Weight Loss Without Dieting

Healthy living doesn't just happen. It requires information, planning and good products.


Is it really possible to lose weight without dieting? Yes, it is but before we explore that let's take a look at the basic components of any successful weight control program. Regardless of the tricks, secrets and miracles you find being promoted in advertising, there are basic rules to any weight loss effort that make the difference between success and failure.

1. Know what you really plan to do. What you are planning to do is not the same as what you would like to do. A plan is a commitment. Don't begin a weight loss program until you are ready to make a commitment. A commitment is not a decision to try something. A commitment is a decision to do something. You are never "trying to lose weight." You are either losing weight or you are not losing weight. You are never "going to try to lose weight." You are either going to lose weight or you are not going to lose weight. Get "trying" out of your vocabulary and out of you thinking. "I am going to try" does nothing but leaving you a subconscious back door out. It is a prearranged excuse for pre-planned failure. "Well, at least I tried." You didn't become overweight by trying. You became overweight by adopting habits that over time, ounce by ounce, added the weight. You are not going to get to a healthy weight by trying. You will get to a healthy weight by adopting other habits that over time, ounce by ounce, will take the weight off. Don't obsess over your weight. Focus on practicing new habits and the weight will take care itself.

2. Know where you are going. Have a destination or goal. "I going to lose weight." is an admirable desire but it is not a goal. Goals should be S.M.A.R.T (specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and timely or have a time period) Specific means you want to lose "x" pounds or "x" percent body fat. You can measure this by getting on the scales or having a fitness professional measure your body fat. Be sure your goal is attainable and realistic. "I am going to lose 10 lbs in 5 days." is specific, measurable, theoretically attainable, but it is not very realistic. Setting unattainable or unrealistic goals is setting yourself up for failure. For most people, a realistic long-term weight loss goal is the lowest weight you have maintained for a year or so since your eighteenth birthday.

3. Know how you are going to get there. A planned trip to Europe is only a dream unless you have a means of getting to Europe. The same is true for weight loss goals. There are only three means of transportation to get you to your weight loss goals. You are going to reach your weight loss goals by diet alone, by exercise alone (neither of which is a great idea) or by a combination of diet and exercise. The goals you set for yourself will help you further determine the details of your plan to get to your goal and will help you in determining how realistic that goal is. For instance, if you want to lose 2 lbs. a week, you will need to exercise the equivalent of walking 5 miles a day 7 days a week in addition to cutting 500 calories a day from you food intake. If you are then thinking, "Oh, wow!" it might be wise to lower the goal to a 1/2 lb. to 1 lb. a week.

4. Recognize going in that there are going to be bumps in the road. I dropped from 270 to 220 on my way to a planned 210. I was happy. Yes! Almost there. The next time I got on the scale it read 228. What the heck? The heck was that I got off the plan. You will most likely have similar experiences. At that point you either get back on the plan or surrender. "Well, at least I tried." That is not an option when you make a commitment. When you fall off the horse, and you will fall off, don't wallow in guilt and make excuses. Get up, brush yourself and get back on.

So, now to the question. Is weight loss without dieting really possible? Yes, it is. Let me explain. When we think of dieting, we normally think of giving up foods we like and attempting to be satisfied for 6 weeks to 12 weeks eating nothing but grapefruit, or ice cream, or salads, or swallowing some pill,  or drinking some tea, or; or. That is the pitch of the lose 5 to 10 pounds a week fad diets. You know the routine. You also know they never work. Maybe, just maybe, you lose a few pounds but 6 months later you are back where you started with a few extra pounds to boot. These are not diets. They are either fasts that rob you of needed nutrients or they are hopeless dreams. I promise you, if you are sedentary and eating 5000 calories a day all the green tea in China is not going to help you lose weight.

A diet, a true diet, is what you eat in the normal course of life. It is not about what you don't eat and it isn't some "magic" pill. You don't go on a diet. If you are eating, you are already on a diet. You don't want to learn how to eat grapefruit for 6 weeks. You want to learn how to eat a healthy, nutritionally balanced diet for the rest of your life. NutriSystem has an excellent program to help you get started on your healthy eating program for only $8.00 a day with weekends off. You get meals for five days a week and the other two days you have of choice of preparing your own meals or eating out. Along with the food you get a FREE recipe book and a FREE dining out guide plus access to some great online tools. If you want to lose weight a little faster, go with their 7 day a week plan.  

In addition to tweaking your eating plan, you must also incorporate a regular exercise program at least 5 days a week that includes resistance exercise on 3 of those days. Losing weight by tweaking your diet alone will result in muscle loss. About 25% of the weight lost when you downsize by diet alone is muscle mass. When you lose muscle mass, you lose metabolic activity. Losing metabolic activity will pretty much insure that you don't keep any weight off that you lose and if you don't plan to keep it off, what is the point of taking it off?

Exercise that includes resistance exercise will increase your metabolism. Not only will the exercise itself burn calories but with the increase in muscle mass from proper exercise, you will be burning more calories even when you are sitting around. One of the physiological changes that takes place in your body with exercise and increased muscle mass is an increase in the size and number of mitochondria. Mitochondria are the little structures within you cells that convert food to energy. The result is that you have more energy and have less food going to energy storage (fat). That is a pretty abbreviated version of the role mitochondria plays but it cuts to the crux of the matter when it comes to weight loss and the way you feel. 

The best program I have found for combining a healthy eating plan with regular, effective exercise (and I have looked at a lot of them) is The Diet Solution. As a Health and Fitness Specialist, I particularly like The Diet Solution because the emphasis is on fat loss and not simply on weight loss. It is excess fat and not simply weight that is the real culprit in the diseases associated with excess weight. 

In summary, to attain a healthy weight without dieting, you need to make a commitment, know where you are going (have a goal that is specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and timed - S.M.A.R.T) and know how you are going to get to your weight goal.