During my sister's last weight loss programme, she did 400 sit-ups everyday for five months, and lived on grapefruit. She rapidly lost a massive amount of weight, but because this self- torture was too cruel to bear, she quit altogether. Needless to say, she regained all the weight she'd lost and a significant amount more for good measure. She is now doing a lot better on the h.i.t lifestyle, slowly getting there, but with a certainty of life-long success.
I eat three meals a day and do 40 sit-ups twice a week, and have been for years. The reason I am making this comparison is not because I want to call your attention to my laziness, it's because I wish to point out that too much exercise will lead to a burn out, and a frustration which will only culminate in us quitting. In the long run, extensive exercise will take up all of our spare time and become a tedious chore. This is the other of our promises, no heavy, burdensome exercise, for we are lazy people. Mind you, we didn't say no physical activity, did we? We're not Marlon Brando, but neither are we Michael Johnson.
A reasonable amount of physical activity will bring about a sense of achievement, it will be something we can stick to and most of all, we would find the time to do it as part of our new ongoing life-style. I am not advocating that exercising is no good, on the contrary, I am all for it and do it regularly, but what's the point of taking on something which is too difficult and time consuming for us to remain faithful to?
Isn't it wiser to develop a sustainable life-time habit of gentle, regular exercise? There are several ways to take exercise without actually taking time off to do it. Walking for example, is perfect. Why not walk the children to school? If school is too far away, why not leave 5 minutes earlier and park 5 minutes walking distance away. Assuming we're picking them up as well, this basic activity will give us 20 minutes of daily walking. Not bad!
When going shopping, instead of looking for a parking space near the door, find one as far away as possible, near to a trolley bay. This is an extra 10 minutes or so of walking per week. In conjunction with our reduced portions, lots of fruit and water intake, we're now taking gentle exercise as well. This is good going. Remember the aim is to take it slowly without dieting, but it is crucial to take all the points into consideration (and the order in which they are presented) and practice them, for our h.i.t to be achieved.
There are several other obvious ways of getting exercise without taking time off to do it, like taking the stairs not the lift. Even if we do take the lift and ride it most of the way, come off two floors early, and climb those two flights of stairs, this is a great start. Walking to a friend's house, riding for fun, gardening, playing sport etc. Later on, when we talk about settling into our new life style, we'll discuss more about how we can step up our physical activity without actually going to the gym. Keep in mind that we're not dieting, and we're certainly not paying all that dough to join a gym, because we know that the gym is not the magic place of weight loss, expensive place maybe, but not magical.
Swimming too, is a perfect way to exercise. And since most of us can do it, it's great to take up as a fun family outing. Take the kids to the community swimming pool on Saturday mornings and swim a few laps. This doubles up as family and fun time, and it's easy to forget that it's actually exercise.
Walk the dog, or take up hiking as a pass time, invest in a good bicycle and go riding with the kids if you're looking for ways to spend more family time. Our motto should be, if it's a mile or less, we could walk it. There is no reason to drive if the weather is good and we could walk there.
Once we've introduced physical activities into our everyday living, we're heading the right way. Let's see what more awaits us in Kilo Six, when we'll see if we can answer the question, “What happens when we slip up with achieving our h.i.t ?”
Remember to read previous chapters on this topic to get the full advantage of achieving the goal of losing weight healthily.
Non-enjoyable activities will lead to burn out.
I have lost 10 kg and have kept them off. My BMI is now less than 23.
Good Luck with the weight loss and your writing.