Just like in the tale of the tortoise and the hare, by keeping your goals focused, you will eventually achieve it.
Losing weight is one area where this definitely applies. The one thing most people want is to see results immediately from dieting. This is normal and no one should find fault with this. Human nature is to want things to happen immediately.
If you want to lose weight immediately, you are setting yourself up for failure. This is not to say that you cannot lose a large amount of weight quickly, but the short-term loss is often doubled.
The weight you have gained is not a problem that you can reverse in a matter of a month. The body is adaptable but it takes enough time to change permanently. The changes you make will require time for the body to adapt.
The time it took for humans to start walking upright did not happen overnight. The changes we want to make to the appearance of our bodies is similar to this development. It won’t take centuries for it to happen, but it will take more than a few weeks. Acceptance of this fact will help you in the time it takes to lose weight, and you won’t be discouraged if a few days go by and you don’t lose weight.
Often people believe that the ads they see are designed to sell weight loss products. There are ads everywhere and I’m sure you’ve seen the ones that promote huge amounts of weight loss in a very short time. We want to believe that this can happen, so we buy the product. The only thing we are not thinking about is the result of this loss in our bodies.
For example, to lose 30 pounds in 30 days, you’ll need to burn more than 21,000 calories per week. For every pound of weight we lose, 3,500 calories must be burned by either exercising or dieting. The weight will come off pretty quickly and you’ll be happy to see the results, but it won’t continue. After you lose the first few pounds, you will stop losing weight. When you reduce this number of calories, the body will begin to protect itself and stop burning calories unless absolutely necessary.
Think of it this way; your body is charged with having a certain amount of food and suddenly the supply is cut off. It will rebel because you haven’t given it the gradual amount of time it needs to adjust to this loss of food. This will cause the body to start its self-protection defense mechanism and stop burning calories. This leads to the end of weight loss.
To add to this problem, another will stop the weight loss process. The brain needs 30% of the glucose we consume. This is acquired from what we eat. If you greatly reduce what you are eating, the brain has less glucose. This is what makes you feel exhausted, irritated, and at the end of your rope. These feelings are enough to make you quit any weight program and go back to the old way of eating.
Regular weight loss methods usually don’t work. Do you believe this or not? If not, why do people have so much trouble losing weight? The human body will not allow you to force it to lose weight. The process should be done little by little, allowing your mind and body to not get stressed.
Your weight loss goal should be 2-3 pounds per week. This, your body will accept it without putting up a defense mechanism. Since this is a small amount compared to your total body weight, your body will regulate itself. This doesn’t sound like much, but for those who have lost a lot quickly and then gained it all back, it sounds great.
If you add it up, two pounds a week for a year equals 104 pounds. This may seem like a long time to many, but losing weight this way is doable. If you keep trying fad diets that take a lot out of you and then put them back on, they will stop working. At the end of a year on fad diets, you’ll be no better than when you started.
When you crash diet, you are setting your body up to crash in a short amount of time. By giving your body the right amount of time to adjust to the changes you’re making, and doing it slowly, not only will your body be happy, but so will your mind. Not to mention, the weight you lose will stay. If not, go on crash diets and you’ll keep winning and losing.
