Pat's weight loss tip for the day.

Average your calories over an entire week - with this you can use incremental goals and rewards to keep you motivated.  For example, if your plan has you eating 1,500 cpd (calories per day) then shoot for 1,200 Monday - Friday, and then you'll have 2,250 cpd for both Saturday and Sunday, allowing you to "splurge" a little bit.  You will still have only eaten 10,500 calories for the week, but you get rewarded for sticking to your plan.

I use an excel spreadsheet to keep track of both my daily intake and how many calories I have remaining for the week.  It has worked awesome for me!

Good luck and God bless,

Pat

That's kind of brilliant.. that will really work?!

It did for me, I actually lost 55-lbs in 5-months last year just using that simple approach.  No drugs, special meal programs, extra exercise.

Now that I am at a body weight that I want to maintain, I have set my calories to what I know my body will burn and use the same method to keep the weight off.

Don't get me wrong, it is very painstaking to always have to keep track of everything that you eat, but it is well worth the effort.

That's awesome- I think I might try that.  I honestly am pretty happy at 1500 a day, but sometimes on weekends we go out and it would be nice to have a drink at a friend's house or have an ice cream cone or something if we go out to the beach.

My tip for today..... Don't use exercise to lose weight.

Even if you work out vigorously for 30-minutes, you will only burn about 400 or 500 caloires per session.  Unfortunately, if you're like most Americans that eat way more than 500 calories than their body can burn per day, even if you workout out every single day you will never lose weight.  This just sets you up for failure as you will workout for weeks with no results and then give up.

A better idea is to set your daily calorie count 500 calories below what you've determined your body to burn each day, without considering your exercise schedule.  If you don't exercise you will still burn more caloires than you consume and if you do get to the gym you will burn that much more calories helping you to lose weight faster.

Exercise should be used for buidling strength and cardiovascular health, not weight loss.

Good luck and God bless,

Pat