| SETTING
WEIGHT LOSS GOALS |
 A
major dilemma in dieting is setting goals for yourself. Knowing how to set
them and how to keep track of progress and the attaining of them is crucial
to success in dieting. Setting goals can be very deceiving too. The overall
concept is tricky for most, since the first thing that comes to mind when
people try to do it is "lose weight". Although your first response
might be that this is indeed your overall goal, it is very far from an actual
"goal".
Fitness goals need to be precise. They cannot be vague concepts or ideas,
these types of goals should just be considered as overall drivers for changes
you make to your lifestyle. Knowing that you'd like to lose weight and become
more active are great for a start, but you'll never know where you stand in
relation to these goals, and you'll have little to keep you motivated on your
journey.
Your goals need to have identifiable parameters that you can measure and meet
on a regular basis. If you spend your whole time working towards a goal that
you cannot see, you'll have a very easy time to lose focus and determination
to reach your destination. Being able to reach your targets is a major boost
in confidence and motivation, and keeps you steamrolling to your goals.
The smaller the increment for each goal, the more motivated you will become
as each goal is reached. Also, the harder you work to reach them, the easier
they will come. Motivation is a wheel that you need to get turning, but once
it is moving it will keep on rolling. Setting goals that permit you to succeed
will keep that wheel spinning at top speed.
Another major aspect to setting weight loss goals is choosing how much to aim
for. Obviously, you cannot just aim to lose 40 pounds in a month, or to drop
5 dress sizes in 6 weeks. Your goals have to be realistic, but also take into
account the reality of weight loss. Your body is designed to lose only so much
weight at a time. Fad diets that allow users to lose 15 pounds in 2 weeks force
your body to dump weight that is made up of water, or other substances that
when lost will make you unhealthy. These weight losses will be regained the
moment you step off the diet, which make them futile and not worth beginning.
The limit to weight loss clocks in at about 1-2 pounds per week, maximum. Anything
more than that will be regained over time, as your body's mechanisms will treat
greater losses as a famine and will attempt to regain the stored energy in the
form of fat.
Therefore, your goals for weight loss should never be more than 2 pounds per
week, but to be safe you should allow only 1 pound per week, but make it over
a span of at least a month, allowing for any "off" weeks that could
set you back from reaching the target. A good idea is to lose 10 pounds over
2 months, or something around that area. This can be accomplished by eating
250 calories a day less and adding 250 calories burned to your daily expenditures.
This permits your body to lose the weight gradually and acceptably, at a rate
of 1 pound per week.
When setting goals for yourself, you must also include rewards for achieving
certain milestones. These should be small tokens of your personal gratitude
for sticking with your program for a certain amount of time. This is not to
say that you should eat a cake every week to celebrate not eating sweets all
week, as you do not want to take 1 step back for every 2 steps forward. Rewards
should be small things that allow you whatever pleasure you've been denying
yourself, to provide that extra boost you may need as time goes by. Give yourself
one piece of cake, or allow a weekend off from the gym, anything that can be
kept within reason and does not ruin all your hard work.
A great trick for helping yourself on the path to your goals is to have a buddy
on which you can rely. This person should have the same drive to reach about
the same goals, or at least have a strong enough interest in you reaching your
goals to make them want to be available for you 24/7 in regards to your weight
loss. Whether it's a person that wants to accompany you to the gym 3-4 times
a week, that can keep you running that extra 5 minutes on the treadmill; or
if it's a person you can call at midnight when you're driving past a McDonald's
drive through craving a Big Mac and need someone to remind you why you don't
want to give in.
Take all of this advice into account when planning your goals, and you should
be well on your way to reaching them. It is no easy task to lose weight and
keep it off, and to stay healthy. But with a little work and some well thought
out goals and rewards, you can certainly get there.
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