My name is Stavros Mastrogiannis, and I have been in the weight loss field for over 27 years. I specialize in helping people who live in the real world, lose weight in a way that enables them to keep it off, without sacrificing all their free time working out and without giving up all their favorite foods.
The fact is, losing weight and improving your health is a lot easier than how most fitness professionals make it.
I know there are thousands of weight loss experts out there with different opinions on weight loss and health. So, what makes my opinion better than theirs? I think that is a fair question to ask.
Early in my fitness career, I realized I was part of a failing industry. Failing, not because it was not making money, the weight loss industry is making a lot of money. In 1992, the year I got into the weight loss field, in American alone, we spent $30 billion on weight-loss products and services, and our weight as a nation went up that year. Today we are spending over $65 billion per year on weight-loss products and services, and our weight continues to go up as our health continues to deteriorate. That is why I call it a failing industry because it does not deliver what it is supposed to be: weight loss and better health.
I don’t think the industry is failing because fitness professionals don’t care. Yes, there are a lot of fitness professionals who are only in it for the money, but most fitness professionals care and want to help. Unfortunately, they have not been able to make any difference because of how they were taught to approach weight loss and health by their formal education.
The fact that fitness professionals need to realize is that not everything they learned in school or through their professional certifications about weight loss and health is correct.
So, the big question is, how was I able to come up with a sustainable solution to the weight problem, whereas all my fellow fitness professionals failed? I had the same education as other fitness professionals.
You see, most fitness professionals today get their education on fitness, health, and nutrition from a college, university, and professional certification course. There is nothing wrong with formal education; obviously, I got a lot myself. The problem with too much formal education is that sometimes it puts your thinking in a box. In other words, it limits your ability to think with an open mind, and if what you were taught was not 100% accurate, like in the case of fitness and health, you will have a tough time finding the answer that you are looking for.
The one thing that helped me the most in finding a sustainable solution to the weight problem was my ability to think outside the box and think with an open mind. What gave me the ability to think outside the box was my upbringing. You see, unlike most fitness professionals who just studied health and fitness, I lived it firsthand. I was raised on a Greek island, where I was submerged in a very healthy culture. When I lived there, thin was the norm; people in the 90s lived productive lives free from most of the diseases that most older adults suffer and die from in the western world today. When I lived in Greece, I thought cancer was a rare disease, never mind because I did not know anyone who had it, I didn’t even know anyone who knew anyone who had cancer. Other diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson were none existent.
My upbringing caused me to question many of the things I learned in school about proper nutrition and health because they contradicted the way we lived and ate in Greece, and that kept my mind open to other possibilities. The one thing I realized earlier on was that just because something is taught in a University or a college, or because the person who said it had a Ph.D. does not necessarily make it right. We need to question everything we learn, and we need to make sure that what we learned makes sense to us. So, I was questioning everything I was learning and doing a lot of my research. I discovered that many of the things that colleges and universities were teaching their students about proper nutrition and health were completely or partially wrong. Unfortunately, special interest groups have a significant influence over what our colleges and universities teach their students. If that was not bad enough, they also have considerable influence over the government’s dietary recommendations. This is not a conspiracy theory; this is a fact with plenty of evidence to support it and don’t take my word for it. Check out the book “Food Politics” by Marion Nestle. It explains how special interest groups influence governments and schools a lot of proof.
So basically, my upbringing caused me to question many of the things I learned in school and gave me the ability to think outside the box, which led me to the sustainable weight loss solution, which I teach to my clients today.
Another thing I want people to know about me, which helped me better to understand people who want to lose weight and improve their health, but don’t particularly love fitness, is that I am not a fitness nut. I didn’t get into the fitness industry because I loved fitness and exercising. I got into the fitness industry because I hated exercise and loved my junk food, but the fitness professionals and all the fitness books I read to try to get in shape were no help. I felt that they did not understand people like me who don’t love to exercise and don’t love to count calories or watching everything they eat.
Realizing that most people were like me, I saw a real need for a fitness professional who truly understands real people who don’t live to exercise or diet, but they want to exercise and eat right so they can live a long and healthy life.
Although I still don’t love exercising, it’s a habitual behavior that I do without much thought. I don’t spend any time thinking about my diet either because I have made healthy eating a habit. Just for you to know, I still eat my junk food. You don’t need to eat perfectly to lose weight and be healthy; all you have to do is eat healthy most of the time.
I am the owner of Live Your Way Thin LLC, a personal training and coaching facility and the author of 3 books on the subject of sustainable weight loss, including my latest one, “Fat No More”, which is coming out some time in September 2020.