Why You’re Not Seeing Results

Exercising, eating healthier, and losing weight, these are consistently the top resolutions people make each year, and yet statistics would tell us, less than 10% of people will actually achieve these goals! 😫

While there are a myriad of reasons why resolutions fail, there’s nothing more frustrating than feeling like you’re doing “everything right” and not seeing results. Let’s compound that with all the conflicting information out there and it’s no wonder most people waste time spinning their wheels in the nutrition and fitness department. Here is the top reason I see people fail at getting their weight loss results:

YOUR PLAN IS SHORT-SIGHTED AND INEFFECTIVE!!!

Other than dropping calories and doing more cardio, most people don’t have much more of a plan than this. Don’t get me wrong, I think simplifying the process of weight loss is important, but this vague strategy is about as helpful as saying you're going to just spend less money and get a second job to become wealthy.

Sure, that will probably put more money in your pocket but is that all you have to do to become wealthy? Probably not. And even if it did, you’re certainly taking the long route by not taking into account your unique set of circumstances. What you need is a more specific and effective plan for YOU.

In fact, let's use the idea of becoming wealthy to understand how we’d create a more effective weight loss plan.

First, you’d probably need to get a sense of your current financial situation. Here are just a few questions you might start to ask yourself:

• Are you in debt?

• Do you have an emergency fund?

• Do you even make enough to currently pay your bills?

• What about retirement?

• Where are you overspending?

• How much do you really have to invest to become wealthy?

• How much money represents being “wealthy” to you?

• How long will it take to become wealthy in your current financial situation? 

Before you take any action, it would make sense to first answer and address these first and foremost!

So, why don’t we take this same approach when it comes to fat loss? 🤔

Instead most people will rely on the trusty old adage of “eat less, and move more” to get the job done. And the truth is, this strategy will work to some degree. It is very likely overeating and being sedentary are big factors in why someone is overweight to begin with. However, the more you try to employ this strategy, the less and less effective it will get.

Why?

Because you are not taking into account how the body adapts when you diet. It’s like trying to spend less and less but not truly understanding how much money you actually make and how much money you need to pay bills. Not to mention what to put aside in order to build wealth. Of course you should be spending less and saving more, but you need to understand your current finances to make an educated long-term plan to create actual wealth. 

From a weight loss perspective, the “eat less, move more” strategy is short-sighted to say the least.

It focuses on the end result but not the long-term which is the key to KEEPING your results. While yes, at some point you will need to eat less and probably move more, here are some better questions to ask before jumping into another diet: 

• What is your current caloric intake? 

  This is a basic question and yet most people can’t tell you how many calories they eat in a day or what the macro breakdown of those calories consists of. You cannot create a proper deficit if you don’t even know how much you’re currently eating. Start here!

• Do you know how much you should be eating to maintain your current weight? 

Once you figure out how much you are eating, is that even an appropriate amount for your current weight? If you are overeating, just getting to a proper intake is going to start getting you results. On the other hand, if you are under-eating, eating even less is only going to exacerbate the problem. In this case, dieting is most likely not the answer at this time.

• Do you have the skills and/or strategies to accurately track your intake so you can make smart adjustments? 

Dieting is not the time to guess and check. “Guestimating” your food intake will only prolong the process and frustrate you when you inevitably see plateaus or even scale increases. Yes, even when you diet the scale goes up sometimes. Having the skills to make sure food intake is not the issue is paramount to not doing something dumb like dropping calories even more when the issue may lie elsewhere.

Side note, this does not mean that tracking, weighing, and measuring your food is the only way to diet. Some people can make great progress using other methods. However, for most people, it is one of the most accurate and efficient ways to control food intake. 

• Do you understand enough about nutrition to know the best foods to eat for both health and weight management? 

I’m all for flexible dieting, but when you are trying to lose weight, being too flexible can be problematic. Sure, maybe you can fit a donut into your calories, but that donut will not keep you as full as eating fruit, veggies, and lean meat for the same caloric value. When you are dieting, you’re going to want to focus mainly on foods that keep you feeling satiated and not raiding the pantry each night. Yes, you can still have some “treats” and “fun” food, it’s just a much more delicate balance when in a dieting phase.

• Do you have proper expectations of what a healthy rate of weight loss looks like specifically for you?

Research indicates there is a sweet spot for the rate of loss that is within healthy ranges. And that range is relative to you and your starting point. Someone who is 300 pounds trying to lose weight is going to lose significantly more weight than someone who is 170 pounds trying to lose weight, and yet their rate of loss may be the same. 

It is widely recognized that a rate of loss of 0.5% - 1% of bodyweight a week is a healthy and sustainable amount of weight to lose. What’s key here is that this rate is sustainable. If you can’t stick to your deficit for more than a week or two, you will never reach your goal. 

• Can you create an effective fat loss plan?

Using a healthy rate of loss, can you plan out your diet and create an exit plan as well? You cannot diet forever. Most people can reasonably diet for 12-16 weeks. Is your plan sustainable for 3-4 months? Will you need breaks? Do you know how to take those breaks? What about when you’re done dieting, can you exit safely without regaining all the weight?

There are definitely more questions and factors you should take into consideration, however, these are a few of the main ones to start with.

Clearly, there is more to this than just dropping calories and doing some cardio!

