General Weight Loss Part 2: Goals and Even More Goals.

As I talked about in my Average Joe's Story I use to try and to loose weight by just striving towards that end goal of being under 200 lbs.  Now that was a noble goal, but difficult one as it would take upwards of 40+ weeks of dieting to make that goal. 

As I talked about in General Weight Loss Part 1 cycle dieting can make dieting easier for the long haul as there is always a little bonus just days away or a big bonus a week or two away.  That made life easier, but so did making and surpassing a lot of little goals along the way. 

Those little goals made that long term goal not so far away as I was still checking things off my mental check list.  Although I never had a physical list written down anywhere I did have a mental list that looked a little like this.

I was 240 lbs. and I wanted to get to below 200 lbs.  40+ Weeks to goal.

First Goal:  Weight food and Count calories every meal for a week.
Second Goal:  Weight food and Count calories every meal for two weeks.
Third Goal:  Weight food and Count calories every meal for a month
Fourth:  Weight food and Start cutting 500 calories out of my maintenance calories to start losing.
Fifth: Weight food and continue cutting 500 calories out of my maintenance calories for 2 weeks.
Sixth:  You probably get the point.

As you can see I didn't even start dieting at first.  I wanted to get in the habit of weighing food and counting calories again.  It was amazing how once I started seeing just how much I was eating that it was actually easy to cut those calories.  It is some times as simple as having two taco's instead of three.  Or one plate of pasta instead of seconds or thirds. 

Lots of little goals that were continually being checked off the list made to long term one not seem as bad.  After I had started to run out of small diet goals I moved on to the next step of weight loss.

The same can be done and I did do on a fitness level, not just diet.  As per my Average Joe Story I started working out with an at home workout routine called Insanity by Beach Body.  Now this routine was 65 days and my prior weight loss attempts never finished all 65 days.  I was determined to finish this time, but I still made small fitness goals a head of the nine week course.

First Goal:  Do Insanity everyday for a week.
Second Goal:  Do Insanity everyday for 2 weeks.
Third Goal:  Finish the first month of Insanity.  (I had gotten this far before)
Fourth Goal:  Get past my last failed attempt at Insanity. (Only made week and half of second month)
Fifth Goal: Finish Insanity and attempt a second run through the whole program.

If people do similar things as I did you can look and see that just by placing and checking off all the small goals we would now be approx. three to four months into a fitness journey.  Now a reader might be asking how they could apply the fitness goals to something other then Insanity?  It could look something like this.

First Goal:  Go for a walk (or to a gym) every evening after work for a week.
Second Goal:  Go for a walk (or to a gym) every evening after work for two weeks.
Third Goal:   Go for a walk (or to a gym) every evening after work for a month.
Fourth Goal:  Walk for a Mile (or Kilometer) every evening for a week.
Fifth Goal:  You probably get the point.

In the end a lot of what could seem like stupid or crazy easy goals can actually make dieting or working out so much easier.  I am sure the same can be done in many aspects of life other then diet and exercise, but this is my experience.