Saturday, July 21, 2007

Why Diet Fitness Often Fails

We all know that people fail on their diet fitness and sometimes we wonder why. After all sometimes the people that fail the worst are the people you would have thought would make it.

There are a number of factors why diet fitness either works or doesn’t. One in three adults are trying to lose weight at any given moment and while not surprising that we are very good at attempting to lose the weight we are not so good at succeeding.

Even for those that achieve their weight loss within five years almost all dieters will gain back the weight they lost and sometimes they will gain back even more.

Weight loss researchers have been spending a great deal of time trying to discover why diet fitness has such a high failure rate and although each of us finds success and motivation our own way they have come up with some ways to maximize your rate of success.

  1. Don’t set unrealistic goals – if you want to set yourself up for failure all you need to do is set goals that are simply not achievable. Remember a slow and steady pace wins the diet fitness race.  
  2. Lack of future planning – another common mistake is to not have planned in advance. It’s a proven fact that no matter what the goal is when you make a when, where, and how plan you have a 75% chance of success. When you know what your goal is you are much more likely to stick to your diet fitness plan.
  3. Socializing – this is one of the top three reasons that a person will fail with their diet fitness plan. People’s social lives come first and when diet fitness interferes socializing wins out.
  4. Deprivation – when a person feels deprived of a certain food and the diet fitness food takes longer to prepare, costs more, or isn’t as tasty as the less healthy food the unhealthy food will often win out.
  5. Portion Size – another big pitfall in the diet fitness game is that it is common to underestimate the actual calorie count in foods and to overestimate the number of calories you have burned through your exercise program. 

Studies have shown that diet fitness plans that are simple and easy to adhere to have the highest success rate. Studies have also shown that women are much more likely to be successful than men simply because there is a much greater stigma for women that are overweight than for men.

Studies have also shown that those that have the most success with their diet fitness plan concentrate more on increasing the burn of calories and less on the reduction of calories. This just makes good sense since to rapid a reduction of your calorie intake will scare the body into starvation protection mode.

A coach or mentor is also an excellent way to stay on top of your diet fitness. There’s no need for your coach to be a nutritionist, or a personal trainer. It can be a doctor, spouse, friend, or anyone else that you feel support your goal and will help lift your spirits and keep you on track.

By: Steve Johnson -

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