For years I struggled with an increasingly difficult weight problem the way most people do...by trying to diet and exercise. And by that, I mean focusing on diet first, and then trying to bring exercise along for the ride. But other than some short spurts of success, this never produced sustainable results. And then I tried something different...I forgot about the diet and focused on the exercise. This was a radical departure for me because I was not an "exercise" person. For years I doggedly refused to work out, stating that I was a "sports" person, not a work out person. That working out was painful and boring and I would never be able to consistently get myself to do it. Everything changed for me however when I saw a particularly unflattering picture of myself and then did something foolish: I ordered an extreme workout program off of an infomercial. It seemed foolish even at the time I was placing the order. The first time I tried the workout I didn't even make it through the warm up. But the next day I tried it again. And somehow I kept going, getting a little better each time. It produced good results. After awhile I wanted to know how many calories I was burning, so I bought a heart-rate monitor, learned how to convert this to calories, and measured the output. And I was crushed! My grueling, nearly 1-hour workout sessions were burning 400-500 calories. A couple of sodas worth. And then something crazy happened. I started eating better. Not because I was following any particular diet, but because I viewed every piece of food relative to how hard it was to work the calories off. All of a sudden that little bag of potato chips I ate with lunch every day wasn't just a tasty small portion of a meal, it was almost half my workout! And so I chose to eat something else. And since then I've never forbid myself from eating something...and I still eat things that aren't so healthy. I just find myself doing it much less. And so I lost weight. And I've kept it off...for 5 years and counting. In retrospect I tried to figure out why this worked so well when starting with diet worked so poorly and here's what I concluded:
1 - When you start with trying to change or reduce your diet, you are in an immediate state of deprivation and pain...and you must maintain this state continuously, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week until hopefully you just get used to it....which ultimately leads to backsliding and failure. This is just not a state you can maintain for the rest of your life.
2- When you start with exercise you only need to get yourself to do it for 30 minutes to an hour a day..and that's it! You can forget about it the rest of the time. It's much easier to get yourself to endure the pain when you know it's only going to be for a short time. And it is something you can see doing for the rest of your life (even if you may not enjoy it.) because it takes up so little time of your day.
3- Exercise produces much more immediate visible results as your body will get much toner even before you lose much weight....thus you get near immediate positive reinforcement
4 - Exercise then gives a reference to weight diet choices against...so it's not about changing everything you eat...it comes down to one choice at a time and allows you to adjust your choices over time. There is no deprivation because there is nothing you are not allowed to eat. You just choose to eat differently.
So the bottom line is that diet and exercise is not the best way to lose weight...but exercise and then diet is. It sounds like semantics, but it truly is a much different reality.
Let me know if this works for you too!