I get this question all the time.
How long is it going to take?
How quickly can I lose weight?
What is the quickest way to lose weight?
This question has a couple of answers.
1. It depends.
Everyone is different.
Sorry.
I know that is not the answer you want but if there was a one size fits all to nutrition then my job would be a lot easier. But there isn’t.
What I do know is that 95% of diets fail after the first year or even sooner.
I know that most people who diet put back on more weight than they lose. So one thing I do know is that although a diet may help you lose weight quickly it almost never leads to sustained weight loss and the side effects of these drastic changes in body weight maybe long lasting, both to your physiology and your psychology.
2. Why do you want to lose weight?
Is it so you feel more confident at work?
Well perhaps you could buy some new clothes that make you feel more confident at the office instead.
Is it so you have more energy to play with your kids?
Perhaps you could focus instead on increasing the number of daily steps you take so you build up the fitness required.
Is there another way to get what you really without even losing any weight?
Could you change the focus to action goals that you can put a defined timeframe on. So perhaps you want to do 20 squats everyday for 30 days and commit to an 80/20 eating regime for a certain time period.
Those are goals you can achieve and feel good about.
Or perhaps your goal could be to do yoga three times a week and eat 5 servings of veggies each day. These are goals you can achieve and feel good about.
Taking the focus off the weight and onto healthy habits that are achievable and you know make you feel good sets you up to win. Especially if you have struggled with dieting in the past you may have some deep unconscious beliefs such as:
- Its my genetics, I’ll never be able to lose weight
- I never follow through anyways
- I can never stick to anything
- I always get sick
Setting yourself up to win by focusing on achievable action goals starts to shift your beliefs from those above to believing that you are someone that can achieve your goals.
That you can follow through on what you have committed to.
Weight loss will just be a welcome side effect of focusing on actions that make you feel good.
To your health,
P.S. Want to learn more about what works instead of dieting? Click here to read my post on How To Lose 10lbs in 4 Weeks Without Dieting.
