1: You Are Not Eating Right

Heard of “You can never out-work a bad diet?” This is the bottom line for weight loss and maintaining a healthy body- a bitter truth that many of us struggle with. So you have been working out, going hard, faithfully showing up at the gym, it’s been six months down the road yet you still see no results! Chances are high you are neither eating the right food nor keeping track (quality and quantity) of what you are putting in your body.

The reason dieting contributes almost 75 to 80 percent to weight loss while exercising contributes only 20 to 25 percent is because it takes a ton of activity to create a 400 or 800 calorie deficit through working out. For instance, you may need to run between 7 to 10 miles a day to just lose 0.45kgs a week! The average person can’t keep up with this!

I believe in striking a balance- everything in moderation, because at the end of the day, we have to live! A combination of healthy nutritional habits and exercise is the most sustainable approach to weight loss gaining strength and keeping fit. When you combine the two, you need no dramatic changes at all to achieving successful body changes. For instance instead of eliminating 500 calories by painstakingly striking all carbohydrates from your diet including the healthy ones, you could burn 250 calories at the gym and cut another 250 calories by just skipping those 3 ice cream scoops.

‘What’ and ‘how much’ are you eating today and the effect this has on your wellness? You can order for a practical personalized meal plan, 100% customized just for you here.

2: You Are Doing the Wrong Exercises

You are probably going to the wrong gym or have the wrong fitness coach. Bitter truth is not every gym or everyone who says he/she is a fitness instructor/trainer/coach will get you your desired results. As for the gym, by now we already know it’s more than the four walls or equipment therein. If you neither go to a ‘good’ gym nor engage a professional fitness coach (you can refer to our blog guiding you on how to identify a good gym and professional fitness coach), you are most probably doing the wrong workouts (unsuitable for you). These can potentially cause harm and cause permanent injuries to your body without getting you the desired results. Please be very cautious and careful about who trains/coaches you- so many out there have absolutely no clue about what they are doing.

Do you have trust and confidence in your fitness trainer/coach to get you to your desired fitness goals?

Ultimately, the wrong exercises can be detrimental to your body. On the other hand, appropriate and effective exercises depending on your age, gender and medical history can be a cure to some of your body dysfunctions.

3: You Lack Consistency and Discipline

Weight loss has more to do with the small and gradual lifestyle changes that one makes in alignment to one’s ultimate goal. These may consist of developing habits like increasing your water intake, following your meal plan, having your meals on time, working out at least four (4) days a week, sleeping for longer hours among others. All these require discipline and consistency and many a times strategy. They say it takes approximately twenty one (21) days to either develop or break a habit. How do you usually develop or break a new or old habit respectively?  

What you do today, in a week, determines the results you will have in a month, subsequently a year and consequentially a decade!

What small changes are you making today to ensure you are still energetic and healthy ten (10) years from now?

4: You are Targeting Quick Fixes

I can’t stress this enough- sustainable and healthy weight loss takes time. There is no way around it; you have to put in the time, work and resources.  Dear fellow millennials and Z generations, I understand our generations are very ambitious and struggle with deferred gratification. We are the ‘I want it now, today’ ‘Can I still get results with a short cut?’ type. We want to have our cake and eat it too! Not with this one! You have to make some sacrifices today for a better tomorrow.

Unlike popular culture, deferred gratification is a virtue, not a vice; a blessing, not a curse word; wisdom, not foolishness.

Have you realistically figured out what it will take you to reach your short-term fitness goal for the next six months?  What’s your S.M.A.R.T fitness goal for the next one year? If you need help with this, you can sign up here.

5: Exercise Alone isn’t Enough

You may want to have an overhaul and strike a balance between your nutrition, physical activity and rest. The three (3) go hand in hand. That’s why the transformation calls for a lifestyle change. If one of the three components has a deficit, you won’t get the results you desire.

It may be unpopular and infamous emphasizing the vitality of rest in our fast-paced culture characterized by endless to-do-lists, sleep to be more specific. It is as imperative as is your workout programme and meal plan. You may wish to be more intentional about how many hours of sleep you have in a day-and I mean actual sleep; not tucking in and scrolling through social media (that doesn’t count!). 

Remember: Muscles are torn in the gym, fed in the kitchen and built in bed!

When was the last time you had uninterrupted sleep for at least 8 hours?