Even though your motivation is virtually nonexistent, you somehow manage to make it to the gym after a long day of work, whether that means answering calls or completing employee training with HSI. Yet you still find that after weeks of doing so, you haven’t managed to drop a single pound. How is this possible? It could be due to a number of factors, but these might be some that are contributing to your lack of weight loss.
Not Tracking Calories
Losing weight essentially comes down to one thing: remaining in a calorie deficit. This means that you must burn more calories on a given day than you consume. In doing so, you will lose weight, but it cannot be achieved by other means. If you don’t know how many calories you’re consuming, it can be very difficult to remain under your calorie limit. By tracking what you put into your body, you can calculate how many calories you have left each day, what foods are high in calories and should be avoided, and so on. Not everybody needs to track their calories to remain under their limit when losing weight, but if you don’t really know what you’re doing, tracking is always a safe bet to start with.
Unhealthy Eating
That being said, just because you’re staying under your calorie limit doesn’t mean you are necessarily healthy. You need all the proper nutrients, proteins, and vitamins that come with eating a well-balanced diet, such as vegetables, fruits, lean meats, healthy carbs, and natural fats. Just because you only ate 2,000 calories of ice cream and didn’t eat anything else to set yourself over your calorie limit doesn’t mean you’ll lose weight the right way. Your body will turn all that sugar into fat and you’ll soon find yourself unable to push yourself when working out due to a lack of sustainable energy.
Not Exercising
Eating healthy makes up around 70% of losing weight and living a better life, but exercise is also an important factor. Just as some people think they can lose weight in the gym alone (while it is technically possible, it isn’t sustainable or the most efficient) others think they can get by just eating an apple or two. By implementing cardio and just a small amount of resistance exercise, you will speed up your metabolism and weight loss dramatically. Plus, the more muscle mass you have, the faster you’ll be able to burn fat.
Fitness is a Lifestyle
You’ve probably heard this before, but it’s the truth. You don’t need to turn into a “gym rat” or start a never-ending fad diet to lose weight and reach the fitness goals you’ve been striving for. However, it’s not as easy as simply eating healthy for a month or going to the gym a few days a week. It’s an entire change to your diet and level of physical activity that is required in order to not only lose weight but keep it off for good.