How can I lose weight???

Question

I weight about 145 and I'm wanting to lose about 10 to 15 lbs. I am eating 1200 or so calories a day and working about 3 to 4 times a week. I do both cardo and weights for at least an hour each time. I haven't seen any results yet and it has been 3 weeks. I haven't even lost 1 pound. What am I doing wrong?

Answer 1

If we were to be truly honest with ourselves most people actually want to lose a few pounds - if we only knew how. >

For many people, the quest of finding the holy grail of dieting may become a substitute for actually making changes required to take the ill health out of your current diet. I know this was me. It wasn't until I stopped and took stock of the way I thought about myself, my body and what it was I was trying to achieve that I realised, it wasn't a particular diet I needed. Rather, I needed a new way of thinking.

The good news is you CAN achieve your desired body shape with the right thinking about yourself, an understanding of how to get optimal nutrition, healthy eating habits and how to incorporate activity into your lifestyle to keep your muscles toned.

But most important of all, you need a regular mental workout to keep your self-image in shape.

Self-image is closely connected to the success or failure of any goal you choose to seek after, but none more so that the goal to get yourself fit and healthy.

So how do you go about strengthening your self-image? Well fortunately your self-image, just like your muscles, will respond well to a regular work out. You can actually strengthen your self-image with a few daily exercises.

Exercise One - Self Examination

Start by compiling a list of all those negative thoughts your have about yourself…I'm undisciplined, I can't manage my time, I let people down, I can't succeed, I don't exercise enough. You will need to decide before you start this process that you won't get discouraged….these are things that you will admit to yourself but they most certainly don't have to control your life.

Next, compile a second list including everything you LIKE about yourself. Keep going until this list is LONGER than the first list you compiled. You might include things such as, I am a good cook, I can make people laugh, I contribute to the soccer club, my daughter loves the way I decorate her room.

Then, take your 'negatives' list and turn it into your 'potentials' list. You do this by creating a positive self-image to every 'negative' you listed. Instead of "I can't succeed", write a counter belief, "I will succeed".

Ceremonially throw out the 'negatives' list - you are saying goodbye forever! Burn them, trash them, destroy them….they are no longer going to be a part of your thinking about yourself.

Now, keep your list of potentials in a prominent place. On your refrigerator door, in your daily journal, or in a picture frame on your desk. Make sure you have them in front on your every single day so that you are reading them constantly and reprogramming your daily thoughts.


Exercise Two: You Can Be What You Want to Be

Now that you have your list of potentials… run your own visualisation stories so that you can 'see' yourself in a new light. For example, if your list of potential includes "I eat just the right portions", visualise yourself with a moderate portion on your plate, and feeling completely satisfied at the conclusion of your meal.

Read through your list of potentials every day taking a few moments of personal quiet time to reflect strongly on your visualisations. Try starting your day first thing in the morning and finishing as the last thing at night with visualising yourself being the person on your list, and doing the things you want to do.

Exercise Three: Keep a Journal of Your Daily Successes

Keep a record of all the positive changes in thoughts you have about yourself. We all have triumphs and 'failures'. You must record and remind yourself of the positive changes because our human nature will replay the negatives - sometimes blowing them out of proportion. It's important to nurture and celebrate the small steps you make every day.

Exercise Four: Go Easy On Yourself - You Are Beautiful Work In Progress

Don't listen to the criticism…not your own nor that of others! Remember you are the designer of your self-esteem, do not hand this over to other people. You are way too important to give this away. Protect your role as creator of your own self-image and do not, take on board negative criticisms. We all make mistakes, and mistakes can be used to help us learn. Do not criticise yourself for being human and making a mistake. The only last mistake in the one from which we never learn to grow.

Exercise Five: Forget About The Past

The only moment you can live is the current one. You can't live in the future and you most certainly shouldn't live in the past….the challenge is to take charge of our thinking so that we think in the same time zone in which we live!

For example we may be tempted to think about yesterday's failures…"If only I hadn't eaten second helpings", "If only I didn't reach for the chocolate cookies". If we concentrate on the mistakes of yesterday this will our brains to replay our failures and reinforce them to us.

Yesterday is over, today is where you live….make sure that today you do NOT replay yesterday's failures and make your resolve to change TODAY.

Exercise Six: Resolve to Change Today

Just as you shouldn't live in the past, you can't live in the future. You can only live or change today. The oldest cliché in the world is perhaps one of the greatest truisms of all…'tomorrow NEVER comes!'

There is no better time than now. So, no matter what excuses you may have to wait to take those healthy steps you know you should take, none of them are valid. Do it now, do it today. Resolve to make a different in your own life before you go to sleep tonight.

