Tips for Your Own
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The answer is not exercise nor is it a nutritious diet. If you thought a support group made all the difference, you're wrong. Breaking those bad habits that keep you overweight...is that it? Nope. How about the amount of weight loss? No, amount you lose doesn't determine your weight loss success story.
The answer to which factor determines your weight loss success story or failure comes from the following Final Words on Weight Loss...
Successful weight loss begins with establishing a negative energy balance and then sustaining the negative balance for the rest of your life. There are several ways to accomplish this; however, none of them is the true determinant of your weight loss success story.
It's not about calories, directly, or about when you eat or even how often you eat. It's not about carbs or The Zone or the beach...it's more basic then those things.
It all comes down to Diet Shock.
Your weight loss success story begins and ends with diet shock. What is diet shock? To simplify, diet shock is your body's natural reaction to fast changes in weight.
Lose Weight Fast ----> Shock Body ----> Gain Weight Fast
The faster weight is lost, the shorter the duration of success you will experience. Weight gain is inevitable if you lose weight fast.
Take it slow. Weight loss over a longer duration of time is associated with greater success. Also keep in mind, most diets focus on this one aspect of losing weight...creating a negative energy balance FAST. It's no wonder they fail miserably at keeping it off.
Keeping Weight Off
The focus of any diet plan should be keeping weight off. Your problem is not losing weight, it's gaining it.
Several recent studies have shown that dieters with maintenance plans (these are second diets that you start after you reach your goal) have a better chance of not rebounding back to their original weight.
Dr. Perri, in the Journal of Clinical Psychology, looked at maintenance plans, specifically, and found that a maintenance plan was essential to keeping it off. His study is described below...
The participants were on a specific diet with behavioral modification therapy. Most were successful and lost weight at 5 months. Half were then placed on a maintenance diet plan and the other half were given no instructions. The results speak for themselves.
By 17 months, the group without a maintenance plan gained weight at a faster rate than those on a plan to sustain a lower weight.
Bottom line...A Maintenance Plan is necessary to keep weight off or, at least, slow down the process of weight gain.
This next image is from Dr. Wadden from the same journal. It shows that diets, even when combined, do not translate into maintenance plans. It's as if you need two plans. One to take it off and the other to keep it off.
To read more on muscle, habits, food and whatever else impacts your success, click here.
I found ONE book that is thorough enough and professional enough to meet my high standards. And if you follow the diet, weight loss will occur because of "burning" fat, the only way to lose weight.
It's called Burn The Fat Feed The Muscle, and it is written by a few body builders with several years of experience.
This is a "strong" book...a step by step approach to burning fat and keeping muscle. Very easy to follow. Reading this book should be one of my Weight Loss Tips.
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