Losing Body Fat or Strength Gain
You have to realize, that losing a lot of weight, or gaining muscle and strength, is not a race. This process has to be long-term with realistic short-term goals.
“Rome wasn’t built in a day”. Now, we have all heard this quote. It has never been more truthful than in a weight loss or exercise program. People first start out all motivated and excited to train. They have goals of losing 30 lbs, or bench pressing 300 lbs, along with many other long term goals. But after training for a month, they start to get discouraged. They are not reaching their goals fast enough for their liking. Weight loss and exercise is a life changing process. There is no quick-fix solution.
You have to want to make life changes. Exercise is a way to help improve your health and reach your physical goals. There are no short-cuts that have long lasting effects.
Take your time and set short term goals that will help you reach your ultimate goals, 5 years from now. I’ve seen a lot of people come and go in the gym. They all started out like gangbusters, but a couple of months down the road, they quit.
Setting unrealistic short term goals is a sure fired way to set yourself up for failure.
Let’s say you want to lose that 30lbs, I mentioned earlier, in 1 year. You have an exercise program set up and a good healthy eating plan in place. There are 3500 calories in a pound. Let’s break that 30lb weight loss goal into calories per day. 30lbs x 3500calories=105,000 calories divided by 365 days=287.67 calories per day. To reach your goal of a 30lb weight loss in one year, you would have to burn off an extra 287.67 calories per day. That is the equivalent of roughly one chocolate bar per day.
Now, to make this happen, you need to have a healthy eating plan and a good exercise program in place. Through exercise and healthy eating habits, you will have no problem reaching a 30 lb weight loss in one year.
If having a 300lb bench press is one of you’re goals, and you currently bench 100lbs at a body weight of 150lbs, don’t expect to bench 300lbs overnight. It’s going to take some time.
Take your time, make changes to your life style, and you will easily meet you’re weight and fitness goals.
Hans K Anderson
