There was a time in my life when I lost muscle mass. My weight on the scales was exactly where I ‘d always wanted it to be. Although my frame was soft and I was weak from lack of well being, I was excited to ‘finally’ be at a weight I had dreamed of as ‘ideal’. As an estimate I’d say my pedometer steps at the time would have rarely exceeded 1000 steps most days.
If you’re into pedometer steps then you know that this is almost the lifestyle of an invalid.
Diet for weight loss, alone, particularly reducing calories severely, when successful, often results in poor health, weakness and looking unhealthy. Most serious weight loss processes in 2010 talk about lifestyle change (good food, healthy habits including exercise, rest, stress reduction) and that having reserves of good health protects you against the everyday body ‘attacks’ that most of our bodies deal with automatically and easily. Health enables us to do all sorts of things without affect. Small things should not take you down i.e. succumb to frequent viruses, injury or sleep deprivation.
When counting pedometer steps specifically for weight loss it is imperative that you experiment with your diet for the best balance between achieving a calorie deficit (to lose weight) and empowering your body to increase exercise. A well fed body responds best to exercise increase. However it is certainly viable to increase exercise gradually while decreasing the calories eaten.
It takes a little experimenting to obtain the best balance for you but it is worth it! The results speak for themselves.
Now my idea of an ‘ideal’ weight for me has changed significantly. For a start it is much higher than I would have previously envisioned and higher than many popular indexes. Fat is very light by comparison but has a bigger volume than muscle mass. Many lists of ideal weights for a certain height assume relative inactivity. Walking or running use the large muscles of the lower body extensively and so a consistent lifestyle of this type of activity can develop strong muscles in these areas. For this reason I have also replaced constant weight reviews on the scales as it is misleading in many ways, with checking the fit of clothes and in particular keeping waist and hip belts for comparison purposes.
Keeping track in easy ways such as with a pedometer steps log and the fit of clothes enables easy monitoring of your lifestyle success in keeping weight gain away or weight loss happening. I am following the Start Walking Get Running Lose Weight program as I introduce running into my lifestyle to increase weight loss and to keep it interesting. Keeping motivated is one of the keys and it is better to associate with people who tell you that you’re losing weight than those who don’t-even if ‘the scales’ tell you otherwise.
Walking and counting pedometer steps is the new wave of lifestyle management for busy overweight people. Tip 1 at the end of this post will start you on your way. Return to this blog for regular tips to help sustain this process.
Too much to do and too much on your mind? Neglecting your diet and exercise needs is by far the easiest strategy and the one you have applied for most of your adult life. Perhaps you keep yourself going by eating favorite foods?
While those counting pedometer steps includes all sorts of people there is a special attraction for the mature and long under-exercised, struggling in some way to live that wonderful life they once dreamed about. It may be that there is a higher force such as a doctor or spouse directing the decision but on the whole this program worked because, your commitment to change over rode the past.
This means being willing to give up those past lifestyle choices that seemed indisputably the ‘best’ or the only possible ways of doing things.
There ’s a clear path for living an active fulfilling life. Pedometer steps counting becomes an established habit in your life, encourages you to take up active options during every day, rewards you with a success mentality when you achieve the targets, and increases your fitness and weight loss.
It is a path because depending upon where you start as in the regular exercise you do and the diet you eat daily, will be the speed of both your walking and your trimming and weight drop.
The series of small successes such as achieving your daily pedometers steps’ target helps with the motivation you need to keep on the program.
Tip 1:
Look for the greatest personal character traits which have supported you in your most successful moments in your life.
For instance, if one of those is the birth of your child, transfer the best aspects to your own re-birth as an active vital person. Pregnancy was required before that baby arrived. Some sail through these 40 weeks and some don’t. Either way it is necessary. Then the work really started but it was a love process.
The positive expectation you felt looking forward to the birth of your child is needed for this activity and pedometer steps process that leads to a fabulous lifestyle.
Pedals & Pedometer Steps is an advocate of the new wave of greater expectations for a better life based on activity and weight loss. We will continue featuring the techniques, tools and systems which enable most of us to find ‘more’ in our lives!
Calories burned walking when you walk 100 kms adds up to a significant calorie deficit and weight loss! This video is indicative of a fun attitude from these women doing the Oxfam Trail Walking Sydney for 2010. This fundraising program operates in several Oxfam countries around the world and exemplifies an opportunity for serious walking to lose weight people to combine fun, team work and philanthropy.
