6 Tips For A Weight Loss Plan

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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
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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.
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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.
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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
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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. Article Source http//EzineArticles.com/?exp
ertDonovan_Baldwin For Great Weight
Loss Tips Check This Out http//tinyurl.com/truth
aboutabsok