Why Can't You Lose Weight?

Losing weight is just as much mental as physical. You have to really want it and be willing to do what it takes. That's the secret, "be willing to do what it takes".

You have to quit buying all those foods you love to eat. You have to walk more. Most people gain weight as they get older because they are less active. When you're less active you burn fewer calories and if you eat the same but burn fewer calories you gain weight. It's not that hard to figure out. It's normal that people gain 3 pounds a year give or take as they get older. Why? you might ask. Because you're slowing down even if you don't realize it. Slowing down is normal and if you're not fighting it, trying to increase activity, then you will gradually gain weight. It will happen to everyone if you're not tracking your food and your activity levels.

It's easy to do with a journal which you can do using paper and pencil or your PC or your smart phone.  I use an APP called "MyFitnessPal", it's free and there are dozens more all free. You pick the one you like. I use to use a spread sheet but it got too hard to remember everything from the whole day. The App is great for me because I can enter things as I go along.

Tracking what you do and what you eat is a big help. When you have that "I'm not going to quit" attitude  a journal will help you find your mistakes and there will be mistakes. Time when you just stop losing and don't know why. The journal is your log book and when you look through the pages you'll find what you're doing wrong. It's not that hard. When you go off track there's only two answers: You ate the wrong things or ate too much or didn't burn enough calories, usually because you skipped exercise or you cut back on walking.

When you find a plan that's working for you, stay with it, don't make any changes until you have to. When your plan is failing and your stuck and not making any progress it's because your body got use to the routine. When that happens you won't burn as many calories and your progress will stop. All successful trainers want you to change your routine every few days so your body doesn't get a chance to get use to the routine. As long as you keep the same intensity and work out for the same amount of time you'll continue to burn the same amount of calories.

All you need is about 3 different exercise plans. I do a run, walk routine, a free weights routine and I'll swim a couple days a week. Do some research and find some exercises that are right for you. You want exercise plans that challenge your muscle. Building strength will burn body fat. Losing body fat will make you a happier, healthier person, a stronger person with better balance.

If you really want to lose your body fat than look for my e-books at the websites listed below. You'll get information on Healthy eating, exercise, and diet. Instead of spending hours on the internet reading dozens of posts, you can save time by picking up one of my e-books. 

There are two e-books. “How Bad Do You Want To Lose Weight?” is available at all the online bookstores selling for $1.99. Go to any of the websites below and search the title to find my e-book. This book gives you all you need to lose weight without spending money on gym memberships, diet plans or meal plans. Look for my book. at Amazon.com, B&N.com, iBooks, Kobo.com, Scribd.com, or Gardner Books in the U.K.

My new e-book is available on Smashwords.com, just type “getting to a Healthy Weight” in the search box at the top of the home page. 

Walking for Weight Loss

This is a good post from MedicineNet for the beginners. Walking is the best way to start an exercise program. When you first start it's not that important that you walk fast, the important thing is that you walk 30 minutes.

Let's start by breaking it down.

1. How Many Calories Do You Burn Walking?

Using walking to balance how many calories your burn each day with the calories that you eat can help you lose weight. But you need to know the numbers, which will vary depending on how much you weigh and how far you walk.

2. Best Ways to Burn More Calories and Fat When Walking

What are the keys to burning more calories with your walking workout? There are good ways and bad ways to try to burn more calories when walking. It is also important to walk long enough to burn fat.

3. Watching the Calories You Eat is Important

One candy bar takes three to five miles to burn off, so the key to weight loss with walking is also to eat fewer calories.

It's a hard truth, but these are the facts. You can't outwalk your mouth.

4. How Fast to Walk for Weight Loss and Burning Fat

Speed matters when it comes to effective walking workouts. How to walk in the fat-burning zone for weight loss. It can be easier to hit this zone with a walking pace than with a running pace.

5. How Long to Walk to Burn Fat

The best walking workout distance and time for weight loss will have your body going into the stored fat you want to lose and burning it as fuel.

Here's how long you should aim to walk three or more days per week.

6. Walking Schedule for Weight Loss

Mix up your walking workouts to get the most weight loss effect. Use this plan for short days, long days, long easy days, days off and weight training.

