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My weight loss wasn't accomplished through diet alone. I feel that diet is maybe 80% of the
equation; it's very important to eat well, but eventually your results from
diet alone will slow down. Exercise can really
help to keep you moving towards your weight goal. (Don't get me wrong, in terms of overall
fitness, exercise is very important!)
 Get Up and Get Moving
If you are as sedentary as I once was, any activity beyond
the normal "lazing about" will be of great help to you. I took a part-time job at a retail store back
in July and that helped to get me off the couch. I was using FitDay to track my calories
burned and was amazed to see how many calories I would burn just working a
single shift. The simple act of standing
and walking around for hours at a time really helped to kick start my weight
loss.
After taking an offer for a much better job that happened to
be at a desk, I had to take time out of my day to exercise. It was difficult for me to get into that
habit at first. Luckily, by that time I
had found a support structure in the Men's Health weight loss forums. There, I was able to connect with others who
had been in my shoes; I was able to share my story and read theirs. I started participating in their "52 Day Challenge" in January, which helped push me to focus more on my diet and
exercise a lot more.
Choose a Workout You
Enjoy
It's important to choose to exercise in a way that you
enjoy. If you don't, it will be that
much harder to stick with it. With so
many different ways to get active, why not choose one that is fun for you?
 I chose running. My
wife and I got a treadmill last fall, and I had been using it occasionally to
walk and jog on. At the start of the
Winter 52 Day Challenge, I decided that I wanted to get a lot more serious
about running. I found The Couch-to-5k program on the internet and started following it; the plan is designed to get
your average sofa spud up and running a 5k in 9 weeks.
Running was difficult for me at first; I was struggling to
run for more than a minute or two at a time during week 1 of the program. Since then, I've made great strides (pardon
the pun). I started week 7 this past
week and I'm already running 5k distances without having to stop and
walk/rest. The change in me is
incredible. While some people struggle
to get back in the shape they were when they were younger, I was never in
shape. I have vivid memories of running
the track in middle school, wheezing and feeling like I had to throw up after a
short sprint. I had never imagined that
I would be running 3+ miles every other day… but now I'm out there doing it.
 The "Secret" to
Weight Loss
There's no secret diet or pill that is going to let you lose
weight without putting effort into it. The combination of eating healthy and getting active is the only
"secret" I know of. Except it's not a
secret; it's what everyone knows and chooses not to do. The key is to achieving your weight loss goal
is finding the motivation to make it happen.
Do you have a weight loss story to share? How do you keep yourself in shape? Leave a comment and join the discussion.
History
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
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Re: Becoming “Half the Man I Used to Be” (Part 3)
