How to Vary Caloric Intake

While counting calories has long had its place in weight loss programs, caloric variation, also known as calorie shifting, has put a new spin on this old standby. Because your body acclimates to the number of calories you ingest, if you continue to ingest the same number of calories each day, your metabolism adjusts and your weight can plateau. However, varying the number of calories you eat each day can keep your metabolism in top shape.

Things You'll Need

• Calorie counter

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Instructions

• 1

  Determine how many calories you need each day to achieve your goals, whether you want to maintain your weight or lower it. An online calorie calculator like the one found at the American Cancer Society's web site can make this calculation relatively easy.

• 2

  Multiple this number by 7 so you know how many calories you should eat each week. When you use the calorie shifting method, you keep the number of calories you consume per week the same; you just vary your daily caloric amount.

• 3

  Chart the number of calories you need to consume daily to meet your weekly caloric allotment. The healthiest way to do this is to vary the number of calories you consume by 100 to 200 calories each day. For example, on the first day, you might eat 2,000 calories, the second day 2,100 calories and the third day 1,900 calories.

• 4

  Check your numbers to make sure your daily calorie consumption from Step 3 adds up to the weekly allotment you calculated in Step 2.

• 5

  Stick with your calorie allotment each day. Because you're not varying your calories very much, every calorie you consume will make a difference. When varying your caloric intake in this way, it's easiest to plan ahead and know exactly what you'll be eating throughout each day.