Find the right reason for setting your weight loss target
Gaining weight is easy and not seldom unwanted, however the reverse process is so much harder than it seems. If you agree with that then we are on the same page! Did you feel that your body has changed over the last years, and you felt your clothes are not fitting well enough, or even worse you have already bought the next larger size? Do you feel uncomfortable when doing chores and exercises or even worse getting out of breath with simple things? If your answer is a yes to at least one of those questions, then you are already in the process of gaining unwanted weight. And here it is: at that point you have all chances to rein and stop the process right here. The first thing that springs to mind is to buy weight loss products, start starving or fall in the trap of highly expensive weight-loss programs that help lose water weight but doing nothing for sustainable weight-loss. Even worse, they kick you into a yo-yo process with losing and gaining more weight than you had before. But if you are in the overweight zone, what is there to do in order to be successful?
The first thing is to find out why you want to lose weight. It must be a reason that is important to you. That can be from your joints that start aching to you feeling very uncomfortable with the excess fat building up on your body. Be aware that reason must be strong enough to keep you going when you are about to fall off the wagon. Stopping the weight-gaining and starting to reverse it is a complex process that needs to start from a mental set up. That is where we can start to work with you. We encourage to share your weight loss reason with your family members or best friends so they can see what you want to do and understand better about some changes that will come with your efforts. In addition, it is very helpful to engage your family members or best friends so that they can support you in your efforts and to celebrate your success which means setting a final weight target and breaking it up into small reachable sub targets. But be careful here: getting back in shape does not necessarily mean to shred pounds, it means also building muscles and subsequently exchanging fat tissue by muscle tissue which is heavier by nature than fat tissue. That is why we have created an approach that consists of 3 elements.
3 major elements of your weight-loss journey
#1 Diet
If you think at that stage you have tried everything already and feel tempted to stop reading here, the step over the first threshold in your weight-loss journey has been done, so stay with us. A change in diet is as important as setting the right weight loss reason. The sustainable success can only come with sustainable life style changes. What would that mean in practice? Have a look to your pantry and remove all sodas, sweets, convenient food for microwave and place it in the farthest corner of your home. Look what is left. Ok you say you don’t have a pantry and/or food in your home because there is no time to prepare your own dishes and you better eat out. Here we go: stop eating out! So you do not know what to eat because you do not know how to cook. That is an important step in life style change. Make meal plans upfront for the week. You can even order ready prepared ingredients accompanied by recipies to cook your own dishes. Cook enough in advance so you can sustain several days from it. Make meal cooking a family event or meet with friends and cook together. You will be surprised how much fun that can be. And when it comes to meal planning also make sure you have enough healthy snacks whenever sweet craving overwhelms you. And one more hint: Make sure that you stay hydrated (about 2.5l water a day) because dehydration can cause cravings similar to an empty stomach. With each personal trainer contact we help you keep on track with your diet efforts.
#2 Exercising
To support your weight-loss you need to exercise, in the beginning mainly to kick your metabolism into a calorie burning mode. If you want to burn more calories you need to build muscle mass. The more muscles you have the more calories you burn and the more body fat you can shred. Within personal training sessions your trainer will introduce you to exercises that help you build muscles and increase your endurance. In addition, you will be encouraged to do some exercises without your personal trainer. Most clients see a trainer on average 3 time a week. Although rest days are encouraged there is nothing wrong with doing some light exercises as walking, swimming, brisk walking, cross country skiing one or two days a week on your own. Very often we experience that our clients rediscovered sports they played earlier like soccer, hockey or other team sports. Those activities are very helpful when it comes to weight-loss.
#3 Quality sleep
Last but not least quality sleep is essential to lose body fat. During sleep phases our body recovers from the day’s activities. That is valid as well for the brain during the REM phase and as well for muscles during deep sleep phases. Sleep has an impact on the cortisol level. Lack of sleep brings the body into a stress situation that leads to an increase of cortisol. Elevated cortisol levels can lead to bodyfat accumulation. So how to get enough sleep when it is so precious? It is not so important when you fall asleep as long it follows your individual circadian rhythm. Everybody is different. So make sure that you can go to bed when your body needs it most. Make sure that you establish habits before you go to bed that you can repeat every single day, like drinking a cup of herbal tea, meditation, stretching etc. so your body can prepare for sleep. We also recommend staying away from your phone for at least 1 hour before going to bed. And if your work and family situation allow, try to go to bed every day at the same time. Since we mention the quality sleep in the end, we want to outline that doing exercises will also help to increase your sleep quality.
If you feel you need some help in getting you on track with your weight-loss targets, get in touch with us. Meet your personal trainer for your weight-loss program.