Has cyclical dieting and exercise let you down when it comes to being able to lose weight? For many people, a healthy solution has been found in the keto diet. This type of diet is great for weight loss because the entire goal is to help your body get its energy from your fat stores rather than from glucose. This all starts by following a restrictive diet with lots of healthy fats to help your body go into a natural state known as “ketosis”.

How Does Keto Work?

Ketosis is a normal metabolic state for the body, and it’s the end goal of the keto diet. Ketosis happens when your body doesn’t have the carbohydrates needed to create glucose for energy; to make up for this loss, it converts fat into acids known as ketones. Ketones are created when fat is processed in the liver, and they supply clean energy to all parts of your body, including the brain.

Keto diets were originally formulated for diabetics and those suffering from epilepsy because they reduce blood sugar and insulin levels, but putting your body into ketosis has also been shown to be an extremely efficient way to burn fat. Though it might seem paradoxical because it’s a high-fat diet, it’s all about what your body utilizes for energy. 

It’s also not as restrictive as it sounds! Keto can be highly variable based on your personal goals, your level of commitment, and how new you are to the whole idea of high-fat dieting.

What’s In A Keto Diet?

The creation of ketones instead of glucose is why the keto diet is inherently about cutting carbs from the diet – and when we say “cutting” carbs, we mean cutting carbs. The strictest form of the diet is a structured, individualized plan in which your diet will consist of 90% fat, with around a 4:1 ratio of fats to carbs or protein. The standard percentages go like this: 

• 75% fat
• 20% protein
• 5% carbs

We weren’t kidding around about the need to cut carbs! But it’s not all strict adherence to an incredibly specific diet. If you’re new to keto, a modified version of the diet that’s less restrictive might be a good way to start. You can do one where you consume carbs around your exercise regimen (often referred to as the targeted ketogenic diet), or one that is higher in protein. If you’ve been on a classic keto diet for some time and want to wind it down to a more sustainable diet for the long term, adding more protein is a good way of adjusting.

Why Keto Is Great For More Than Helping Lose Weight!

Keto diets are a natural way of helping your body burn off its fat stores, but they have more advantages than just the weight loss. Keto diets generally have higher protein intakes than your average diet, which works well when trying to shed pounds while also keeping your metabolic health in check. You might also see improved cholesterol and lower blood sugar levels, and balancing these two reduces the risk factors for inflammation and heart disease.

Keto is also fairly easy to stick to! Whatever type of plan you go with, a keto diet will help you lose weight without tracking calories, which is a major obstacle for people trying to stick to certain regimens. Once you know what you can eat, food preparation and dieting becomes a much more positive, much more rewarding experience.