7. Treadmill Weight Loss Walking Plan

If you prefer using the treadmill for your workouts, this plan will help you challenge your body with a variety of workouts and a weekly schedule to maximize them.

8. Keep Track of Your Walks and Weight Loss

Studies show that keeping track of your walking time and calories can keep you on the path to losing weight.Keeping a log or journal will help ensure success, or use a pedometer with memory or linked to an app to track your walks and exercise.

9. Walk of Life 10-Week Program

Our free daily program for walking, healthy eating and weight loss. Each day for 70 days you will be coached to enjoy a walking workout, exercise, improve your diet and have fun.

10. Ten Things to Stop Doing to Walk Off Weight

Use this list to check yourself and see what habits and thought processes you need to change in order to be successful in walking off weight.

Blogspot is making some changes

Blogger using "blogspot" just found out that Google is making some changes next year. Many of our readers sign in with Twitter or other logins but that will change in January. After the change you will need to sign-up for a Google Account and use that login to read the blogs on Google sites. I'm sure Google will explain all this better than me, but it's all free and there won't be any subscription charge and there is several benefits to having a Google account. It probably has something to do with the security of the blog sites. So don't be surprised when all this takes place next month.

Happy New Year from Howbaddoyouwanttoloseweight.com

An Inspirational Story

All it take is willpower to lose weight and the story following is an example of what you can accomplish when you set your mind to it.

Have you seen the story of this 50 year old woman who was brutally fat shamed in a department store by some rude skinny lady?

For years this woman struggled to lose weight yet NOTHING worked.

P90X, Atkins, Zumba, Beach Body, Gluten Free, Cross Fit… NOTHING worked.

And the last straw was when she was brutally fat shamed in the shopping mall while hoping to find a pair of pants she could fit into.

It was in that moment she began her quest to not just LOSE the weight - but to get HOT.

And one year later…

She dropped an incredible 41 pounds!  And she didn’t just lose weight… instead she got a tight, toned body with that sleek sexy muscular looking stomach.

Get this…

She did this ALL without EVER stepping foot in a gym or without some crazy diet, or using pills or surgery.

Lose weight and keeping it off is about changing your life and becoming a new person. A person who is going to forget everything they know about eating and exercise and do it right this time.  

For more weight loss information check out my new website

howbaddoyouwanttoloseweight.com

Merry Christmas

To My Loyal Readers

Don't worry about your diet today. Try anything you want, just remember to eat and drink in moderation. You can fix your diet tomorrow. Have a Merry Christmas and be safe.

Ray Edward

Does Rapid Weight Loss Work?

This is a post from MedicineNet and it's important that you read and understand that the whole idea of "rapid weight loss" not only doesn't work but it's dangerous. You might have friends that lost weight with pills they saw advertised on TV or the internet but just because they had no side-effects doesn't mean you won't. Besides the possible side-effects people always seem to put the weight back.

 Why is that? The programs are designed to give you temporary weight loss, that's all. Because they want you to buy more at a later date and keep you as a customer. Anyone selling anything to the public has to sell a product that people will like and continue to buy, so diet pills were never made to give you permanent weight loss. 

So many marketers promise "fast weight loss" it's difficult to sort through them all.

Most rapid weight loss pitches fall into these categories:

Starvation Diets

Beyonce popularized the so-called "master cleanse" diet: water, lemon juice, maple syrup, and cayenne pepper. Variations of these diets have been around since at least the 1950s. They often also promise "detoxification" through colonics or enemas. These diets are very temporary and sap the strength from your body.

Diet Pills and Supplements

Dozens of diet supplements promise to speed weight loss. Generally, they claim either to block absorption of nutrients, increase metabolism, or burn fat. All these methods are dangerous. If you feel you need diet pills ask your doctor for a prescription. 

Very Low-Calorie Diets (VLCDs)

One proven method of rapid weight loss is the medically supervised very low-calorie diet (VLCD). Most of what is known about rapid weight loss comes from studies of people on these diets. You can do a very low calorie diet by going Vegan, but you have to take supplements to get the extra nutrients your not getting from vegetables. Remember, being a Vegan is a full-time lifestyle.

Creams, Devices, and Magic Voodoo Spells

There seems to be no end to the dubious ideas promoted in the name of rapid weight loss. Most promise to replace diet or exercise. None of this work.

