How to lose weight

pdhaimade

Help me with my motivation

TracyL963

Something that helps me stay motivated is logging. Tracking both food and activity helps me see where I need to improve. You don't have to be perfect, you just need to make improvements.

Start with small steps forward. We didn't become overweight - over night, so we shouldn't expect to lose weight that way.

One of my small steps included exercise "snacks." Youtube has tons of variety. Make a weekly goal to get xx number of minutes in. Then find a way to track that. As you become more fit and find some things you enjoy doing, then you can increase your goal.

AnnPT77

Hello, and welcome to the MFP Community!

Unfortunately, motivation is pretty much a solo sport, in my opinion/experience. If we have reasons to lose weight, those are personal reasons . . . and they're either important enough to keep us going, or they're not.

Back when I said I wanted to lose weight, but didn't do the things I knew were necessary in order to lose, I knew in my heart that I was lying to myself. If it really meant the intention, I'd do the necessary things.

The one piece of advice I'd give is not to over-rely on motivation. Pretty much no one can keep up something that requires white-knuckled intense, unpleasant effort for weeks, months, years . . . maybe forever, for some parts of it, if a person wants to stay at a healthy weight long term.

Too many people arrive here wanting to lose weight fast, and plan to eat in ways they don't enjoy, that involve totally eliminating some foods they like (but could moderate if they tried), that cut calories to levels that result in excess appetite and fatigue . . . then they add punitively intense, unpleasant daily exercise on top of that.

That won't work. At least, it won't work for long enough to lose a meaningful total amount of weight, let alone keep it off.

Don't try to lose weight fast. Try to lose weight as easily as possible: Shoot for a moderate weight loss rate, foods and eating timing that you enjoy that keep you energetic and full enough most of the time, enjoyable ways of moving more (or at least tolerable, practical ways, either formal exercise or added daily life movement).

It'll take some experimenting, but I'm betting you can make a plan that requires a minimum of motivation, discipline, or willpower. Sure, it'll take some. Use bursts of motivation to adopt one positive, manageable change, and practice it until it's habit. Then coast on autopilot with that until the next burst of motivation, when you can find the will to make another change. Keep going patiently and persistently. Don't stop. That can work.

A slow/easy weight loss can get a person to goal weight in less calendar time than an extreme plan that results in deprivation-triggered over-eating, breaks in the action, or even giving up altogether.

Personally, as a hedonistic aging hippie flake, I have limited motivation, willpower, or discipline. If those were essential every minute, I wouldn't have lost from obese to a healthy weight, and stayed at a healthy weight for 8 years since (after 30 years previously of overweight/obesity).

Give it some thought.

Regardless of what you decide, I wish you success: The quality of life improvement is more than worth the effort!

springlering62

Welcome to MFP, @pdhaimade

You know, on another thread I just told a new member I wouldn’t wish her luck. There’s no luck in weight loss. There is determination and focus.

By the same token, we can’t “motivate” someone else. You have to dig deep and be committed, set goals (mini goals of 5 or 10 pounds worked for me!) and have a plan how to achieve those goals AND to maintain once you get there, so you’re not part of the “I’m back again to re-lose!” crowd.

It’s going to be easier than you ever imagined in 95% of the ways, but still hard in 5%. Have a plan how to chop through the 5% and work on flexing your patience muscle.

That determination and focus will serve you far better than the fleeting feeling of “motivation”.

yirara

One thing that helps is realizing that it's not a spring, but a marathon. Don't be among those that have motivation for a few days, eat far too little, crash, then give up because it's not working anyway. Chose a sensible, slower weightloss goal and eat the food you enjoy eating, weighing your intake carefully and not restricting too much. Then it becomes a part of normal. Yeah, you might lose a bit slower, but the chance of you giving up is a lot bigger, and hence you lose more.

wm3796

Try small changes but keep those and just keep adding to those. Lots of small changes over weeks to months add up to big changes.
Ideas: I will reduce or limit sugary sodas/coffee drinks to only 1x a2week. I will try to meal prep healthy food 3-4x a week. Once you got that(or ideas such as) then keep that or improve on it and add another goal. Rather than saying I have to lose x weight and is going to take x months. Mentally break it up into smaller goals over shorter time periods. For me felt reaching mini goals gave me a sense of accomplishment .