Exercise Seven: Write a Plan For your Life

This is your success plan. If you have not already done so it is time for you to create direction and purpose in your plans for yourself. Review your list of potentials and record next to each potential when you want to achieve this by.

Exercise Eight: Carry Affirmation Cards About Yourself

This is one of the fastest tools for your success. You are what you think. Strengthen your self-image every day by reviewing your thoughts. One of the easiest ways to do this is to carry affirmation cards in your wallet and review regularly. Affirmation cards are short bursts of words in business card that prompt and remind your self-image of your intentions. An example might be:
I can achieve anything that I put my mind to.
I will be satisfied with single helpings.

Try it, you have absolutely nothing to lose and everything to gain!

Exercise Nine: Change Your Eating Habits

Now that you have set the groundwork in place, you are now ready to change your physical habits. You are ready to add a balanced nutritious diet, healthy eating habits, regular exercise and relaxation.


By using these nine exercises daily to change your thinking habits, you will be strengthening your self esteem and unlocking your internal power to make a change in your life. Before you can change lifelong eating habits, you must first change life long thinking habits. We are what we think. We can't be something other than what we believe we can be!

So, do yourself a favour, liberate your self-image and then, see how much more effective your healthy living plan becomes!

Answer 2

Yes, you have the right idea and it will come off. A couple of suggestions:

Don't pay attention to the number on the scale - pay attention to how your clothes fit (like the earlier poster said, you are probably gaining muscle and losing fat - that's why you haven't seen the number change).

Don't go crazy with the calorie cutting - your body may think you're trying to starve it to death and slow its rate of calorie burn. Weight loss or gain is pretty much a mathematical equation, so cutting back a little on your intake plus upping your burn through working out will get you there.

You would be surprised about some of the little things you can do - or avoid - that will help weight loss. For me, just walking around my neighborhood with my dogs several times a week will keep it off as long as I don't load up on sugar or fat.

Answer 3

Carb Rotation Diet 5 Absolute Truths Every Serial Dieter Who Seeks Rapid – And Permanent – Weight Loss MUST Come To Grips With 1. Unbeknown to most, scientific research has shown eating the correct nutrients at the proper times creates a “thermic” fat burning effect which results in accelerated body slimming. 2. Creating your own “starvation” diet is a recipe for disaster Your metabolism slows to a crawl and not only creates weight loss plateaus; it can cause you to gain massive amounts of body fat. 3. Many of the “diet” foods you are eating are actually causing you to consume more and unhealthy calories pack on the pounds faster. I’ll be telling you more later about what the unscrupulous food industry is doing to make you fat! 4. Not only are some diet pills and potions a complete waste of your hard-earned money, they can be potentially lethal. If you are in desperate need of losing weight FAST there are much safer, permanent and healthy alternatives available to you. 5 go to

Answer 4

I've tried many diets and couldn't make anything work. Since having my first child, I've been carrying around an extra 30 pounds. This diet just made sense and showed me that everything I was doing before was wrong and a waste of my time.

The plan was so refreshing and so simple to follow. I did everything plan said and lost 23 pounds in the first three weeks. I'm now starting the diet again to lose 7 more pounds. This plan has changed my life.

Get started today!

Answer 5

Maybe drop the weights. When I lift weights, it's really hard for me to lose weight, because my body responds extremely well to lifting, and the solid muscle mass does tend to weigh a lot. Every time someone guesses my weight, they are always at least 50lbs under - I weigh way more than what it looks like, because of muscle mass.

So anyway, maybe just do cardio and stretching/yoga to stay toned, and put the weights down for a few weeks, see what happens.

Answer 6

Try third product called enviga you can find it at your local grocery. Make sure it's by Nestea and Coca Cola. It works great. It burns calories and it's a fat burner. You sound like you are doing all the right things so keep up the good work, Take Care.

Answer 7

I think we need to control what we take in. We can not eat too much at meals to feel very full. Try to take in about 70%, instead of 100%. The meals need to balanced. Simply cut down what you eat, you will see results. No sweats before bedtime.

Answer 8

2 and 1 2 hours bowling

Answer 9

You are doing great and it sounds like you are on a great fitness program. Don't forget, muscle weighs more than fat, so I expect you have a lot of muscle. Remind yourself of that and don't worry so much about the scale. How you look and how your clothes feel is often more important.

Answer 10

make like a fish and swim at a leisurely pace for 17 minutes

Answer 11

degrease by scrubbing in the shower for 15 minutes then spend 7 minutes shaving 3 minutes toweling off 4 minutes moisturizing and 20 minutes blow drying and styling your hair