The first
step for healthy weight loss is to create some sort of weight loss plan.
I know that
sounded a little vague, but your weight loss plan does NOT have to be something
that only NASA could understand or approve.
YOUR weight
loss plan should include such simple things as what activities (exercise) you
are going to indulge in, when, where, and so on. You will want to outline your
goals, both long term and short term goals You will definitely need to outline
what your strategy will be for nutrition...notice I DID NOT say
"diet"!
Why have a
formal, or at least semi-formal, weight loss plan?
It has long
been known to those who are successful in business, sports, entertainment,
motivation, and other areas, that one way to improve your chances of success is
to sit down and write out where you are, where you want to be, and how you are
going to get there.
It is easier
to plan for losing weight, or any other goal related activity, if there exists
a clear picture of starting points, ending points, and how you intend to move
from one point to the other. It is very easy to start a weight loss program or
any other activity with intense motivation and a flurry of lofty plans only to
lose site of the objective or to be led down unproductive paths by daily
activities and the blurring effect of time.
Here are a
few tips to consider when putting together YOUR personal weight loss plan:
1. Make your
goals realistic:
Wanting to
weigh what you weighed in high school is, for most of us at least, unrealistic.
Using some movie star's weight or a relative's weight as your goal is also
possibly detrimental to actually accomplishing effective weight loss. Each of
those people arrived at THEIR weight by a combination of genetics, diet, and
exercise which may not apply to you at all!
Most people
do not realize that a healthy weight loss program should, for most people,
result in a weight loss of only a pound or so a week. To many who have been
striving for years to lose weight, this may seem a depressing statement.
However, let me put it in perspective.
I have a
close friend who was so desperate to lose weight that she opted for gastric
bypass surgery. She weighed 340 lbs at the time of the surgery. When the doctor
was briefing her on what to expect, she learned that even with surgical
intervention, she would probably only lose about 70 lbs in her first year. That
works out to 1.35 lbs a week, which would be a healthy weight loss that most
people could achieve through a combination of physical activity and proper
nutrition. The doctor also informed my friend that she would continue to lose
weight over the following years until she reached some new level which would be
determined by genetics, nutrition, and activity. This is the same expectation
that anyone bypassing the bypass and opting for a healthy weight loss program
could expect.
Finally,
unrealistic weight loss goals insure failure, while an average of a pound a
week over a period of a year is relatively easy to attain with motivation and
effort.
2. Do not
focus on weight loss:
I know that
sounds strange since your goal IS weight loss, but it is easy to see failure if
you are only looking for weight loss. For example, people's weight fluctuates
from day to day and even within the day itself. A temporary setback where
weight is regained becomes inflated if viewed against the background of only
weight loss. However, if your goal is to do the things which are going to make
you healthy, for example, then those few days of overeating at Thanksgiving may
be more excusable in your own heart if you know that you have been taking your
walks, or have cut your use of sugar, or are still taking action in some other
form.
This is
something that should be considered in your weight loss plan. How are you going
to make your life better overall? How many ways can you approach "weight
loss"? Do not make it your goal to lose so many pounds this week. Rather,
set a goal to walk so many minutes, lift so many pounds, garden for so many
minutes. That way, even if your weight does not change that much in that period
or even goes in the wrong direction, you still know that your body is
benefiting from the parts of your weight loss plan that you are still in touch
with.
NOTE: People
who begin exercising as part of their weight loss program often experience a
weight GAIN somewhere in the first few weeks of their new exercise experience.
THIS IS PERFECTLY NATURAL! If you have just begun exercising to lose weight and
experience a weight gain, this should be only temporary, and is most commonly
caused by your body adding muscle mass faster than it loses fat.
3. Plan to
go slow:
I don't know
if there is a statistic somewhere that demonstrates how many people drop out of
their weight loss program due to stress, strain, pain, or just plain burnout.
However, I have experienced it myself, I have read about it, and I know people
it has happened to. Sometimes the simplest statements are most true. One that
you will often hear is, "It took years for your body to get this way, and
you cannot change it overnight."
This is so true. Also, take into
consideration that, even though you might not be SEEING significant changes, if
you are taking the steps that you have outlined in your weight loss plan, your
body is adapting inside, in places you cannot see, but it is repairing and
preparing to move to higher levels of fitness and health.
4. Plan to
measure your progress:
I know I
said not to stress so much about the weight loss, but you do need to see what
is going on. You don't have to concentrate exclusively on pounds lost, however.
If you can walk farther this week than you could two or three weeks ago, you
are progressing. Hopefully, in another two weeks, you will be walking farther,
or faster. If, at the start of your weight loss program you could only exercise
for five minutes at a time, and now you can exercise for 15 minutes, that is
progress, isn't it? That's an accomplishment and is something you should be
proud of.
NOTE: One
measurement of progress in a weight loss program is quite simply
"size". Two weeks into a weight loss program, you might actually have
gained weight, for example, as I pointed out a few paragraphs ago. However, if
your clothes are looser, or you need to buy smaller clothes, or friends are
coming up and asking, "Have you lost weight?" these are good signs
that your program is working even if your scales haven't gotten the news yet.
5. Plan to
stay motivated:
One of the
most common obstacles that knock people off their weight loss program is loss
of motivation. The drive and excitement that gets you started is very seldom
still around when you lace up your walking shoes for what seems like the
millionth time and have only lost two lbs.
Including
your reasons for losing weight, the emotional and perhaps physical triggers
that got you started in the first place, as part of your written weight loss
plan gives you a means of reinvigorating your desire to achieve your goals. We
often forget how we felt and what we believed at the start of such a journey,
and being able to pull out the paper and review the dreams and expectations can
bring us back up to that original level, or at least remind us of what we are
enduring this for.
I used to be
an instructor for a major national corporation, and one thing that I and other
instructors would tell our students was, to achieve their goals, they had to,
"plan their work, and work their plan."
Donovan
Baldwin is a Dallas area writer. A graduate of the University Of West Florida
(1973) with a BA in accounting, he is a member of Mensa and has held several
managerial positions. He has written poetry and essays for his own use, and
instructional media in many of the positions he held. After his retirement from
the U. S. Army in 1995, he began writing articles on various subjects for
websites he owned as well as for use by other webmasters. He has a keen
interest in health, fitness, diet, and weight loss and has recently completed
courses on Diet and Nutrition, and Fitness. He has posted a review on a great
way to build
muscle and burn fat.
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