In my last post I talked about motivation, the driving force behind any behavior change.  In the next few posts, I’ll focus on putting together your weight loss plan.  That will include:

1. Setting your goals & start date
2. Identifying a support person
3. Barriers to starting your plan & solutions to overcome them
4. Planning for the challenges that will come
5. Milestones and rewards

In this post let’s consider setting your goal, planning your start date and the importance of identifying a support person.  Your goal is the weight you want to be or the pounds you intend to lose by your target date.  Both the weight loss and target date need to be realistic.  A healthy rate of weight loss is 1.5 to 2.5 lbs. per week.  If you have medical issues, you should check with your doctor about your plan, especially about how quickly you plan to lose weight, the nutrition plan you will be using and details of your exercise plan.  Too rapid a weight loss can be unhealthy especially if you have certain medical conditions.  It took time to gain those extra pounds and it will take time to lose them.  Be patient!  Remember slow and steady wins the race!

You should also choose a start date to begin your weight loss program.  Give yourself some time to go through the planning stage for your program.  It shouldn’t take more than 2-3 weeks to get the planning done.

Finally, choose a trusted friend with whom to share your plan.  Tell them your start date, goal weight loss and target date.  Their role is to help encourage you when you feel discouraged and celebrate your successes with you.  Some people choose someone who has successfully lost weight themselves.  While that experience isn’t necessary, the strategies they used to overcome challenges can be useful.

Next time, I’ll continue talking about the other parts of your weight loss plan that you may wish to consider before you actually start your weight loss program.  If you want to get a head start on those topics, check out my website www.insightsforhealth.com where there are tools to Make Your Plan as well as many other features to learn about nutrition & exercise.  You’ll also find tools to calculate the nutritional content in foods, find the calories expended with common activities and to set up Health-e Texts to reinforce your new healthier behaviors.  To use some of these you must register as a member, but membership is free!

Your comments are welcome.

For Your Health! – Dr. Bob

Changing any behavior, especially ones associated with our daily lifestyle habits, will take a lot of energy and work.  Everyone has great intentions when they first start a weight loss program or stop smoking.  As they get into the program and realize the difficulty, they often rethink whether it will be worth it.  This is where they need to draw from the strength of their motivation for starting to make these changes in the first place.

In my opinion, it is best to identify your motivations while you are in the planning stage, before you start making your changes.  You need to clearly identify why you are committing yourself to the work involved in changing your target behaviors.  You should write this and all components of your change plan down in a notebook or keep it on your computer so you can refer to it later.

Motivations come in all shapes and sizes.  They can be related to improving one’s health, looking better, being more attractive to one’s partner or wanting to see one’s daughter get married.  They can be somewhat abstract, such as, “I want to feel better” or much more concrete, such as, “I want to stop smoking so I can avoid hospitalizations for my lung disease.”  Motivations can be relatively trivial or much more serious, such as, “My husband thinks I’m too fat, and the spark is gone from our marriage.”  These are common reasons for people to want to change their behaviors.

Again, as you begin to make your behavior change plan, you should identify and write down your motivations. Over the following months as you make the necessary changes you will be faced with barriers to your success.  The strength of your motivations will help you conquer those barriers.  The more meaningful the motivation is for you, the greater its power.

Goals are often related to motivations.  For smoking, it is to completely stop smoking by a specified date.  For the woman who wants to be able to wear a certain bathing suit when she and her husband go to the Bahamas in July, her goal is to lose a specific number of pounds by a specific date, the date her trip begins.

A lot has been written about the characteristics a goal should have.  The concept of SMART goals identifies the key characteristics.  There are some differing thoughts as to what each of the 5 letters stand for, but here is one that makes sense for what we are discussing:

• Specific – What needs to happen by the goal date for the goal to be met?  For smoking, it is usually complete smoking cessation.  For weight loss, it is losing a certain number of pounds or weighing a certain amount.
• Measurable – It needs to be something that you will clearly know that it has been attained or not.
• Attainable – The goal can be reached taking into account the goal date.  Losing 50 pounds in one month is just not safely attainable.
• Relevant – It is relevant to you and your condition and circumstance.  This often ties in with motivation.
• Timebound – There is a specific target date when the goal is to be attained.

As you prepare your plan be sure to use these characteristics in writing your goal. 

Please add your comments on these topics or share some of the motivations you’ve used to reach your own goals.

For Your Health – Dr. Bob

In addition to defining your goal and goal date, you should understand your motivation for making these changes.  Is it for your health?  Is it to better enjoy life with your family?  Is it to get into that bathing suit this summer?  Whatever it is, you should write it down and look at it frequently as you implement your Behavior Change Plan.

Please share some comments and motivations to change that you found effective in your own life.

Dr. Bob

When making changes to lose weight, increase exercise or stop smoking many doctors, health coaches and advice books state that developing a plan for change is essential.  I agree with that approach.  You should set attainable goals with a target date and plan how exactly you are going to make the necessary changes to attain your goals.

What do you think?  Have you ever used such a plan?  What other tricks do you have to share?