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The previous article called How to lose half your body weight focused mostly on the mind-set and various factors that enabled me to halve my own body weight in less than three years. It did feature very little – if any – specific tips such as what you should eat, or how you should train. I was very aware of this and I wanted to avoid it due to the fact that I personally believe that the more choices you make because someone else tells you it’s the right thing to do, the more likely it’s going to be that you won’t pull through. This means that eating what someone else tells you to eat makes you less likely to continue on eating it. This goes into training and any other area as well. Exercising the kind of physical activity that someone else recommended you to do rather than what you’d personally choose to do will most likely increase the chance of you dropping out.
Having that said, I will in this article still go into the more specific tips. However, I urge you to keep in mind that this should be viewed as more of a collection of tips where you can pick and choose from those that relate to what you personally prefer. Don’t view it as a complete schematic that you should thoroughly follow or copy in order to succeed. Some of the tips might work in your favor, some might not.
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General: Having specific meals where you’ve accounted for each and every ingredient will take a lot of time to learn. I would personally suggest finding a few sources of protein rich ingredients that you can build your meals around (for me that was meat, eggs and cottage cheese). Protein is good for keeping yourself satisfied throughout the day and this can be balanced with a fair amount of fat. I personally prefer keeping the carbohydrates low in favor for more fat, but that is more a question about personal preference.
Specific tips:
- Keep the protein high and the carbohydrates and fat low (ex: more meat, eggs, cottage cheese than pasta, rice, potatoes etc.)
- Use vegetables to keep yourself fully satisfied (I personally prefer broccoli)
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General: There is no correct answer to this. The amount of meals that you want to eat should be based on what keeps you satisfied throughout the day. To add to this, it should also revolve around how much time you have. If you have a very stressing job, fewer meals could be in favor due to you not getting enough opportunities to eat. Personally, I prefer four bigger meals and some smaller ones in-between. I'd also recommend that you find something that'll serve you as a reward. This should be something that won't contain too much (or any) calories. I drank a lot of coffee and light beverages during my diet. Caffeine in itself has served me quite well in keeping me satisfied in-between meals.
Specific tips:
- Have four major meals a day (Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner and Supper)
- Add low calorie/high protein snacks if you’re not keeping yourself satisfied in-between meals
- Find a low (or preferably zero) calorie beverage that'll serve you as a reward during your diet
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General: Just as your diet, you need to find something that you personally enjoy. If you hate walking, then don’t do it – find something that you can enjoy or at least endure. Personally, I love going to the gym, and I could be there every single day of the week if I was able to. The reason why I keep going is not because I have to, it’s because I love doing so. As time progress and you get further with your weight loss you can bend the rule of enjoyment more and more, because you’ll be prepared and willing to make some sacrifice. Right at the beginning you’d be wise to stick to those activities you really enjoy though.
Specific tips:
- Find the activity you personally enjoy
- Only do activities that you don’t enjoy once you are comfortable with physical activity, and only if they serve to accomplish short-term goals. Never incorporate them as regular long-term activities
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General: You can’t set a number for the amount of physical activity that you need to do. Firstly, some activities are more demanding than others, and secondly, it will depend on how you’re eating throughout each day. I’ve found that having a "lighter" daily physical activity that is a “must-do” is the best way to initially lose weight, as it enables you to be more flexible with your nutrition. A lot of people are concerned with what time of the day that they should do their physical activity. For example, is it most optimal to do your cardio before or after breakfast? My suggestion is to not concern yourself with these kinds of questions at all. To begin with, it’s not clear if one or the other is the better choice and even if one would be the better choice, it would only be marginally better. The most important thing to keep in mind is that the best exercise is the one that gets done. Therefore you should not choose to do any exercise because you have to - choose to do it because you want to (unless, as I wrote earlier, you are comfortable with physical activity and it serves to accomplish a short-term goal).
Specific tips:
- Aim for a simple DAILY physical activity in the beginning (ex: 30 minutes walk)
- Choose the kind of physical activity YOU prefer
- Exercise when YOU want, not when you should
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General: Don’t make it more difficult than it has to be. Eat the things that you enjoy as long as you still lose weight. My personal experience is that regular food always keeps you more satisfied than any bar or powder ever does. However, if you feel that you’re not getting enough nutrition or that you don’t have the time, it can be a highly effective component during your weight loss. The harder you train and the further you come with your training, the more concerned you can be with supplements. But if you're right at the beginning of your weight loss I'd recommend keeping it simple and just making sure you're getting enough vitamins and minerals as well as omega 3. Supplements are in no way a necessity if you have a well-adjusted diet, but that might not be the case when you are just starting out.
Specific tips:
- Choose regular food over powder or bars
- Add Omega 3 and some kind of multivitamin to make sure you meet the daily needs
- Use supplements as a complement – not a replacement – to your regular food
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General: This might be the most important part of your weight loss. Keep track of any progress that you’re making. If you don’t keep track you won’t know if you succeed or not. Having no knowledge of whether you’re doing a good job or a bad job will be detrimental to your weight loss as you won’t get the benefits of knowing that what you’re doing is working. This means primarily keeping track of your weight, but also enters into areas of training - such as keeping track of how much you’re lifting or how long of walks you’re taking. It doesn’t always mean that you have to write down the length of your walks or how much time you spend, but at least set a specific amount for each walk in order to prevent yourself from underachieving. It is also important to somewhat keep track of what you eat. It doesn’t need to be thorough in any way, but at least get a vague picture of what you’re putting into yourself. Later, this can be more controlled if need be, but it’s important not to overthink it at the beginning as it might turn out overwhelming. Also, as you progress, be sure to set some specific goals. They need to be measurable so that you know if you’ve succeeded or not. It might be something like: “I will lose 2 kg (4,4 lbs) in one month”.
Specific tips:
- Weigh yourself each day. Calculate an average at the end of each week. Compare this average to the previous week in order to estimate whether you’re progressing or not
- Keep track of your progress. Whether it is morning walks or at the gym. For how long are you walking? How much weight are you lifting?
- Have at least a vague picture of what you’re putting into yourself
- Set measurable goals. Be specific. Ex: “Lose 4 pounds in 1 month”
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What I want you to take with you after reading this is that you need to remember that adjustment and personal preference is the key. If you enjoy doing something and it's giving you results, don't stop doing it. Maybe you are doing it wrong, and maybe you could do it in a more optimal way, but don't concern yourself with these kinds of questions right at the beginning of your weight loss. All the tweaking and fine tuning will come eventually as you start to learn more about your body. Once you get a hang of physical activity and nutrition you can delve deeper into the subjects, and you'd be wise to start simple and work your way up. That way it's less likely that it'll turn out overwhelming and end up with you quitting completely.
To simplify, let’s sum up all the specific tips:
- Have four major meals each day with protein being the major source
- Use vegetables with each meal for a greater satisfaction
- Add low-calorie snacks in-between meals if you can’t go without eating
- Find a low (or preferably zero) calorie beverage that'll serve you as a reward during your diet
- Find physical activities YOU personally enjoy doing
- Aim for a simple DAILY physical activity in the beginning
- Exercise when YOU want to, not when others want you to
- Only do activities you don’t enjoy once you’re comfortable with physical activities and only do them in order to achieve short-term goals
- Choose regular food over powder or bars
- Add Omega 3 and multivitamins to your diet if you feel the need
- Keep track of your weight, your training and (somewhat) of what you’re eating
- Set measurable goals
