What can I do Myself?
You can do a lot yourself. By changing your diet and increasing your physical activity, you can achieve a sensible weight loss.
The most difficult is to maintain the weight loss. It can be a good idea to write your goals in a special table so you can follow the weight. It is difficult to lose weight, but far from impossible. Most overweight people know that if they eat fewer calories and increase their combustion they will lose weight. However, knowledge is one thing, action is another. What is crucial for success is the motivation.
Far most overweight people have a wish to lose weight. However, a good and meaningful life is not just to be normal weight. There are a lot of conditions that affect the quality of life. The problems arise when there is no correspondence between what you want and what you do. ‘I want to lose weight, but still I eat too much and exercise too little’. ‘I want to lose weight, but I had the munchies’. You want more things at the same time.
One way to attack the problem is to fill out the tables of balance below. In the tables you should list the conditions that speaks for changing your current habits and those conditions that speaks against or that makes it difficult to change. In a similar manner, you should list those conditions that speak for continuing your new habits and those conditions that speaks against continuing.
Here is an example with diet:
| Advantages from not changing the diet | Disadvantages from not changing the diet |
| - I like the food I eat | - The food I eat makes me ill |
| - I am not sure I can do without it | - I am not losing weight |
| - The food increases my quality of life | - I have a bad conscience all the time |
| Disadvantages from changing the diet | Advantages from changing the diet |
| - It does not taste well | - I lose weight |
| - It is expensive | - It makes my family happy |
| - I become more angry | - It will be fun to shop for clothes |
| - I do not like 'rabbit food' | - I get positive attention |
Here is an example with exercise:
| Advantages from not increasing my physical activity | Disadvantages from not increasing my physical activity |
| - I avoid injury | - I beome ill from it |
| - I save money | - I do not lose weight |
| - I do not spend the time | - I get a bad conscience |
| Disadvantages from increasing my physical activity | Advantages from increasing my physical activity |
| - I do not have the time | - I lose weight |
| - It is expensive | - I can 'play' with the boys |
| - I become injured | - It will be fun to buy clothes |
| - I do not really know how | - I will have more energy and a better mood |
The most important is not the answers in the table of balance but the considerations you make as you fill out the table. Is it in fact true that I do not have the time to increase my physical activity? How good will it be to play ball with the boys again? How will it affect my confidence if I start exercising?
It will probably not solve your discrepancies between what you want to and what you do, but the table of balance and your considerations can help push you in the right direction – the direction you want when it is time.
Click here to go to the tables