Realistic Weight Loss Goals: Your Key To Weight Loss Success

Realistic weight loss goals have an enormous influence on your success when you begin a weight loss or diet program. Many people start a diet and doom themselves to failure because they set unrealistic goals. This happens when they set a goal such as, "I will lose 15 pounds in the next week", or "I will by skipping lunch!" Those are goals but they are not realistic weight loss goals. Goals like these will undermine your ability to stay on your diet because you cannot achieve them. In order to continue a diet you must see success and nothing is more discouraging than trying to lose weight and seeing no results. The lesson we need to take from this is set realistic weight loss goals and focus on creating success every day. If you do this you will be successful and have the energy and will power to continue.

When you begin to set weight loss goals it is crucial that you create short-term realistic weight loss goals that are well within your reach. Exactly what is short term? A short-term goal is a goal you can accomplish in one week; it is a quick and easy weight loss goal. Remember, you need to achieve this goal in one week so it has to be straight forward, uncomplicated and clearly defined. A goal without a plan is useless so after you have created your weight loss goals you must then write down the actions you needed to make this goal happen. As you develop the list of actions be specific, write down every detail of every action you need to take to achieve each goal. Always remember that the more specific, the more clearly defined, the more precise your goal and required actions to achieve that goal the greater and faster your success. Think of it this way, your goals and actions are like a "roadmap". Imagine trying to drive across the country with a map with only one road on it. You might eventually get to the other coast but you would have traveled all over and wasted precious time. Now, if you were to take the same trip but this time you had a map that was filled with detail, hints, guidelines and clearly defined roads you would complete the same trip in a much shorter period of time. Your short-term realistic weight loss goals and the actions needed to achieve those goals are the detail rich "road map" to your weightloss journey. If you do not take the time to understand how to set weight loss goals you will fail. Take your time creating these goals and then you will see just how powerful and effective realistic weight loss goals can be.

There is nothing like success to breed success and the short-term goals you create are the foundation of everything you will achieve. To ensure your weight loss goal setting is as effective as possible it is important how you structure your goals. Not only do your goals need to be filled with details it is also important that each goal is stated using positive language. For instance you could write as one of your goals, "I want to lose some weight this week." This goal is not the goal you want when settings goals for weight loss. Why? That statement leaves you open to too many obstacles to be successful. To be successful you need to be specific, clear, and positive. Another way to state the same goal would be, "This week I will lose 2 pounds." Now you have set a precise goal, 2 pounds and a definite timeline, one week. This is a goal you can pursue and achieve. A realistic weight loss goal does not have to be an earth-shattering goal, just a goal that moves you forward, creates success, and helps you build momentum.

Some people might think that losing two pounds in seven days is not a great goal but look behind the goal: two pounds may not seem like a lot but to lose the two pounds you have made significant changes in your life. The changes you will have made will impact the very basic behaviors of your life. Examples of these behaviors are how much you eat during each meal, when you eat each meal, and what foods you are now eating. These are significant changes because the changes are fundamental alternations of your behaviors. Give yourself every chance to be successful by setting realistic weight loss goals you can achieve every week.

Since creating the short-term realistic weight loss goals is so crucial to your success it is important that you only create these goals when you can devote 100% of your attention to the process. These goals are critical to your success and finding a quiet place where you can focus completely on creating the goals is very important. After you have created your goals read them out loud. Do they sound realistic? Can you achieve each goal in seven days? Through the process of writing a list of realistic weight loss goals the path for your success will be very clear to you. Always remember that the clearer your goals, the more detailed your goals the more easily you will find success.

The ultimate goal is to achieve long-term sustainable weight loss. The long-term weight loss will be driven by your short-term realistic weight loss goals. An example of a long-term goal is what do you want to weigh in one year? Visualize the person you want to become. Think about the emotions you want to experience after being successful losing weight for an entire year! Create a vivid vision of the person you will be in one year. Be very precise and clear in your visualization, what clothes are you wearing, what are you doing, what emotions are you experiencing and of course how do you look. All these changes are within your reach but everything starts with realistic weight loss goals. Take the time to create the detailed realistic weight loss goals that will propel you into your new future. If you take these few simple steps you will discover that you can do anything you set your mind to and it all started with just a few realistic weight loss goals!

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