Know your BMI & BMR
To create your new lifestyle, you need to know these two terms, and their numbers:
- Your BMI, or Body Mass Index.
- Your BMR, or Basal Metabolic Rate.
Your BMI is a quick way to tell if your weight is appropriate for your height.
You can use this Body Mass Index calculator to figure yours out.
When I was my heaviest, at 262 pounds, my BMI was 36.5!
A healthy BMI is 18.5 to 24.9, overweight is considered 25 to 29.9, and obese is anything over 30.
Your BMR is basically how much energy your body consumes at rest, as in, if you stayed in bed all day. The BMI is represented by the amount of calories your body needs daily at rest.
You can use this BMR Calculator to figure yours out.
Once you have these two numbers, write them down.
Then go do the calculations for your dream weight (mine is 178 pounds).
- My BMI at 262 pounds: 36.5
- My BMI at 178 pounds: 24.8
- My BMR at 262 pounds: 2348 calories
- My BMR at 178 pounds: 1825 calories
That’s a caloric difference of 543 calories a day, or in terms of one of my favorite candies back in the day – about 53 peanut M&M’s!
(One peanut M&M is about 10 calories.)
Remember though, this BMR number doesn’t account for any activity. You can use the BMR Activity Multiplier to figure your actual calories consumed per day based on how active you are (or aren’t 
).