Pedals and Pedometer Steps recommends including activities to enhance your pedometer steps counting and to keep your interest alive for your pedometer steps program. This example of a special event walk demonstrates the opportunity to build pedometer steps and a walking to lose weight lifestyle.
Why is this such a good idea?
Pedometer steps counting is a great example of the tried and true method to not only losing weight but keeping the weight off once the activity level developed through walking for weight loss is continued as a lifestyle.
To develop your exercise or activity into a lifestyle choice requires building interest and variety, and friendships or family relationships into it. The charity or fun walk is a perfect opportunity to do this. What is appealing to me in this video is the fun attitude the girls have taken when recording the promotion. This Sydney event is in August.
The event began in 1981 as a military exercise for the elite Queen’s Gurkha Signals Regiment in Hong Kong, and has since grown into one of the world’s leading sporting challenges. Oxfam TRAILWALKER is a global event, taking place annually in New Zealand, UK, Hong Kong and Japan.
Emotions are not taught intentionally often. The ‘rule’ book does tend to promote action over feeling which means we can keep our inner most self hidden. Pedals & Pedometer Steps has written about the benefit of watching outstanding performers (athletes, dancers, The Biggest Losers) closely to learn about handling emotions positively, and for success. This is important for those introducing exercise, weight loss or pedometer steps counting, as tiring, injuring and depleting the body, has an emotional affect.
Everyday people must cope with this on top of their job, family commitments and other frailties. If your life is independent and successful then you may find that a period of extra commitment does not create a strain on your existing arrangements. One also suspects that you may already be on top of your fitness, health and well being also.
Many are not in that situation. Overwhelm in a number of areas may be the catalyst for the over weight lifestyle. Someone trying to add an exercise program into an over committed life can’t be blamed for wanting it to be fast and easy-and not cost much. These commitments may be for your time or even your emotional energy.
Handling the emotion of the exercise is also about handling the emotion of the lifestyle change. Although most people hope it can be a temporary change it requires a permanent change. That’s why we generally want it to be fast. Like a pill which we take until the problem is healed. With a lifestyle problem the only pill which does work is a belief that changing creates a better lifestyle.
Sometimes it seems better not to know the extent of the changes you will need to make until you are ready for each of them. Then the next step becomes obvious. Trying to rush and anticipate changes to come may rock the boat before you are able to contemplate the change with ease.
Long term weight loss with activity based, diet moderation style programs work effectively with ongoing commitment to this lifestyle which has resulted from the change. A friend was an avid pedometer steps counter and big eater for a small girl, but balanced the two successfully, from her family home and at work. She conscientiously monitored her weight and exercise and any weight change was quickly obliterated. A great success.
Then she got married. Yes the motivation for her intense interest in her waist measurements. She had loved the lifestyle and her fiancee was fully aware of it. He was not a problem. So she moved her home location and travel times increased. Her new family (in laws) had different criteria of behavior (food must be eaten), time away from her husband was questioned.
Again lifestyle change is necessary. This is not a difficult thing to do once you have a basic understanding that it requires a lifestyle plan. With the same dedication she has previously shown, she is now applying herself to making her schedule around the new requirements in such as way as to include activity. The style has to be modified and she is doing it so she can continue enjoying well being within a new lifestyle. The important point is that lifestyles do change many times over a lifetime. While there is a tendency to cling to one which is particularly satisfying it is better too move on. The new lifestyle can be sculptured to be even more satisfying, perhaps in differing ways.
Becoming a pedometer user introduces much more activity into your daily life. This can be tiring. Pedometer steps counting is addictive and it is great to get the target you want. Over time your resilience increases and you can do more without getting over tired. The best way I have found to get through any difficulties with pedometer steps within your normal daily framework is to follow some of these tips:
If you have made a mistake of some sort, move on. Do not dwell on it. You’ll do better when you can.
I have benefited most from others’ attitudes and advice more so than instructions and techniques. Getting instruction of pedometer step’s counting, walking or running, is easy on the web. Easy diet advice abounds. It is often the daily advice of what to do when…which is most helpful. Talk to other pedometer steps users.
Stop and take a breather if it suddenly seems too hard. Think of as many positive reasons for doing it and having fun with it that you can. This is not the time to throw up your hands and say I may as well overeat now. Have a small indulgence then look at Step 1.
As usual Pedals & Pedometer Steps wishes you well on your lifestyle journey.
Start Walking, Get Running, and Lose Weightis filled with common sense strategies for managing the food you eat and simple but very effective exercise plans that ease you into shape.
A Proven Walking or Running Plan For All Ages and Experience Levels...
