This is me!
Scary isn’t it, Yes I know, Halloween is over, but I’m still scared, and I need to do something about my weight before I give up!
You see, my body mass index is 30, which is borderline obese, now I dont think I am, but the word borderline suggests to me that something is wrong and I need to fix it.
Why I need to weigh less!
I am currently in my mid thirties, I am married to Lisa and we have two great kids, Grace (5 ) and Jack (3) and lately, I have been wondering what is it that is stopping me from reaching my potential? After much soul searching, I concluded that the only thing that was stopping me, was me!
I was,
- making excuses for not exercising
- over eating
- putting things off to later because of mental clutter
- spending money on useless gadgets and fads
- to lazy to clean/fix anything around house
I created this blog as a way to explore and experiment with ways in which I can simplify my life and in doing so, I truly believe that once I can achieve this, it will not only myself to continue on do great things, but be the best possible father and husband and Project less is all about my aim to simplify, minimalize, organize, and get fit by performing a sequence of small projects that will enable me to live better with less, and what better way for me to kick this off with “Eating Less”
No. 1 Action Item for Project Less is ”Eat Less for a month!”
Sounds simple doesn’t it, but like with every good plan you got to do a bit of research.
For the last 10 or so years, you name it I have had a good shot at all the weight loss products such as, Body for Life, WWFM, Ultra Slim, 15 day Detox , CSIRO , and a few of my own freaky inventions, and in all of these attempts, yes, I lost weight, but soon after I stopped or get bored with it, the weight came back just as quick.
What if I try eating less?
From all of the diets I tried, they all had there own “thing”, something that made it a bit different from all the other products on the market. There were shakes, no carbs, less carbs, no fat, no meat, more meat blah,blah. When I started thinking about all these different types of diets and my experience with them was that whenever I started , my calorie intake dropped either dramatically which meant I witnessed an immediate weight loss and the weight loss normally continued until Ieither I stopped or finished the program, but as soon as I resumed back to my old eating habits, the weight quickly came back. This made me think “How much do I eat normally, and what if I just reduced this?”
I needed to test this theory of mine and here is what I did two weeks ago.
- I weighed myself, and then wrote down everything I eat for the week . No cheating, no thinking about it, just write it!
- At end of the week, I tallied up the calories using a simple calorie counter ( I used an Australian site – Calorie King) then worked out my average dailycalorie intake
- The next week, I ate 500 calories less a day then the average from the previous week ( Eg My average was 2035 calories – 500 = 1535 calories, which was my daily allowance for the next week )
- At end of second week, I weighed myself and I lost 2kg (4.5 Pounds) – Simple as that!
So, as my first action item for Project less I will eat less for a month, I will use my 2nd week eating habits as guide, but will continue to strive to eat better, with plenty of water and a limit of no more than 1500 calories per day.
My Current Weight is 90kg (198 lbs) and I aim to lose at least another 2kg (4.5lbs) by December 1st.
Wish me luck
Greg
{ 7 comments }
Good luck and keep up the hard work. It is critical that you focus on diet. In my eyes, focusing on a healthy lifestyle consists of 70% diet (NOT DIETING) and 30% fitness attention
Dave
The Minimalist Path & LifeExcursion
Thanks for the encouragement Dave,
Although my main concentration is on portion size, and eating much less, I am finding in this first week I am feeling quite hungry, so to counter this I am eating more “healthier snacks” which of course, is less in calories.
Whenever I suggest new diet techniques to others, I always say eat as many fruits and veggies as you want. Sure there are sugars and calories in many fruits but they are good for you and are WAAAAY more beneficial to your diet than having crappy snacks in small portions. Eventually you will not want to eat after stuffing your face with apples and broccoli.
David Damron
Hi Greg,
I want to support and encourage you. I just saw the comment you left over on my blog. You and I are going through a similar process. My body mass index is 43!
I’m also in my mid-thirties. Let’s keep in contact by email and later on we can share a guest post on each others blog of our progress in six months time if you’re willing.
Dave is right, we have to change our long-term diet so that we can keep at it for life. Add a bit of regular exercise and we’ll get there.
Sounds good Gordie, have sent you an email
You go for it. I like your sensible approach. Eat less is the secret. It sounds simple, yet I have struggled with this for the past 10 years. After spending 40 years of my life being skinny, I suddenly gained 60 pounds. Have fought off 30 lf those, but for a middle aged woman it is not easy. I have never lost 4 pounds in one week, no matter how little I ate. Take advantage of your quick 30 year old metabolism. It is good to eat less. Thanks for the inspiration.
Hi Erin,
It is a bit of a struggle, not matter how old we are, there is so much bad food everywhere being forced on to us, we all need to take a step back.
Thanks for your encouragement
Greg
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