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Friday 28 November 2008

One Truth of Successful Weight Loss and Fitness

Weight Loss Advices
One Truth of Successful
Weight Loss and Fitness


Consistency is Key

We’ve already learned there are no shortcuts. We know that long term lifestyle changes are necessary for reaching our fitness goals. Do you know where most people fail in reaching their goals? How many businesses fail because the owners just didn’t stick it out long enough? How many people fail at achieving long term health because they stopped just a little too soon? Just about everybody.

You see the big payoffs come a little farther out than we expect. In business, the
learning curve is longer than we expect. What we think will happen in a year or two takes five. The typical business fails in less than five years, so most never really realize getting to that point of success. In fitness, what we really expect to see in eight weeks will probably come in twelve (if we are realistic). But because the typical person usually gets frustrated and quits in eight, they never see those benefits. They then assume the program doesn’t work.

A lot of the programs that satisfy this mentality are not good programs long term. They have quick short term effects which fool you into thinking they are good programs. Low carb diets, for example, can result in some immediate weight loss. However much of this is water loss and muscle loss. Long term these can have some serious health risks. Since they had some immediate results, people tend to continue to believe in them even though they don’t see those results continue long term.

You need to develop a long term benefit mentality. This mentality can be seen in
many cultures outside of our own. Many Asian cultures tend to plan business
expenditures over generations. They look at the effects of their actions many
years in the future. They are successful because of this. Think of everything you do long term. What kind of health am I going to be in one year from now, a decade from now, in my eighties?

Forget next week, it won’t be much different than this week.

Don’t use the scale too much. On a daily basis it’s not that important and can be very misleading. This will lead to failure. Use it on a monthly basis, not daily. Pay attention to other indicators more than the scale: measuring waist size; how your clothes fit; body fat analysis. These can be far better indicators than the
scale.

Set your mind to be consistent in your diet and your training.

However, the idea of never having a cheesecake again can lead to failure just as fast as having cheesecake too often. Set goals and give yourself some cheat days. That way if you really crave that piece of cheesecake, you can tell yourself you’ll have some on Sunday. I guarantee it will taste twice as good then.

I’ve avoided some pretty bad habits by putting that gratification off rather than saying I’ll never have it again. Mentally it’s much easier.

Set your goals to eat healthy and exercise six days a week. Then give yourself one day to eat junk. (You’ll probably be satisfied with less junk if you’ve been good all week). If six days is too hard make it five (or whatever you can handle) and change your goals later. Use this process and your chances of success are going to be very good.

Don’t hit it too hard at first. You’ll burn yourself out fast and you’ll never develop good habits. Ease into good habits and you’ll accept them. Developing good habits over time will ensure success; trying to change too fast will ensure failure.

When setting weight loss goals always keep this in mind: How long did it take to put that weight on? Getting it off is going to be different for different people, but it is going to be relative also to old long term habits.



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