Set a realistic goal for weight loss!!

O.K.- so, you have talked yourself into trying to change. You want to loose some weight, you want to quit smoking, you want a new job…. whatever it is- YOU MUST SET A GOAL!!

When I was in the People Magazine Weight Loss Challenge, the first thing that the editor of the story asked me was… “what is your goal?”- “Hell, I don’t know. I don’t really set goals.” — my really smart response. Well, I am here to tell you that if you don’t have ‘em…. you will end up not achieving anything and you will get discouraged. When I was a kid, my dad gave me a speech one time (I am sure I had done something really intelligent) – and I will NEVER forget the last thing he said. He said, “If you don’t know where you are going, you will probably end up somewhere else.”

Now… I don’t think that he was so profound a thinker to have come up with this himself, but at least he was profound enough to remember it and smack his 8th grader over the head with it. And it is SO true. The absolute first step to this process is to set a goal.

In the coming editions of Weigh Down South TV I am going to talk a little more about how to arrive at a goal… how to set one- but today I want to focus on the two parts of the process as I see it.

Once again- as I see it goals have two parts. You have the STRATEGIC GOALS  and the TACTICAL GOALS of getting from one place to another. Lets just say that your overall, nebulous goal is to have better health. That is great… we could all aspire to better health. Maybe its not even that profound… maybe you just want to look better on the beach… you want to be more confident… actually that is rather profound, but you get my drift.

So, your OVERALL GOAL is that you want to be more healthy. Your STRATEGY for being more healthy is to loose weight. And then lastly you should have TACTICAL GOALS- this is the HOW… How are you going to do it?

Well, you set a goal- a big hairy one. I want to loose 40 pounds. Your TACTICAL GOALS might be something like this:

1. I will get up at 5:00am 4 days a week and go to the gym and do SOMETHING

2. I will only eat fruit in the afternoon as a snack

3. Every Saturday I will go for a 30 minute walk with my dog

4. I will only eat ice cream once a week (instead of every friggin’ day like Rob does)

5. I will eat a 300 calorie breakfast every day

Make these realistic so that you don’t get burned out. These are baby step goals that will help you get to the big goal. These are smaller, achievable goals that will help you build confidence and eventually get you where you want to be—- instead of somewhere else!!

This entry was posted on Monday, November 8th, 2010 at 3:31 pm and is filed under WDS. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

4 Responses to “Set a realistic goal for weight loss!!”

MizFit Says:
May 3rd, 2010 at 4:44 am

AMEN to the SMART goals.

I used to mock my sister when we were little because her todo list always began with WAKE UP.
now I look back and think how she set herself up for success.
The moment she awoke she got to cross a goal off her list!

Karyn Says:
May 4th, 2010 at 3:10 pm

I never thought of the baby steps as tactical goals. They are so important to your success!

Healthy life|become health and happy – A diet buddy can help you lose weight Says:
May 5th, 2010 at 8:32 am

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Johnny Andino Says:
November 8th, 2010 at 10:15 am

I’m so worried about the direction our kids are headed in nowadays. Watching Jamie Olivers food revolution tv show scared the thingies out of me. I suggest we all start cooking some healthy recipes like these at home if we’re going to fix this horrible situation. The ones on that site seem pretty easy, I tried last night and it’s the first time my family has eaten healthy in so long, I just feel great.

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