First attempt at cutting, motivation and planning...

[inclue]

Quick background- I'm almost 27 lifting on and off since highschool and consistently for about 5 years. I'm 235-ish lbs and my natural weight is 175ish. I have a pretty good metabolism and I normally eat pretty decent, hardly do candy/soda/other crap. I don't know exact body fat, never had a really good way to test it or bothered, but my top 4 abs are usually faintly visible for an idea.

My thing is, the idea of a true cutting/bodybuilding diet is a terrible mental brick wall. So how do you guys who don't enjoy eating baked chicken breast (don't get me wrong I love chicken) for every meal do it? And what do you like to throw into your diet that makes it enjoyable at the same time?

I'm aiming to slowly cut throughout the summer and hit my peak around July, my worries are that I won't be able to maintain alot of my size and strength, or just stick with the diet. Right now I've narrowed my diet to about 3500 cal and 280 grams of protein on average.

Do you think given my weight/body type stats that my calorie intake is on track? To little to maintain?
How do you find that perfect balance to hold your size/strength (I know some will be lost) but lose the fat?

 

[rmonks]

Good luck with your diet..the best solution may be to get help of nutritionist...Highly recommend 3J he has worked with many of us on this site and I havent seen anyone unhappy with him including myself..Its going to be very tough to guess if your cals are right without knowing your height and bf% but I am 6' 200lb and I am eating 3500cal to gain 2lb per week...the varieties of proteins on your diet are almost unlimited with the exception of no pork or fatty beef although some can get away with small amounts of that. I know 3J can put diets together to help maintain as much muscle as possible...up to you good luck either way!

 

[inclue]

Oh ya I guess my height would help, I'm about 6'. 3500 cal at this point has actually help me drop some weight, I would guess my BF% to be around 13-15 but like I said I haven't actually taken my % in a long time and I don't know how accurate it was then. What have you found to be the most accurate way that is able to be obtained by the average person?

I'll have to look into getting ahold of 3J, obviously I am a new guy to the forums and I don't want to be a bother.