The Most Important Fat Loss Tip You Probably Arent Thinking About

     No matter what nutrition or training plan you choose to follow, you will get success if you stick with it, so long as it is a quality approach and not some quick-fix fad.

Any 'magic bullet' promise means you start out with the view that you will deprive yourself for a short period of time and then go back to 'normal'. 

You will find that certain approaches work better for you than others, but you need to focus less on the detail and more on ensuring the changes are being implemented consistently and ongoing on a regular basis.   Underlying all nutrition plans for fat loss is the simple fact that you need to expend more energy than you take on board in order to lose weight. The training is designed to ensure that you expend extra calories, lose fat over precious muscle tissue while building strength, endurance, muscular balance and co-ordination. A common error is to fail to realise or acknowledge that at the end of the day, we need to create a calorie deficit, and this calorie deficit needs to be maintained over time. 

Any strategy or programme you follow is (or should be) taking you, one way or another, into this caloric deficit. So really, your choice of programme should be based on what you can stick to, consistently, for an extended period of time. By sticking to an extreme or 'fad' approach for a short period of time may elicit a weight loss response, and even some fat loss, but unless you have absorbed the changes into your daily life you are likely to slip back to old habits as soon as your diet is over.

Also, if you constantly decide to stop one programme, have a little 'break' then start a new 'better' one, you may be undoing all your hard work - the calories you can consume in between could easily tip the balance in favour of weight gain, so you are back to square one (or further - the classic 'yo-yo effect).

The key is to understand the concept of 'consistency'.  Fat loss takes time and keeping it off takes new habits and behaviours to be embedded in our daily lives.  If you consistently eat fewer calories than you use, ensuring they are as nutritionally dense as possible by eating as cleanly as possible, you will lose fat. 

This can allow for 'treats' along the way!  The secret is to be able to have a small indulgence, savouring and enjoying it, then getting straight back on track.  You may like to treat yourself each day, with a couple of squares of dark chocolate after dinner, a reward that can make the good work of the day seem easier.  So long as this is factored in to the plan it is not a problem.  You may prefer to have a 'cheat' meal once a week, where you can choose something that you would otherwise consider 'off-limits'. You just need to make sure its factored in calorie-wise - if you need to stick to 1500 cals a day for 7 days in order to lose fat, but then eat (and drink) an entire days allowance in one meal out you can see how that single 'treat' can offset the whole week's hard work. 

It's scarily easy to do that, too!  A 3 course restaurant meal with wine can easily top or even double a usual day's calorie limit, so if you are eating out on a regular basis you need some strategies up your sleeve!  You can log your intake on FitDay.com or CalorieKing.com - it's very easy to see how all those extra calories add up without you even realising, once it's all written down, but it also makes it really easy to make clever substitutions to minimise the damage. 

The key is to make changes to your exercise and nutrition behaviours and stick with them over a period of time, making them part of the fabric of your life - your new healthy habits.

CONSISTENCY and PERSISTENCE are vital. You need to take action CONSISTENTLY in order to get results. You also need to be patient and persevere - giving up when you don't see results in a mere two weeks is counter-productive.

You must of course monitor your results. If you don't see results after an extended period you may need to question your approach and check you're not exploiting any 'loopholes' in the programme. 

Many popular diet plans have a 'hook', where they promise you can eat as much as you like or something similar, but this relies on the fact that you probably won't (thereby 'tricking' you into a calorie deficit). 

Just remember, there are no loopholes when it comes to creating a calorie deficit. There are no quick fixes and one plan is usually as good as another when it comes down to it.  So stop looking around for new and improved approaches and stick to one - consistency will win, every time!

Copyright (c) 2010 Caroline Radway

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