaining homeostasis in different conditions, why would body fat percentage be any different?

> I count kcals and exercising for years now. My simple best advise: eating is 80-90% of the deal

Exactly this. A climb up the local hill with my MTB taxes me for 1000kcal. Skipping three beers after amounts for the same amount of energy, and is way easier to achieve

> count your kcal for one month

Bingo. When I was much younger I was super skinny. I was weight lifting, but simply not gaining weight. I thought I ate a lot, and decided to start tracking. I barely ate anything. Even as a kid I hated to stop doing whatever it was I was doing and taking time to eat. That spilled over into adult life. But, once I saw numbers it became clear and I was finally able to adjust.

Humans are generally terrible at estimations like this. I suggest tracking anything that you think may be a negative in your life.

I wouldn't say that cutting 500 calories a day is tough. I cut out breakfast recently and I was only really hungry for the first 3-4 days and only for a couple of hours each day. Thereafter I didn't even think of eating in the morning. Lost 3 kilos in about a month. I am going to the gym daily and also go for runs outside.

> If I manage to get a negative kcal of more than 500kcal a day, this is very tough to take. Your body revolts. It takes a lot of discipline to go with -500kcal for a couple of days in a row.

And -500kcal per day is only 1 pound of weight lost per week.

Gaining weight is easy. Losing weight is very rough.

> Losing weight is very rough.

As someone who went from 105kg to 75kg, I wouldn't describe the process as "rough". It took a series of small, sustainable changes to activity levels and diet over an extended period of time.

At no point did I feel like I was forcing myself to do stuff I didn't want to or was depriving myself of anything.

Couldn't be happier with the results (with how I feel, with the various active pursuits that are now part of my life etc).

> And -500kcal per day is only 1 pound of weight lost per week.

So 500kcal per day is only 1 pound gained per week? Sounds like gaining weight is a lot of work! Basically you have to eat 5 large meals for just a single pound? At that rate it will take years of work to go from healthy to obese!

While 500kcal is a good meal (by no means large), it's also less than a 100 gram chocolate bar which I can devour in about 25 seconds. Most of the problem nowadays it that a lot of food is of EXTREME caloric density.

> Gaining weight is easy. Losing weight is very rough.

For many, this is not true. My normal activity levels and eating tendencies make gaining weight quite hard for me.