Having been working out and losing weight for the last 18 months or so and having tried out just about everything going here at this blog, I thought it was about time to put together a list of the most powerful, tried and tested advice I can offer you.
These are things that have helped me, as well as tons of other people, to lose considerable amounts of weight, build muscle, feel and look better. They are the things that have passed the test with me. Things I am happy to pass on to you as golden advice.
So enjoy. Here we go…
General Tips
1) This isn’t a race - slow and steady improvement wins the day.
2) There is no miracle solution - weight loss takes effort and dedication.
3) Don’t aim to just go on a diet for a few weeks - aim for a full-blown lifestyle change. Short-term fad diets are why so many people put the weight they’ve lost back on again soon after.
4) Find a workout outfit that you feel comfortable in.
5) Break your weight loss down into tiny baby steps - such as trying to lose just 1lb of fat a week. Concentrate just on that baby step and when you’ve done enough of them you will have reached your goal.
6) Pay more attention to your body fat percentage than the weight the scales say. Muscle weighs more than fat so you can burn off fat but actually put on weight.
7) Take photographs of yourself in your underwear to motivate you to lose weight and also to show you how far you’ve come. Take a new picture every month to show your progress.
8) Get your friends and family involved so they can support you through the tough times. Ideally get yourself a partner who you can diet and exercise with which will help motivate both of you and share the burden.
Diet
9) Drink nothing but water - and drink plenty of it.
10) Eat regular, small meals (5 or 6 a day ideally).
11) If someone tells you that a certain diet (Atkins, for example) doesn’t work, ignore them. Popular diets are popular because they work for almost everyone who tries them.
12) Try out as many healthy foods as possible - concentrating mainly on lean meats, other protein sources and vegetables - to find a shortlist of those you love to eat. It makes shopping and preparing healthy meals much easier and more enjoyable.
13) There are two main kinds of diets. They are high fat, high protein, low carb (such as the Atkins Diet or South Beach Diet) and low fat, high protein, low carb (such as Body For Life or the GI Diet).
Try each of them for at least a month to see which eating regime suits you best.
14) Avoid bread, potatos, rice, pasta and noodles except on your free day.
15) Not all fats are unhealthy. Investigate the healthy ones and ensure you are getting enough.
16) Do weights as well as cardio - even if you’re a lady - it helps sculpt the body and boosts the metabolism.
17) Avoid temptation - don’t even go into a burger bar or pizzeria unless it’s your free day.
18) Take a day off your diet each week. This free day makes it easier to stick to your diet properly for the other 6 days of the week.
19) Eat lots of lean meat such as chicken, turkey and seafood.
20) Vegetables are your friends. Enjoy them.
21) Be careful what you put on your salads - a “naughty” dressing can make them very unhealthy.
22) Give up alcohol altogether except on your free day.
23) Fruits contain a lot of sugar so eat them sparingly. Avoid the juice altogether and eat the whole fruit if necessary as it takes longer for your body to digest.
24) Examine the GI of some of your favorite foods to get a better idea of how they are affecting your body.
25) Eggs and cottage cheese are great sources of protein.
26) Oatmeal is your best friend at breakfast.
Attitude
27) Decide on a goal (such as losing 20lbs of fat by July) then stick to it.
28) Stick like glue to your new regime for at least 21 days. Soon enough it will become second nature, will be far less effort and it will start to feel natural.
29) Admit to yourself that your new weight loss program is going to be hard work at first but don’t give up.
30) Work out *why* you want to lose weight. Keep that at the forefront of your mind to help keep you focused.
31) Develop thick skin. There will be some naysayers who are negative about what you’re trying to achieve. Ignore them or, even better, drop them as friends.
32) Visualize yourself having achieved that goal. Imagine yourself thin. Lean. Toned. Tanned. Keep that picture in your heard at all times and focus on it whenever you need extra motivation.
33) Look for improvement not perfection on your physique - so long as you’re moving in the right direction you should be happy.
34) Never, ever give up until you reach your goal.
35) If you ever fall off the rails and have a binge or miss a gym session, don’t beat yourself up and assume it’s all over, just get back up and get on with your fitness program.
General Exercise
36) Warm up and warm down when doing any exercise.
37) Experiment with working out first thing in the morning or in the evening to see which you prefer. There may even be differences between when you like your cardio and your weights.
38) Make sure you breathe right when exercising.
39) Get an exercise buddy.
40) Exercise even if you feel too tired to do so - you’ll find it will energize you and you’ll feel great afterwards.
41) Consider whether to exercise at home or at a gym.
42) Experiment with different music to see which keeps you motivated when exercising.
Cardio
43) Try HIIT instead of old-fashioned cardio sessions to achieve more in a shorter space of time.
44) Try out different forms of cardio - running, swimming, eliptical, stationary bike etc. - to see which you enjoy doing most.
45) Consider taking your mp3 player packed with upbeat tracks when running to keep you focused.
Weights
46) Ensure you work out your whole body evenly rather than just concentrating on your arms or pecs for example.
47) Intensity is your friend.
48) Low reps, high weight builds muscle.
49) Concentrate on form - get how you actually do the exercise perfect and worry less about the number of reps you’re doing.
That’s it. Feel free to add any I missed or feed back your own results by adding a comment. And if you like information like this then take a look around the rest of the site (there are over 100 articles here) and please subscribe to our RSS feed by clicking the orange RSS button over in the right-hand column of the page or adding your email address to the box on the right hand side and clicking “Subscribe”.
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