It is a wonderful feeling to realize that if you lie flat on your back all day and watch the world go by, your body burns up some 1,700 calories worth of energy just to keep alive. Add to this another 800 calories for the energy expended in sitting, walking, playing, and washing dishes or thinking seven or eight hours at an office desk, and you have a grand total of 2,500 calories that you must take each day in the form of food merely to keep your weight stationary. These figures apply if you weigh about 160 pounds.
Now suppose, after you have eaten your 2,500-calorie quota, you spy a solitary doughnut left over on the dessert plate. Its loneliness touches you; unless it is eaten it is going to be thrown out with the coffee grounds and cantaloupe rinds. Sheer waste! So you eat it?
That single doughnut is a treacherous, subversive influence. It packs a 200-calorie punch. It boosts your daily calorie intake 200 degrees above par, for a total of 2,700. It is these extra calories you don't need that keep you from getting slim.
Actually, not every calorie in this case of the superfluous doughnut is laid down in you as fat. Because of the stimulating effect of food itself, and through other regulatory means that nobody understands very well, you are usually able to handle a small portion of those surplus calories in your stride.
In practical terms, however, a daily intake of 200 to 300 calories in excess of needs results in a weight increase of 8 to 10 pounds a year. Only 3/5ths of a pound a year is considered allowable; at least that is the usual annual weight increase of normal persons as they grow older. One investigator with a diabolically mathematical turn of mind has calculated that one extra pat of butter a day beyond one's needs will add 165 pounds to one's weight in twenty years.
When you eat more food than you need, it is possible to take extra exercise to prevent its turning into fat. But we might as well be honest with ourselves. It takes more exercise than we think. For instance:
If you consume the above, the additional exercise maintenance requirements needed to burn up these surplus calories would be :
a.One doughnut (200 CALORIES) - Conduct an orchestra for 135 minutes
b.One ice cream cone (150 CALORIES) - Wash dishes for 135 minutes
c.One marshmallow (20 CALORIES) - Write for 60 minutes
d.One chocolate nut caramel (80 CALORIES) - Type for 90 minutes
If you consume the above - the additional exercise maintenance requirements needed to burn up these calories surplus calories would require you to:
e.Two dates (56 CALORIES) - Read aloud 120 minutes
f.One peanut bar (350 CALORIES) - Wash clothes for 180 minutes
g.One ice cream soda (400 CALORIES) - Saw wood for 55 minutes
h.One fig bar (60 CALORIES) - Ironing for 60 minutes
i.One wedge of pumpkin pie (360 CALORIES) - Swim for 135 minutes
j.One vanilla wafer (23 CALORIES) - Sew for 60 minutes
k.Two Brazil nuts (90 CALORIES) - Walk slowly for 45 minutes
l.One serving poultry stuffing (275 CALORIES) - Sweep the floors for 150 minutes
m.One tablespoon thick gravy (50 CALORIES) - Knit for 90 minutes
n.One bottle (12 oz.) soft drink (120 CALORIES) - Play the violin for 150 minutes
Pretty somber, isn't it? Each horrendous pound of fat stored on your person represents about 4,000 calories, and to use these up you would have to climb stairs for nearly four hours. That is why, although exercise is a splendid accessory, it is not practical as a sole method of reducing. Or are you tougher than we think?
