Why aren't you losing weight?
Lots of people want to lose weight, but lots of people aren't going about it in the right way or don't know how to, and thus, lots of people are struggling to achieve their weight-loss.
People will try all these fad diets like the Mediterranean diet, things like Weight Watchers and Jenny Craig, or the dreaded shake diets. The problem for many is that they often come out of these diets in a very similar position to what they were when they started, overweight and unhappy.
Others might tell themselves that it's not their food that is the problem, it's the fact that they don't do any exercise. They think that if they sign-up to a gym and do some cardio 3 or 4 times a week that everything will be fine and they'll become slimmer.
Both of these types of people are looking for the easy way out. The first group want a diet that is pre-made for them so that they can do the minimal amount of actual effort, whilst the second group don't want to admit to themselves that they have nutritional issues, or simply don't want to change their food.
Almost everyone in my experience will fall into one of these two categories, but there is a very hard truth that they both need to accept. In order to lose weight, you ABSOLUTELY NEED to be tracking your food. Very rarely have I ever seen someone commit to losing weight, and then proceed to do it without tracking and counting their calories/macros. There is really no excuse to not do this these days either. Back in the day people had to look up in a manual how many calories an apple had and write that in their food diary, along with anything else they had throughout the day. At the end of the day they then had to get their calculator out and add it all up to see how they went relative to their goals for the day. Prehistoric!
In this day and age however, we can simply log-on to our app and type out a whole day within 5 minutes and have it all calculated for us. There really is no excuse.
If you really do want to achieve whatever goal it is that you set out to do, whether it's losing weight, gaining muscle, improving your fitness or even simply maintaining where you are at, you should be tracking. The only time you should allow yourself to not track is when you can look at a piece of meat and judge exactly how many grams it is. The only time you should allow yourself to not track is when you can recall the precise calories of every food that you ate throughout the day, and promptly add them up in your head to ensure you are on the right track.
Can you do this? If so, great, you're one of the lucky few that probably don't need to track their food. If not, logon to your app right now and track what you've eaten so far today, and what you plan to eat for the rest of the day. In fact, you should be planning the week in advance, not trying to catch up your food diary after the fact. Once you've done that, see how you stack up, are you on the right path? Are you lying to yourself about your food? Do you constantly go out on the weekends and render everything you've done throughout the week pointless?
Does it look like you're on the right track but you're still not losing weight? Well it's a great thing you tracked your food because now you're able to analyse what needs to change. Without that tracking, any changes are just a stab in the dark. Regardless of your position, you 100% need to track everything.
Does this seem extreme to you? Perhaps it does. But NO ONE has EVER lost weight by eating more calories than they're supposed to. "You can never outrun a bad diet" as they say. The only way to lose weight is if:
Calories out > Calories in
The amount of calories you burn in the day must be more than the amount you intake.
No amount of fad dieting or exercise can ever make up for you eating too much food, or the wrong types of foods. And how do you know if you're eating too much? You track. Writing down your food every day gives you so much knowledge and understanding of what you're actually putting in your mouth each day, and shows you what has been causing your problems in the first place!
So, if you truly do want to achieve something, anything, start tracking and planning ahead with your food. It will do you a world of good. And if you're unsure of how to go about it or you need some help, chat to your Personal Trainer about it. Because even a small discussion about your food is so much more beneficial to you than any exercise you could possibly do.
*Disclaimer: Individual results vary based on agreed goals. Click here for details.