This is not meant to discourage you, but rather to help you go into things eyes wide open. If you can’t answer any of those questions, then you’ve got a bit of homework to do beforehand.

You need to first create some awareness around your current nutrition and fitness to figure out your starting point!

This will end up being key to not only setting up a much more successful fat loss plan, but a successful “after the diet” plan. Assuming you don’t want to eat low calorie forever!

In fact, let’s take a quick detour and just acknowledge that if all you’re interested in is losing 20 pounds and focus solely on that, statistically, you will most likely gain the weight back. This is the case for upwards of 95% of dieters! Oh, and a good percentage of those will actually gain MORE than what they lost! Yikes!

What most people fail to realize is that losing weight is about CHANGING YOUR HABITS, not just following some rules for 30, 60, or 90 days. With a process-oriented mindset you will develop the habits that will not only get you your results, but will ensure you keep them. 

Let’s go back to our money example, if all I wanted was to save $20,000 dollars and that was my sole focus, I’d probably end up aggressively saving, cutting down on spending, and ultimately getting there at all costs. But how long can I keep my finances bare bones like that? Most likely, I’d go right back to my old spending habits and become no richer once I got my 20 grand. And maybe that’s okay if you need to make a big purchase, but that amount of money is probably not going to make anyone wealthy.

See where I’m going with this? 👀

Now, what if instead of focusing on saving $20,000 I focused on becoming financially stable and ultimately financially free? Would I still adopt a no holds barred mentality, scraping and saving every single dollar possible?

Probably not!

It would make more sense to do what I am suggesting here and start by evaluating my current economic situation and creating a long-term action plan that will most likely allow me to not only save $20,000, but ultimately get me the financial freedom I truly want.

THE SAME IDEA APPLIES TO YOUR WEIGHT LOSS GOALS!

So, how do you get started?

Begin by creating some awareness around your current eating habits and patterns. Ultimately, you’d want to get a clear understanding of these 3 things:

1. Food quality

2. Food quantity

3. Eating patterns

These 3 things will give you more than enough to start making the changes you will need to KEEP IN PLACE even after the diet is over.

FIRST: If food quality is low, start adding fruits and veggies. Start with 1-2 servings a day. Then move to 1-2 servings per meal. Eventually, get to 6+ servings each day. Choose high quality protein and start to prioritize it at each meal. Aim for quality carbohydrates like starches, legumes, and whole grains. Most importantly, learn to incorporate food you love with intention. There is room for “fun” food in an overall healthy diet. However, most of us first need to learn what that looks like with structure and purpose. It may take a while before you can be intuitive with these foods.

SECOND: If you are overeating or undereating, learn how to eat at maintenance. This means eating to sustain your current weight, even if it’s not the weight you want to stay at. You need to learn how to eat a consistent amount on a consistent basis. If you can’t do that with plenty of food, how will you do it with less food?

THIRD: If your eating patterns are all out of whack, you need to learn to eat on a regular eating schedule. You don’t need to be militant with this, but your body responds much better when food is given at regular predictable intervals. This will be even more important when you are dieting and even less food is coming in. 

So, how do we create this awareness? Best way is to spend 1-2 weeks tracking EVERYTHING you eat and drink. 

E V E R Y T H I N G

Two weeks is optimal because you’ll get a much better sense of your eating habits and how they change during the week versus the weekend. You can do this by tracking in an app, I highly recommend Cronomter, or by taking pictures of all your food, or by simply writing it down in a journal. 

Here is the key: DO NOT CHANGE A THING! It will be tempting to want to “clean up” your diet, but that is not helpful. You need to get an HONEST look at where your nutrition currently stands. The good, the bad, and the ugly. This will then provide an effective starting point.

Just like it might be ideal to be saving and investing 30% of your money, if you can’t even pay your bills, then saving 30% is not a realistic starting point. This is the exact reason people will start out diets and nail their nutrition and workouts for a few weeks and then come crashing down. They can’t sustain that level of change that quickly.

Ideal is not helpful if you can’t stick with things for a consistent amount of time!

Which is probably longer than you think, but that is a topic for another time.

Now that you have a clear and accurate idea of your intake, you can start answering the next set of questions. Is your current intake appropriate for you? If not, can you spend some time getting your intake to that level? If you don’t have the skills or strategies to track, can you learn how to do so accurately? Do you know which foods you need to emphasize on a regular basis not only for optimal health but to support eating in a deficit? Do you know what an appropriate rate of loss looks like specifically for you so you can plan out your fat loss phase and have proper expectations? Do you understand the sacrifices needed, and are you willing to commit to them for a consistent amount of time?

This last question is critical and where many people fail. The deeper question is really WHY do you want to do this in the first place. A superficial answer will not cut it when the going gets tough, and the going will get tough!

I hope this was helpful in understanding why most people fail at losing weight. While the idea might seem simple (eat less, move more) there is a lot more that goes into the execution of a successful weight loss plan. One of the first being AWARENESS. 

If you get nothing more out of this but creating awareness out of your current intake, you’re ahead of most people when it comes to nutrition. From there, you can then create a much more effective plan that won’t leave you tearing your hair out.

Of course, if you need help, hire a coach. This is where a knowledgeable guide can actually short-cut your results because they can apply their expertise to your unique circumstances. 

If you’ve got any questions or need help, feel free to reach out at info@eatsbydre.com .