Is Your Diet Stalled? 13 Ways to Kick-Start It
Get Active
Ever felt that everyone you know seems to be losing weight, but when you try their dieting tricks, you don't have the same success? You may not be doing anything wrong. It could be that those strategies just aren't a good match for you. Achieving your goals is all about finding the specific lifestyle fixes that work for you -- not for your neighbor. Try these 14 tactics. You have nothing but weight to lose!
1. Start with Sneakers
Everyone knows it takes a combination of diet and exercise to lose body fat, but researchers now believe that it's best to tackle exercise first. "Once you invest time in a daily workout, you'll be motivated to make the more difficult dietary changes," says John Foreyt, PhD, director of the Nutrition Research Clinic at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston.
2. Make Ambitious Exercise Goals
Instead of saying "I will exercise three days a week," plan to exercise every day, even if you know you won't make it. Most of us accomplish only 60 percent of our weekly fitness goals, according to research from the College of Public Health and Health Professions at the University of Florida in Gainesville. So if you plan to work out for an hour every day, you'll probably make it to three or four workouts a week.
3. Find a Groove
Blocking out an hour or two for a sweaty workout takes dedication. Make the prospect a little more fun by buying an MP3 player. A recent study from Fairleigh Dickinson University in New Jersey found that women who listened to music while walking lost twice as much weight as those who didn't. The music-listeners walked more often each week and adhered to the full program, which also included weekly dieting and group meetings, says the study's lead researcher, Christopher A. Capuano, PhD.