Exercise Equipment can help you lose weight but you have to use the equipment, most people stop using the machine after a few weeks. You can't exercise away a bad diet. So if all you have to do is walk to lose weight, why spend money on a machine to walk. 

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) does regulate dietary supplements; however, it treats them like foods rather than medications.

The FDA also does not regulate claims made by over-the-counter weight loss products. Unlike drug manufacturers, the makers of supplements don’t have to show their products are safe or effective before selling them on the market. This means that dietary supplements do not need approval from FDA before they are marketed.

Aside from the very low-calorie diet and weight loss surgery, no other product, pill, or diet has been proven to work for fast weight loss. The prescription drug Orlistat can help, but it works slowly and only with diet and exercise. Orlistat is marketed as Xenical. Labeling for Orlistat notes that it can cause severe liver damage.

In any rapid weight loss program, what really burns fat is not a pill or type of food. It's the drastic reduction of calories, combined with exercise.

Rapid weight loss diets can have ill effects, but so does obesity. For this reason, very low-calorie diets (VLCDs) are considered a reasonable weight loss option for people with obesity (having a body mass index (BMI) greater than 30) needing rapid weight loss for a specific purpose such as weight loss surgery .

VLCDs are doctor-supervised diets lasting several weeks. The meals are nutritionally balanced, but expensive -- people can end up spending thousands of dollars over time. VLCDs safely produce a loss of 15% to 25% of body weight in 12 weeks. That's for those who finish the program: 25% to half of people don't complete the program. Weight returns when the diet is stopped and happens rapidly; some experts say its best to take a more sustainable approach to weight loss comparable to that of regular diets.

Most people seeking rapid weight loss, though, usually do it on their own. Frequently, it's to achieve a short-term goal, such as fitting into a dress, or looking good at the beach.

Starving yourself is certainly not a good idea. But if you're otherwise healthy, a brief period of extreme calorie restriction isn't likely to hurt you. You should tell your doctor what you're doing, and be sure to include protein in your diet (70 to 100 grams per day). Take a multivitamin, and eat potassium-rich foods (tomatoes, oranges, and bananas).

Also, remember that crash diets rarely help you achieve a sustained, healthy weight. Most people put the pounds right back on.

For more weight loss advice see my NEW website:

howbaddoyouwanttoloseweight.com

More people want to get healthy

I was watching the news this morning and sports wear, the clothes you exercise with, is taking over the casual clothing market. We all know that exercising has been shoved down our throats for the last couple decades but it hasn't been until recently that more people of all ages are actually taking exercise seriously. You can go to the "Y" or any health club and you can see people of all ages. So why is being thin gotten so popular?

We know people are working longer now, and the competition for jobs is getting much harder. It's no secret that today the slim and trim people are doing better in the job interviews. They just look like their a more serious applicant. They look like their a harder worker. Your perception is a big part of a job interview and if you give the perception that you're a harder working employee than you might have the advantage.

We still have a majority  of overweight adults  but this might be the last generation. I think in twenty years you will see a big change in what we eat and how we take care of ourselves. Young people are adopting this new lifestyle and some of the over 40 group are all in. It's not that fast food is on the way out, but all food will be changing. I thing that finely all of us realize that we need more from the food you're eating. A new trend has started with younger adults and instead of looking for comfort food they're looking for healthy food. I'm not saying that comfort food is on the way out, but I thing in years to come we will see less of it.

When we get comfort food and other fried foods out of the schools and replace it with healthy food and healthy snacks that's when you'll see a difference in the way young people look at food in general. That's where we have to start making a change in eating habits. The government had a good idea when they wanted to change the food in schools but they didn't know how to implement it. Those changes have to be done on the local level. Parents have to get involved and demand change and then you'll see results. We also need to teach physical education again. Elementary School in particle stopped physical education due to budget cuts, so parents are finding outside activities for their kids and it's expensive and time consuming and most kids can't join in. Most of the schools in the suburbs have gym classes and other after school sports but inner city school have often been forced to cut out those programs.

Learning good health like diet and exercise has to be taught in schools from the earliest age if you want to create healthy habits that the child will care with them for life.