Calories don't matter right? But they do, way more than you think. An average human should consume about 2,500 calories per day. If you stay consistent with those calories your whole life you will not gain or lose weight unless you are doing cardio to burn calories or if you are lifting weights which will help speed up your metabolism while growing your muscle and burning calories as well. To burn off a pound of fat you must burn 3,000 calories. Most of the time this takes about a week and a half to do so.