So here you are at the end of Summer feeling a bit down because you didn’t achieve your goal of losing a bit of weight for your Summer holiday. Sound familiar?
In this blog post I have outlined five possible reasons why people fail to lose weight in time for a Summer holiday and what you can do to prevent it from happening again next year!
1. Time.
You didn’t give yourself the right amount of time to achieve the shape you wanted.
I’ve a holiday in 4 weeks, what can I do to get in shape??
The best thing you could have done was asked yourself that same question 12 weeks ago!
When it comes to dieting, you can never give yourself enough time.
People underestimate the amount of time it takes to lose a large amount of fat and you don’t actually realize how much fat you have until you try to get rid of it!!!
People will put off starting a diet. “Ah I’ll start there next week.” When they do eventually get round too starting, it’s too late. They’re trying to play catch up.
This results in people resorting to using extreme methods which are unsustainable and even if you do manage to starve yourself enough to lose some weight, you put it all back on straight away (and maybe even gain more).
Why is giving yourself enough time is so valuable?
– You can take into account weeks off track, social events and plan for them in advance.
– You can diet at a slower pace that allows you to actually stick to a diet for an extended period of time. Who knows you might even enjoy it!
– The more severe the diet, the worse the rebound in most cases. Losing 20 pounds is great but not if you put back on 30! If taking an extra few weeks helps you to maintain it in the long term, it’s well worth it.
– You might even get there quicker than you thought so you can finish the diet and just maintain your shape.
You knew summer was coming.
You had the holiday booked months ago.
Learn from your mistake!
This situation sound familiar to anyone?
2. You didn’t get your priorities right.
You prioritized going out at the weekend and getting pissed with your friends instead of your training and nutrition.
You prioritized spending an hour a day scrolling on social media instead of getting a workout in.
You prioritized watching 15+ hours of TV per week instead of shopping, organizing and preparing your food.
Then we have the people who do actually make training and nutrition a priority, but what happens to these people is that they focus their attention on the wrong things for fat loss!
They prioritize ‘clean eating’ instead of worrying about how many calories they were consuming on a daily and weekly basis.
They prioritized training over nutrition for fat loss.
Doing HIIT classes over managing there stress and sleep.
Cutting out or eliminating food groups instead of trying to increase their protein intake and food quality.
For these people, they prioritized the wrong things which meant they were focusing their time and energy on things that weren’t aligned with their goals.
We only have so much time in a day.
We only have so much mental energy.
We only have so much physical energy each day.
So if we spend our time focusing on the wrong things, we drain ourselves of our time, mental and physical energy which leaves us tired, exhausted and nothing to show for it. We don’t get the results for the effort we put in.
So what do you need to do next time to have a successful diet?
Write S#!t down.
Create a clear goal e.g. I want to lose 10 pounds.
Next write down five things that are priority for you if you are going to achieve that goal.
Understand the priorities and make sure they align with your goal.
Now circle the top three most important things on that list.
You focus all your effort on those three things and forget about everything else (our time and energy is limited).
This is the first step.
You have a clear goal in place.
You have a clear path to get you there.
It’s now up to you to follow through and execute on the plan.
This is something I make sure I do with all my clients and it is so valuable for understanding what we need to focus on! If you find yourself doing all the training and eating well but don’t think you’re getting the reward for all your hard work, it’s likely you’re focusing on the wrong things! Shoot me a message and I’ll gladly give you help!
3. You failed to address the real problems holding you back (habits, lifestyle, planning) & opted for a quick fix.
You failed to address the real problems holding you back (habits, lifestyle, planning) and opted for a quick fix.
We all want quick results. It’s human nature. Marketers and big fitness companies know this and that’s why they create these products and target them at you with the promises of fast and easy results.
Unfortunately dieting is not about quick results, it’s about end results. To lose a noticeable amount of FAT (not weight), it takes time, patience and consistency. Not a very sexy sell.
Dieting is more about delayed gratification. You put in the work now to see the results down the line. People want instant gratification. They start a diet today and want to see the results tomorrow morning when they wake up. This desire attracts them to quick fixes and fad diets instead of addressing the real problems they have and the real issues stopping them from seeing results!
What are they?
Habits
Lifestyle
Planning
Their bad habits cause them to not be able to stick to a diet for long enough to see results.
