Tag Archive 'Weight Loss'

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Walking Improves our Appearance

Many people walk and exercise to improve their appearance. Being unhappy with the way we look and our body dissatisfaction is a big problem in our society. We spend billions of dollars a year for products designed to change our body. I know in my home library I have my share of diet and exercise books. 

 Would you be surprised to learn that most people walk and exercise for two dominate reasons?  The two reasons are:  to look better and to shop for fabulous clothes without feeling fat.

 People whose ages are 20-30 assume their peers go to the gym and work out; it is expected of them. It develops into “bragging” rights on how often they workout.  People, ages 30-40, who never had to exercise now notice their body changing and start a moderate exercise program to look better.  People, ages 40-50, the gravity of their body starts to drag and droop somewhat and it is very easy to become overweight. People, ages 50-60, develops a negative attitude because they are losing the body they had when they were younger, which effects their relationships, professionally and personally.  People, ages 60-70, are losing their muscles, strength, endurance and energy. They start a moderate exercise program, such as walking, and become more interested in their health.  People 70+, realize that walking would be important to their health so they become active once again.  At this age people want to continue to look good; however, looking good is not their priority–it is their health.

I’m talking about men, women and kids all ages.  Did you know kids who are as young as five years old say they don’t like how their bodies look?  Unfortunately, in today’s society, many kids are inactive, overweight and depressed. 

If we live long enough and are honest enough, most of us would admit that our walking and exercising programs are designed to improve our body image and make us feel better about ourselves.  It would be beneficial if we view walking and exercise as a tool to make us look fabulous along with health benefits we achieve.

Posted by Rosalie on Dec 13th 2009 | Filed in Healthy Walking, Never Give Up Walking | Comments (0)

The Hidden Secret of Losing Weight

rbrb_2712Many books, personal trainers and television stars say, in various fashions, all you need to do is exercise to burn calories and you will lose weight.  This is true; however, people keep jumping on the bathroom scales to see how much weight they lost by exercising.  One day the weight goes up and the next day the weight goes down which reaps disappointment in seeing results.  There is a secret to stop this yo-yo effect which causes many people to just give up. 

One day I woke up and decided to enroll in a hospital weight loss program to see what those experts have to say.  The first meeting their message was:  your responsibility is to create a healthy body-our responsibility is to track your progress.  You develop your exercise program and do it each and every day and ignore the one thing that stops weight loss.  Can you guess what the one thing is that stops us from losing weight?

The medical staff asked how many of us had a bathroom scales that we could jump on every day.  I proudly raised my hand because in preparation for the class I had just purchased a bathroom scale that gave me my weight and my BMI (body mass index) and it was computerized.  They said to get rid of it.  I remember one of their suggestions was to take your bathroom scale and put it in the trunk of your car; hide it; give it away or ask a family member to keep it at their house. 

Here’s the secret-GET RID OF YOUR SCALE!  You must throw (or give) away your scale for one year so you are not distracted from your ultimate goal of creating a healthy body. This is the really important part, exercise regularly and you can measure your success in two ways:  1) feeling better and gain many healthy benefits and 2) by the inches you will be losing – your clothes will show your body changes and you are losing your unwanted fat by walking.

Everybody can lose weight for short periods of time; but, the secret is keeping the weight off over a life time.  Many people will lose weight and can achieve their ideal weight; however, it will not stay off unless you are committed to a lifetime of exercise and not stop.  The message is clear:

1)     Start walking today

2)     Get rid of your bathroom scales

3)     Have a mindset that walking needs to be a lifetime activity to maintain your weight and your health

Posted by Rosalie on Oct 3rd 2009 | Filed in Never Give Up Walking | Comments (3)