Diets and fitness advice are like the finger. They focus too much on the advice and will miss the opportunity to attain heavenly glory. And so, folks, you finally get Bruce Lee into an article and past the editors. Seriously, what the hell am I talking about?
Weight loss is not what you eat and what you do
There's no end to expert advice on calorie deficits, diets, exercise plans, motivation on the move, and the like to make you think weight loss is easy.
Almost everything is designed to make you feel bad if you haven't lost weight at first. You eat too much. You are not eating properly. You don't move enough. You are not moving properly. The thing is, none of this stuff really matters because weight loss is a senseless exercise in every way.
Of the 51 weight loss and maintenance strategies identified, grouped into 14 areas of the Oxford Food and Activity Behaviors taxonomy, the following were most commonly reported: having healthy food available at home, eating breakfast regularly, increasing vegetable consumption, reducing sugary content and fatty foods, restrict certain foods and reduce fat in meals. Increased physical activity was the most consistent positive correlate in maintaining weight loss
– Paixão et al., 2020
You can lose weight by losing one link. You can lose weight by going to the toilet after taking laxatives. You can lose weight if you have not exercised in twenty years and walk half an hour a day for 8 weeks.
The creation of new diets will continue to follow popular trends. However, the belief that these diets promote weight loss is due to personal impressions and reports published in books rather than strictly controlled research.
– Freire, 2020
The silver ball of weight loss, the only exercise that makes everything possible is the one that trains the mind.
Train the mind to lose weight
The hardest thing you can ever do is see yourself as you really are. If you have a clinical problem, such as a pathological obesty that requires intervention and ultimately weight loss, you need medical advice. And no, Instagram models and "science and evidence based" trainers are not recommended as medical experts.
Based on general outcome patterns and the most frequently published associations, participation in physical activity and sport was associated with a less negative and more positive body image. In addition, a negative body image, which was examined primarily as body weight or dissatisfaction with the shape, was associated with lower physical activity and sports participation and discussed qualitatively as an obstacle to participation. Alternatively, a positive body image, which was most often examined as body satisfaction, tended to be associated with increased participation in physical activity and exercise. This pattern of findings was consistent for men and women and was included in this overview across age groups.
– Sabiston et al., 2019
If you are a competitive athlete like a boxer who needs to save weight for a fight, you need a trainer who has done this before and has experience.
Bodybuilders who lose weight in the run-up to a competition also have some problems, but they're not really interested in weight loss in the traditional sense of the word. In addition, your advice is completely unrealistic for the average person, since most people's lives do not depend on gaining weight, cutting or resting.
On the other hand, if you're part of the other 99% of the world looking for weight loss help because you feel bad or just feel bad, start with an honest assessment of why you want to lose weight.
Therapy would help here. Yup. I said it. If you have a chronic need to lose weight and are healthy or generally okay in all other ways, you may want to see what that means in a holistic sense. I mean what's the real problem because it's not your weight.
Even if you think you're feeling better at losing weight or putting your leg up in the dating pool, this is still a slightly varied tactic because what you supposedly want is invariably not what you actually need.
So you need to train your mind and get in shape, enough to answer the question "What do you really want?" To be able to answer with absolute honesty.
Losing weight does not feel good or looks good
So, here's the practice, finally, so I'm not being trolled for clickbait headlines.
1 lap, no time limit. Ask yourself the following questions:
- Why do I want to lose weight?
- If you want it to look good, define what looking good means to deal with age and gender issues and how you would measure the results.
- When it comes to feeling good, define what that means based on your age and gender, and at the same time check how you would measure the results.
- Make a list of all the good things that will happen as a result of weight loss)
- What happens if I don't lose weight?
- Make a list of all the catastrophic things that will happen to you as a result, and then compare all the things that won't happen to them.
- Compare the list with all the good things you thought would happen if you lost weight.
Then finish warming up:
- Do you know that your weight may not change as you build muscle, but your shape may, and that this may mean fat loss but not weight loss?
- Do you know that there is no ideal weight for an average person?
After you've done all of this, you may still want to be a torn, slim, mean human machine. You have idealized this body in your mind or you have an ideal body image that you would like to acquire.
You then have to ask yourself a question: are you ready to do what is necessary to get this body because it is a serious undertaking that requires deprivation, abstinence, determined dedication and an environment that will guide you through the process supports how long it could take?
References
1. Freire, R. (2020). Scientific evidence of diets for weight loss: Different macronutrient composition, intermittent fasting and popular diets. Nutrition, 69, 110549.
2. Paixão, C., Dias, CM, Jorge, R., Carraça, EV, Yannakoulia, M., Zwaan, M. de, Soini, S., Hill, JO, Teixeira, PJ, & Santos, I. ( 2020). Successful maintenance of weight loss: A systematic review of the weight control register. Obesity ratings, 21 (5), e13003.
3. Sabiston, C.M., Pila, E., Vani, M. & Thogersen-Ntoumani, C. (2019). Body image, physical activity and sport: an overview of the scope. Psychology of Sport and Exercise, 42, 48-57.