Weight Loss is Hard

You’re not the first person to wonder why it's so hard to lose weight.

The truth is many people struggle with weight loss. Sometimes what you really need is a change of approach, or the inspiration of others.

The problem is that weight loss is supposed to be easy especially when you look at the number of commercials that are selling a certain piece of equipment, a magic pill, or a new and improved diet. 

Of course, in the real world, it doesn’t work this way. It takes time to gain weight and time to lose it.

Yes, the concept is simple. Eat fewer calories than your body needs, and you’ll lose the weight. But, as you and I both know, it’s never as simple as that.

The Problem With the Body's Ability to Adapt

The human body is one impressive piece of machinery. Hundreds of complex chemical reactions happen inside your body everyday.

But what's even more impressive is that the body is great at adapting to the situation in hand, no matter how complex it is.

Adaption is part of the reason you gain weight and then struggle to lose it.

You’ve probably heard of insulin and thought diabetes.

Insulin does much more than just controlling sugar levels in your body.

When you consume sugar and carbs, your body produces insulin. This converts the carbs into energy, and any excess is converted into fat and stored. Hence, eating more calories than you need leads to weight gain.

As your body becomes accustomed to the cycle of storing fat, it adapts even more.

Your muscles become less capable of burning excess calories, effectively becoming insulin resistant.

This encourages fat storage. The blood sugar has to be converted into something to keep it in the right range.

You’ll still get hungry and eat more, increasing the resistance and filling your fat cells up even more.

When you’re ready to start dieting your body will still deal with blood sugar in the same way, your muscles won’t get enough extra energy to justify huge leaps in activity levels, and your body will still be busy converting blood sugar to fat.

That’s why building a habit is so important. It takes time for your body to adapt back and convert the blood sugar into energy for your muscles to burn.

With the right approach, you won’t just lose weight; you’ll be able to keep it off for good.

All you need to do is ask the right questions.

Are You Eating Healthily?

Processed foods are high in sugars and other chemicals. These will encourage you to consume too many calories.

The best way to actually start losing weight is to change your eating habits.

Drop the processed foods, focus on simple meals, try the perfect plate approach, and shrink your plate to reduce portion sizes.

You can even prepare your food in advance.

Are You Eating Too Often?

It’s easy to get into a habit of having breakfast, a mid-morning snack, some lunch, a mid-afternoon snack, an evening meal, and maybe even another snack whilst watching TV.

However, if you adjust your eating habits or simply change them occasionally, you may find that it can make a huge difference to your weight loss achievements.

How Intense are Your Workouts?

If you haven’t exercised in a long time, then any form of exercise is going to help you burn more calories and lose weight.

It doesn’t matter if you’re walking the dog or just climbing the stairs ten times a day.

However, once your fitness level starts to improve, you need to focus on short bursts of high-intensity training.

But, intense exercise does place your cardiovascular system under greater stress and is likely to increase the risk of injury.

Therefore, it is a good idea to hit start hitting the weights.

There are two benefits to adding muscle-building exercises into your weekly routine:

Increases Variety

Doing the same exercise every day is quickly going to become tedious, which will make it harder to keep doing it and reduce the effectiveness of it.

By adding muscle building exercises, you can keep the variety which will help you to stay motivated.

Muscle Burns More Calories

Building muscle is also a good idea because muscle burns more calories than fat when at rest. This means that building muscle will help you to lose weight, even when you’re not exercising.

Have You Got the Right Attitude?

According to science, you need to eat fewer calories than your body needs. This will help you to lose weight.

While this is true, you also need to make sure you have the right attitude.

Adopt the wrong diet, and it can seem like an uphill struggle, which makes it very tempting to break the diet. Of course, once you’ve broken it once you’re likely to do it again.

The trick is to find more reasons to be healthy. It might be to run with your children, to be healthy enough to skydive when you’re 80, or perhaps simply to be around to embarrass your kids in 40 years or more.

Once you have your reasons, you simply need to record every success you have, no matter how small.

This will inspire you to keep going and actually enjoy your new lifestyle.

You don’t need a diet; you need a healthier lifestyle.

Sustainability will ensure that you continue to lose weight and feel great.

How Healthy is Your Daily Routine?

Have you ever considered your current routine?

What time do you sit down and collapse in front of the television?

Do you often grab lunch on the go because you haven’t had time to prepare it?

Record your activities for a week, and you’ll quickly see which patterns are unhealthy and need to be changed.

You can then focus on reallocating your free time to make it more productive and less about sitting around.

You’ll be surprised at how little you really need to watch TV!

Routines and habits are things that we do without thinking or asking why we do these things.

Start slow, such as dropping your television time by 30 minutes and taking a walk instead.

You’ll be surprised by how much difference this can make and how quickly you can develop healthier routines.

Do You Have the Right Goals?

Reaching a goal is an essential part of your weight loss journey. Each goal post will encourage you to lose more weight.

For this reason, you need to set short term goals that are achievable.

Of course, long term goals can then be achieved naturally simply by achieving your short term goals.

Don’t forget, weight loss is different for everyone and your goals may not be the same as your best friend or someone else trying to lose weight.

Set the goals that suit you, and you’ll be inspired as you reach each one.

But don’t reward yourself with a sweet treat as this may undo your hard work!