Losing weight is challenging. It can be hard to get motivated and stay motivated once you set your goal to lose weight. It takes a lot of will power and discipline, and it doesn’t happen overnight. When I first lost 30 pounds in 3 months, I was super inspired. I had a vision of what losing the weight would look like for me and I was fired up to reach my goal. It’s amazing what you can do when you truly set your mind to do it.
WHY DO YOU WANT TO LOSE WEIGHT?
What will your life look like when you lose the weight? What are you working toward? Really think about your motivations for wanting to lose weight — this is what will help you to stay focused when you are feeling low or want to quit. Your vision should be really meaningful to you because it will most likely take months or even years to reach your goal depending on where you start. Remember, this needs to be a “lifestyle change” not just a quick “diet”. For me, I wanted to feel comfortable in my body again; I wanted to feel like myself. I felt like myself inside, but when I saw that number on the scale or myself in photos, I didn’t recognize that person. My lifestyle change was about me getting back to where I felt my best.
VISUALIZE; ACTUALIZE
Now that you’ve honed in on your true motivations for wanting to lose weight and what it will look like for you when you get there, spend time each day visualizing that life. I changed my phone lock screen to a picture of Hawaii with my goal weight typed over it. Each time I would look at my phone, I would be reminded of my goal. I would see that reminder and it would renew my motivation. When you have your eyes on the prize, you feel that fire to go hard and work toward the goal. It’s easy to cut your calories, eat the right foods, and stick to your exercise routine when you have the end goal in mind. By spending time each day to focus on your goal, you keep your fire and determination alive. Think about your life at your goal weight; how do you feel — getting your mind right is laying the foundation for you to be able to reach your goal.
IT GETS EASIER
When you start your lifestyle change to lose the weight, it may be really difficult because it’s different; your body isn’t used to it yet. But it only takes 21 days to make a habit, so each day that you keep working and sticking to the plan, it gets a little bit easier. Some days may feel harder than others, but the closer you get to that 21st day, the easier it’ll be overall. Not only will it start to feel easier, but you’ll also start to see the results of your efforts on the scale which is extra motivating. Just push through those challenging days; you can do it. Once you get past the initial 21 days, your body will get used to the changes and it won’t be as difficult to continue; it’ll be part of your normal routine.
HOW TO LOSE THE WEIGHT
You’re motivated to lose the weight and ready to start taking action, but what do you need to do? Hit the gym? Eat only salads? Cut carbs? It’s really very simple and I’m so glad it finally clicked for me — all you need to do is eat fewer calories than your body burns. That’s it! But what does that mean? Where do you start?
First, you need to find out how many calories your body burns on its own. Basically your body is burning calories all the time; just to keep you alive. Here is a calculator where you can plug in your age, weight, height, and activity level to get your Total Daily Energy Expenditure (TDEE). The TDEE is the number of calories your body is burning just to keep you alive. My TDEE is 1621 — so each day, my body is burning 1621 calories on its own (no exercise; just me living my normal life). If I eat 1621 calories in a day, I won’t gain or lose any weight because my calories burned cancels it out.
For weight loss, you just need to eat fewer than your TDEE calories. One pound is equal to 3500 calories, so if you want to lose 1 pound per week, you would need to eat 500 fewer calories than your TDEE each day. So for me, I would need to eat 1121 calories a day in order to lose 1 pound by the end of the week. Eating at a calorie deficit is the way that I lost my weight. You don’t need to exercise to lose weight.
Of course, you can choose burn the extra calories through exercise which should have the same weight loss outcome. I could eat all 1621 of my calories in the day and I’ll lose the weight as long as I burn 500 calories by working out every day. In the past, I thought this was the only way to lose weight, but I could never maintain it so it didn’t work for me. It’s way easier for me to manage my food intake in order to lose weight. Exercise is good for your body and has other benefits besides helping with weight loss, so it’s good to do some kind of exercise each week.
DIET AND EXERCISE
If you want to attack your weight loss from both ends, you can create a calorie deficit with your food intake and incorporate exercise. I use MyFitnessPal app to help me log my food and track my exercise so I can see my progress each day. I use a food scale to weigh my food which helps me to be the most accurate when logging my food in the app. My Fitbit can sync with MyFitnessPal to track my exercise. I don’t trust the accuracy of the Fitbit in terms of how many calories I burned, so I don’t really track that. The Fitbit is more of a motivational tool for me, but the real key to losing weight is to be consistent — take each day as it comes. If you have a bad day and mess up, don’t quit — start again and keep pushing yourself until you reach your goal.
EXERCISE MOTIVATION
If you are incorporating exercise into your weight loss plan, it can be challenging to stay motivated. Find exercises that are fun for you — maybe you like yoga, cycling, playing basketball, running, or swimming. Do something that you enjoy. Create a Spotify playlist to get you pumped for your workout, or wear a cute workout outfit that you feel good in.
You already know that I enjoy running on my treadmill, but lately I have been wearing the chest monitor that I got with it and it’s really helped me to keep my heart rate in the cardio zone. This is a good motivation for me to see my progress with how far/fast I can run and how my heart is getting conditioned.
I also bought a few workout items from Target to help me feel good during/after my runs.
1. It’s more motivating for me to have a few cute pieces when I am working out or after my run is over. When you put effort into yourself and how you look, I think you feel better about yourself.
Remember, consistency is key in your weight loss journey. Don’t give up! There’s still time in the year to reach your goals. You can do it!
