What Not to do if You Want to Lose Weight

Nearly everyone you speak to wants to lose weight. This is not to say that they are necessarily obese or seriously overweight – but just that most of us are less active than we should be and possibly overindulge on the sweeter things in life.

But if so many people want to lose weight, why are so many of us still not in the shape that we would really like to be?

The answer comes down to a number of very common mistakes that tend to hamper our performance. In this post, I’m going to break down a number of those mistakes and demonstrate which behaviors you should look to change in order to make your next diet successful.

Be Overly Ambitious

One of the biggest mistakes that we will often make when trying to lose weight is to be overly ambitious in terms of our diet plan and our exercise.

A common example of this might be planning to exercise 5 times a week for an hour at a time. This is a big mistake because it is unsustainable. Even if it works for the first few weeks, the reality is that it is going to eventually become too much at which point you’ll return to your old shape.

When looking at any diet plan, ask yourself whether it’s something you can realistically do forever. If not… what’s the point?

Forget Drink, Butter and Others

Another common mistake is to overlook the role that certain less obvious things have in your diet. That is to say that it is easy to remember to eat the right dinner or to avoid cake… but less obvious things like soda drinks, butter on your sandwiches and more can all also have similarly disastrous effects.

Wait

When I speak to people who want to lose weight, they will often tell me that they’re planning to use a certain diet plan or a certain exercise regime but that they’re waiting until life is less busy, until they have bought a fully-written training program from a fitness guru etc.

The point is that losing weight is really not complicated. There are some methods that are more effective than others but ultimately, as long as you are eating a little less and exercising a little more, you will begin to improve.

If you want to lose weight and you haven’t already started, then it suggests that you are putting it off or procrastinating – that you don’t have the motivation. That’s what you should focus on.

Overlook Lifestyle

What’s the best way to lose weight? Quit your job! Imagine it: you’d suddenly have much more time, much more energy and much more inclination to train and to eat correctly.

Of course most of us don’t have the luxury of being able to walk out of our offices, but what we can do is to pay more attention to the role that our work plays. Likewise, focussing on sleep, on our emotional state and on our routine is also important if you really want to make a big difference in your health.