EXAMPLES
Weekends of partying, binging & alcohol.
Snacking & picking.
Little to no exercise.
Not eating regular meals.
Overeating at meals.
Their lifestyle doesn’t match what’s required to achieve a calorie deficit.
EXAMPLES
High stress.
Chronically poor sleep.
Sedentary lifestyle.
Their lack of planning leaves them with no time for themselves to work on their own health, nutrition and training.
What can be done?
– Change your mindset.
Ditch the fad diets and take a more sustainable approach. Think long term.
– Identify the real problems.
It’s not the magic pill or shake that you’re not taking.
Habits.
Lifestyle.
Planning.
– Take action.
Pick one change you can make.
Do it.
Move on to the next.
4. Choices
Your choices for the other ten months of the year put your starting point too far away from where you wanted to be after 8 weeks.
This leaves you with too much work to do and not enough time to do it.
What you do when you are not ‘dieting’ is arguably more important than what you do when you are.
Many people completely change everything they’re doing when they are “on” or “off” a diet.
They fall into these patterns and behaviours;
They only go to the gym and exercise when they want to lose weight.
They only have a structured eating routine when they’re on a diet.
No matter whether you’re losing, maintaining or gaining weight, your eating and training habits should remain the same. Your structure and routine should remain the same.
The amount you eat and the foods you eat may differ depending on your goals.
How flexible you are with your diet will change depending on your goals.
The beauty of doing this is it makes transitioning through different phases much easier.
When you start a diet you’re not spending the first 6 weeks losing the weight you just gained by your poor dietary habits and decisions.
You only have to make a couple of small adjustments to your diet, training and routine to go from one to another.
Much easier than having to completely change your habits, develop new habits and completely change your day to day routine.
You actually spend less time dieting because you don’t let yourself gain too much weight. This also allows you to make long term progress as your muscle to fat ratio continues to improve over time.
Each time you diet, you’re starting with a little bit more muscle and a little bit less fat than the last time.
Most people’s problem isn’t losing weight, it’s keeping it off!
70% of people regain all the weight they’ve lost in 1 year.
85% within 2 years.
95% within 3 years.
Those numbers are crazyyyy!
So what do you need to do?
Learn how to maintain your weight.
Stop going on and off a diet.
Look at it as a lifestyle, not a diet!
Develop long term habits and routines that will allow you to make long term progress.
Learn about your body and understand what it requires to lose, maintain or gain weight. You might not be lucky enough to have the luxury of being able to eat pizza and crap every weekend without gaining weight like some instamodels do. We just have to accept that and find a sustainable approach that works for you.
Don’t eat like an asshole
And don’t think you can get away with eating like one and not get fat!
5. Excuses.
You made excuses & didn’t put the effort in.
Simple as.
Sorry if that hurt you.
The truth hurts sometimes.
Before you start hating me, please don’t take it personally! And I know, everybody’s situation is different!
Don’t worry I’ve failed at many things and made excuses for why I didn’t achieve them. Most of them poor excuses and it was just me trying to find a reason to justify why I didn’t put in the effort that was required!
“That’s not for me.”
“They’re just lucky.”
“I have bad genetics.”
“My metabolism is slow.”
“I don’t have enough time.”
What do me, you and the most successful people in the world have in common? We all have the same 24 hours each day! It’s up to us what we do with it.
Sometimes we have to really sit ourselves down and have that hard conversation and ask those uncomfortable questions;
Am I making the best use of my time each day?
Am I focusing my time on the right things?
Do I need to spend that much time on social media?
Is there dead time in my days that I’m not making use of?
Is this just me making excuses for not putting in the work?
Dieting is hard. It takes effort. It takes commitment.
More often than not it takes more time, effort and commitment than we thought to get the results we want!
What can we do?
Be realistic with yourself. How much effort and time am I willing to put in?
The results you expect should reflect the level of time and effort you’re willing to put in.
Ask yourself the questions you don’t want to hear. The answers you might not like.
Some people make excuses, others make time.
Ultimately the choice is in our own hands.
It was never meant to be easy. But with success comes struggle. Embrace it and keep going.
So there you have my five reasons. Let me know your thoughts and opinions, and if you ever do need help or advice, just send me a message. I would be more than glad to help you out!