New Year Weight Loss: Goal Setting

I hope everyone is continuing to have a Happy and Healthy New Year! 

As we enter the second week of January, some people start to struggle just a bit with their health and wellness goals. 

The first step to achieving a health goal is defining that goal.   It’s best to make your goals simple, specific and achievable.  If you have a large goal like losing 100 pounds, I recommend that you break that up into smaller more quickly attainable pieces.  Examples are to lose 10 pounds or no soda for 30 days.  Once the smaller goal is achieved, you may then set a second achievable goal. 

My personal short term goal is to follow my Fitness Genes Fat Loss meal plan as exactly as possible for the next 6 weeks.  I’m already on week 2 and I must say I feel great!   Before the holidays, I was eating less healthy foods.  Since I’ve revisited my meal plan and I’m eating mostly whole and natural foods, I’ve immediately noticed an improvement in my skin tone.  Before I was bloated and tired and now I feel just a bit better. 

This week I completed a webinar on how to develop a meal plan based on your Fitness Genes result.  The demonstrated macronutrient calculations are based on my genetic results.  However, the principal of calculating macronutrients can be applied to any meal plan so it may be worth checking out even if you do not have personalized recommendations from Fitness Genes. 

The most common concern about my meal plans involves alcohol.   There is no alcohol on the weight loss plan.  Unfortunately, nothing will sabotage good intentions like a drink or two.  This happens for several reasons.  First, alcohol delivers calories without any nutritional benefit.   Each gram of alcohol has 7 calories which are converted to sugar in the body.  Alcohol cannot be stored in the body so it must be metabolized immediately.  While the liver is busy metabolizing alcohol it cannot metabolize other nutrients making them more likely to be stored as fat. 

The second pitfall with alcohol consumption involves lowered inhibitions.  Your carefully planned food choices may fall to the side when presented with a tempting high fat, high calorie option.   Additionally, alcohol consumption can cause low blood sugar or hypoglycemia which will make it necessary for you to eat more even if it’s not on your plan. 

So, I strongly recommend abstaining from alcohol while you are on a weight loss program.   When you have reached your goals, you can absolutely include moderate alcohol consumption as part of a healthy lifestyle. 

If you do chose to drink, make informed decisions.   Here’s a chart published by Cosmopolitan that summarizes the calorie content of common drinks. 

I encourage everyone to stay true to their wellness goals.  Here’s to your health!