It’s not that hard to lose weight, in fact it’s a guaranteed process. So, if you’ve noticed that your “love handles” aren’t quite as lovable as it used to be – and you want to get rid of them – you’ve come to the right place.
Diet and exercise, diet and exercise, diet and exercise. We’ve all heard it over and over again. It’s no deep dark secret that that’s how you lose weight. That’s not the problem, keeping motivated is! Good news, by keeping a simple graph of your weight loss successes, it’s a whole lot easier to stay motivated.
Keeping a simple, basic graph of your weight loss success will go a long way toward keeping you excited and on track. You start your chart at 100% of your total weight and as you start to see your percentage of weight loss line going up and up, it gets downright thrilling.
Your percentage of weight loss is calculated like this: first you need two numbers, you need your beginning weight and you need your current weight. Your first high-tech calculation is to subtract your current weight from the beginning weight. The answer is the total number of pounds lost to date. Then, you divide that number by the beginning weight. And finally, you multiply by 100. Here is an example…suppose you started at 200 pounds and you are now at 190. 200 -190 equals 10. You’ve lost 10 pounds. Divide that by your beginning 200. So, that would be 10 divided by 200 equals 0.05. multiply 0.05 times 100 and you have 5 percent of total body weight lost so far! Easy isn’t it?
If that seems confusing to you, re read the paragraph and follow along with the calculator it really is pretty simple.
Select a certain day of the week and a certain time of day and weigh yourself at that time every week. Then, calculate the total weight loss and add it to your chart. As you see the line going up it will go a long way toward keeping you motivated.
Note: our bodies fluctuate up and down in weight fairly radically throughout the day – so try to choose the same time of day for each weighing session. Also, our weight fluctuates on a day by day basis so don’t do this everyday. It can be discouraging. Save it for a once a week thrill.
Clearly to lose weight you want to eat fewer calories than your body burns, but you don’t want to go overboard. That can be very unhealthy and mess up your metabolism big time. Create a diet where you will lose approximately 2-5 pounds per week.
3500 is the magic number. That’s the number of calories you need to burn to lose 1 pound. Or, on the other side of it, that’s the number of EXTRA calories you have to take in to gain 1 pound. So to lose 1 pound in 10 days all you have to do is burn off an extra 350 calories per day. (It can be a little more involved, but as a rule of thumb this is true.)
Do enough dieting and exercising to burn off an extra 2500 calories per day, and you will lose 5 pounds a week. Burning off an extra 1000 calories per day will generate a 2 pound loss. To be safe, your diet should fall somewhere within those two extremes.
Never ever risk your health just to lose weight. It varies a little depending on your fitness and activity levels, but for men you should always stay above 1600 calories per day, and for women above 1200. Your body has to have a certain number of calories just to maintain and if you go too low you are asking for trouble.
At first, it may make you feel a little silly, but get some of those little gold stars and reward yourself with one every time you meet your goals for the week. Put it right on your graph. Start your graph today and you will soon realize how much fun it can be.