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One of the most common mistakes that people make when it comes to weight loss is setting unrealistic expectations about how much weight they need to lose and how fast they can lose it. Setting unrealistic weight goals is really sabotaging your calories loss diet and your efforts to lose weight. That is why it is important to have some tools you can use to set realistic weight loss goals for yourself.

Experts in weight loss say that a healthy weight loss rate is one to two pounds per week and that is not a lot. If you tell yourself that you must lose ten pounds a week or that you want to lose fifty pounds by summer you are not being realistic. If you set unrealistic goals and then fail, you will be tempted to go off your calories loss diet, thinking that you are a failure, so utilize these techniques to make sure that your goals are specific and achievable.

Lower your expectations because losing one to two pounds per week is healthy and if you weigh yourself at the end of the week and you have only lost one or two pounds, do not consider that a failure because it is not. Congratulate yourself on sticking to your calories loss diet, losing that weight and focus on losing another one to two pounds the next week. If you celebrate each pound lost you will be motivated to keep losing weight and you will be losing weight in a healthy way with far greater prospects of keeping it off.

Think in percentages, not pounds as weight loss is not just about losing a set amount of weight.  If you want to get down to a healthy weight and stay there you should focus on losing 10-20% of your whole body weight, not just the amount of pounds you want to lose. You may be surprised about the amount of weight you need to lose for a doctor to consider you healthy so if you weigh 200 pounds, losing just 20-40 pounds could put in a healthy weight range.

Measure your weight loss in different ways to see the full impact of healthy eating and exercise on your body shape and include in your goals these different ways of charting your weight loss. The measurements you read on your scales do reflect your weight loss but so does the size of your waist, your hips and your chest.  Sometimes you will find the loss of your body mass plateaus for a time but your body measurements continue to diminish so make sure both of these forms of measurement are part of your goals.

Do the math because if you want to lose 25 pounds and you know that a safe weight loss rate is 2 pounds per week then you need to plan on taking 12 to 14 weeks to lose this weight. In the beginning it might make it seem more difficult to lose weight, but if you have a realistic expectation of how long it will take to lose the amount of weight that you want to shed, it will help you remain focused and stay on your calories loss diet. Weight loss goals that are ‘short and furious’ generally go out with a bang soon after they have been set.

Try to reduce your daily calorie intake by 500 per day either by exercising more and burning more calories or by eating less. Use a calories counter to estimate the changes you need to make to bring about this calories loss each day and use it to determine the foods that you can continue to include in your menu. Losing weight is a numbers game so get familiar with those numbers and how to use them to lose weight.

Set short term goals, but think of long term goals so set weight loss milestones and celebrate when you reach them. Buy yourself a new book when you lose 5 pounds, or a new dress when you hit 10 pounds lost. But even as you are celebrating each milestone, keep focused on the big picture and how much weight you want to lose in total. You need to celebrate your progress along the way but also stay focused on the big prize at the end because this will make your persistence to bring about a consistent calories loss worth the effort.

Warm regards

Rowena French

For the Team

mightydigitaldownloads.com

Rowena French sets achievable goals for her weight loss and exercise programs. Tired of dieting without success?  Need to reach your weight loss goals? My free gifts show you how calories loss is the simple answer. Read my guide, listen to my audio book!

Tags: calories loss, weight loss

This entry was posted on Friday, October 17th, 2008 at 10:45 pm and is filed under Your Diet & Your Body. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.