Why Weight Gain and Weight Loss Are the Same Problem

What the body is actually responding to when it builds, sheds, or resists change

On the same call, I was asked two questions that sat at opposite ends of the spectrum.

One person wanted to gain weight.
Another wanted to lose a significant amount of it.

On the surface, those goals couldn’t look more different.
But underneath, they came from the same place.

A body trying to remember how to work.

What follows is how I answered both.

How to Gain Weight Without Fighting Your Body

The body exists to move.

Life that move have bodies with legs.
Life that doesn’t move are plants.
Brains also exist in things that move.

So when someone tells me they can’t gain weight, I’m not thinking about calories first. I’m listening for something else.

Is the body being given a reason to build?

Movement is the primary signal for growth.
Food supports the process.
Movement initiates it.

When you move with intention, especially through the legs, you increase circulation. You load the bones. You stress the joints and muscles in a way the body recognizes as useful.

That stress is not damage.
It’s instruction.

It says, build tissue here.

I’ve watched people move from fragile, underweight frames into healthy, grounded bodies. Not by forcing food down, but by restoring movement that made nourishment matter.

Energy comes first.
Then movement.
Then mass.

This is why things that increase vigor and motivation matter so much. When energy rises, the body wants to move. When the body moves, it adapts.

One of the biggest mistakes I see, especially in younger men, is mistaking repetition for growth.

Machines.
Slow, controlled reps.
The same angles, week after week.

That builds tension.
Not resilience.

Real growth depends on fascia.

Fascia isn’t a wrapper around muscle.
It’s a living, spiraled structure that begins at the bone.

If the body stays tight, the fascia can’t expand. And if fascia can’t expand, muscle has nowhere to go.

This is why mobility isn’t optional.

You cannot just lift forever.

Twisting matters.
Range matters.
Speed matters.

Explosive movement matters.

Throwing.
Jumping.
Carrying awkward weight.

Strongman-style work does something machines never will.

Pick up a rock.
Carry it uphill.
Bear crawl backward uphill.
Dig a hole. Chop Wood.

That kind of work adds real mass.
Functional mass.

And one more thing people often resist hearing.

Leanness makes you look bigger.

Contrast creates presence.

You don’t need excess weight to look strong.
You need alignment.

Also, time matters.

Five to ten pounds a year is normal.
That compounds.

I was once much lighter than I am now.
I gained weight slowly, steadily, and it stayed.

If you’re young, like the 17 year old young man asking me, relax.
Your body is still building itself.

Let it.

How to Lose Weight Without Destroying Yourself

This question carries more emotional weight.

Because most people start with a number that doesn’t actually belong to their body anymore.

If you’ve carried extra weight for years, you didn’t just carry fat.
You carried load.

Load changes structure.

Bone density increases.
Muscle adapts.
The frame becomes something new.

Trying to return to a teenage weight after decades often isn’t health. It’s nostalgia.

A healthier body doesn’t always look smaller in the way people expect.
Sometimes it looks denser.
More stable.

For many people, the real transformation isn’t an old smaller weight.
It’s a new baseline.

Here’s where people get lost.

They fixate on the scale.

I’ve said this for decades.

Throw it away.

The scale creates obsession, not awareness.

Muscle weighs more than fat.
Inflammation has weight.
Water has weight.

As the body heals, the mirror changes before the number does.
Sometimes the number barely moves at all.

That doesn’t mean nothing is happening.
It means the body is reorganizing itself.

Another truth that surprises people.

Isolation can kill consistency. Especially if you have struggled with it in the past.

Working out alone in a garage is easy to abandon.
Showing up where people expect you is not.

Find a place.
Find a group.
Find a rhythm.

That’s when identity shifts.

You stop trying to lose weight.
You start living as a healthy person.

From there, the body follows.

As for exercise, simple beats intense.

Sustained movement matters more than effort.

Walking.
Yoga.
Hiking.
Games.
Anything that keeps you moving without resentment.

Bicep curls won’t save you.
Presence will.

Stress matters too.

What you resist persists.

If you’re gripping the outcome, watching the clock, measuring every fluctuation, the process slows down.

Release the number.
Do the behaviors because they feel right.
Let time work.

Two years will pass either way.

One version of you will be more mobile, grounded, and alive.
The other will still be negotiating with a scale.

The body remembers what it is, when we stop interfering.

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