Are You Setting Yourself Up for Failure?

Sometimes we encounter barriers to our weight loss. Stop for a moment:  when you read that first sentence, you probably thought of the biggies like temptations for food cravings that you have to overcome. But not everything is so blatantly obvious. There are many obstacles that prevent you from succeeding that are easily fixable if you know how to recognize them.

You need to spot the things in your life that stop you from losing weight. What makes it hard on you? Do you not have time to work out? Is eating healthy more of a pain than a pleasure? Think about it before you read on. There are a million things in life that you know you “should” be doing, but you don’t do. Barriers can often be psychological in nature. Even if they’re very simple tips, we sometimes avoid doing them – it’s almost as if we’re afraid of success!

You’re need to figure out behavioral changes that will enable you to bypass your barriers. For instance, you may feel like you don’t have time to exercise. But if you pack your workout clothes the night before, and commit to a shorter workout period, you can live a healthier life.

Simple tips won’t work on their own – you have to adopt them into your life and adapt them to your lifestyle. There are people who will say, “Want to lose weight? Eat fewer calories than you burn!” And with finances, they’ll say, “Want to be debt free? Don’t spend more than you earn.” Well, life doesn’t quite work that way – if it did, we’d all be thin and rich, wouldn’t we?  That’s why you need to figure out what’s stopping you and find a solution.

The biggest barrier to your weight loss success is you. What are you willing to do to make those pounds go away? Packing your workout clothes the night before is just one small change. What about planning a week’s worth of menus so that you don’t eat on the fly and wind up sabotaging your caloric intake?

It takes time, yes – but people who plan meals lose weight and keep it off more than those who rely on fast food drive-throughs and quick meals that usually include fattening pasta and cheese sauces.

Another type of obstacle is influential in nature. If you’re always around diet buddies who constantly complain and whine that diets don’t work, it’ll rub off on you. Don’t let their failures influence your weight loss journey.

So, don’t allow yourself to be complacent about your weight loss. If you need something like a pedometer to make sure that you’re taking 10,000 steps a day and the athletic store is farther than you want to drive, then you’re becoming a barrier. Do what it takes if you really want it. Weight loss requires commitment and determination, and you have those qualities inside of you, just waiting to lead you to a healthy and fit body!