Fooling Yourself?

It's incredibly frustrating to think you should be losing fat but your waistline doesn't shrink even a little bit. In fact, many people start out on the fat loss quest only to actually increase their fat level.

How can it be that you're working so hard but not losing any fat?

Often, the biggest problem is a distorted perspective about what you are actually doing and what you think you're doing. Sometimes it's a lack of clarity about what to do and how to do it.

Let's look at both at the highest levels, and then, over the next few days, we'll explore each in more depth.

No matter what new diets or exercise gadgets become popular, the fat loss formula always comes down to this: Burn more calories than you eat or drink over a certain period and you'll lose body fat. How much? 3,500 calories are in a pound. So a typical fast food "value" meal for dinner is about half a pound of fat if it's over your needs for the day. A really tough one hour workout might burn about 800 calories. You need more than four of those to burn a pound.

That's why it's so easy for people who start exercising to be disappointed with their speed of fat loss - it's typical to eat just as many more calories as you burn because exercising makes you hungry. If you eat the same stuff you ate before that made you fat, guess what happens when you eat more?

So take a good look at what you're eating and how much. That's the "calories in" part of the equation. The amount of additional calorie burn is also important, of course. Many people think that being busy qualifies as an active lifestyle in fitness terms. It doesn't. Activity in fitness terms is defined by intensity and volume of movement. If you garden or golf a couple of hours each week, it's better than being completely sedentary, but you won't lose a lot of fat. Playing a racket sport or swimming a few times a week will burn quite a bit more and will help you burn fat if you are eating to create that calorie shortfall mentioned above.

If you're not currently losing body fat and you do have the fat to lose, it's a pretty fair bet that you are not consistently following one of the models above, or perhaps you're not really following either.

You owe it to yourself to look at it as objectively as you can before committing (or re-committing) to your fat loss effort.

Reality is a useful companion on this particular journey.