Weight loss...plain and simple

“Unless you try to do something beyond what you have already mastered, you will never grow.” Ralph Waldo Emerson

January - the time of year where we are inundated with companies marketing their weight loss methods/products/schemes.

At a local department store shelves that were stocked to capacity with weight loss supplements are now barren. Consumers desperate with hopes to see the pounds melt away with the swallowing of a pill will be sadly disappointed when not a pound will be lost. Gyms are overflowing with new members at this time of year, only to see them drift away after a month or two when the other priorities take precedence. Email boxes are full with the latest program gimmicks of losing 20 pounds in a week for some absurd amount of money.

Statistics (a UCLA study in American Psychologist) say that one can initially lose 5-10 percent of their weight on any number of diets, but then regain. Sustained weight loss is found in only a minute number of people. Complete weight regain, plus a few pounds is found in the majority. This bears the question, why do people continue to go on diets when they have been proven to be ineffective and counterproductive? So if dieting doesn’t work to lose weight, and taking supplements doesn’t, then just what does?

Proper nutrition and regular exercise. Novel idea. Exercise has been noted to be a key factor leading to sustained weight loss. Only 20% of people who have lost weight keep it off. Not so great a percentage, is it? So why do people keep trying the latest fad diet? I have read that the longer you are able to maintain your weight loss that the odds of regaining weight goes down.

It’s about changing your habits. I count calories and eat very little to no processed or junk food. I exercise…daily. I track my weight. I weigh and measure my food. To some, these measures sound extreme and they say that doesn’t work for them. But how is what they are currently doing working out for them? Are they comfortable? If not, isn’t it time to step out of that comfort zone and try something new. Do you want to be a statistic? Or do you want to beat the odds and say you succeeded?