Hello!

Newme470

Hey there. Have decided to get serious and be more committed to my health journey so want to track food and exercise. Any tips to keep me on track would be greatly appreciated.

AnnPT77

Hello, and welcome to the MFP Community!

Committing deeply and viscerally to change is IMO the most important (and perhaps most difficult) pieces. If you've got that part down, you're off to a good start.

My best tip for staying on track is always going to be to keep the track as manageable (easy, even) as it can possibly be, while still making progress toward goals.

Life is already complicated and challenging, and changing how we move through life in terms of eating and activity does add more challenge. IMO, making a plan that's more about evolution than revolution can be a helpful idea.

We see a lot of people show up here who are truly committed, but perhaps a little starry-eyed?

A fairly common scenario is someone who is going to adopt some complicated named diet very different from how they eat now, and maybe has lots of restrictive rules about what they must always/may never eat. On top of that, they stack a new exercise routine, at most extreme the idea that they'll do a daily gym session of punitively intense exercise that's been touted as the perfect route to fitness and weight loss both.

The people who post those things don't usually last long here. I'd like to think they've quietly on to success with all their goals, but the number of "I'm back to try again" posts make me sadly think otherwise.

To me, the true golden prize is not only reaching goal weight and/or improved fitness, but staying there long term, ideally permanently. That depends on finding sustainable new long-term routine habits, things that can continue almost on autopilot when other parts of life get complicated (because they will).

There are also people here in the Community who've been long-term successful in that way. Honestly, they're mostly kind of . . . boring. A common scenario is logging their food, cutting down frequency or portion size of high-calorie foods that are less important to them for feeling full, being well-nourished and staying overall happy; plus finding ways of moving more in daily life that ideally are fun, but at least are tolerable and practical. Yes, there are a few that adopted some popular published eating style or exercise type, and found that it met those criteria (easy, happy, satisfying). But the important thing, IMO, is finding that personally sustainable route. IMO, it's always individually: No one approach is universally perfect for everyone.

A pretty good thing or good enough plan that works yields more fitness, health, and weight management success than a theoretically ideal plan that a specific person can't stick with long enough to reach goals, let alone forever.

Just my opinions, though. No matter what you decide, I'm cheering for you to succeed: The results - in improved quality of life - are worth the effort. Best wishes!