Recently, the people that I know have been asking what actually happened to me. For some who have known me long enough, my weight previously almost hit the 100kg mark and now I am 79kg. What caused the tremendous loss of weight? Some ask if it is because of stress, if it is because of health issues. Some even ask if it is because I’m having a new girlfriend. Well, the actual answer is simple, I just want to look & feel good.
Slimming down is actually simple. There are actually 2 ways of slimming down, the conventional way and the simple way.
The simple way is what we have heard of in recent years, where you need to purchase certain slimming products and consume it. There are some products which claim that you can slim down without even doing workouts. This method usually will cost you a bomb and the results are sometimes uncertain.
The conventional way is rather what we have heard since the old days. This way is basically to exercise, practice diet control, etc. The conventional way is being known as the “hard way”, but this costs less and will take a lot of hard work.
Well, personally I choose the conventional way. The reason is very simple – I don’t want to spend much money on losing weight. I would rather spend the money elsewhere.
The first thing you need to do is to control your diet. You need to know what is the recommended daily calorie intake for a man/woman. Then, you need to know the estimated amount of calories of the food you consume. Bear in mind that most food manufacturers do state the calories/100g. If it is not stated or the food you consume is from your local hawker stall, you can actually search online as someone might have done research before. From there, you can do your own calculation on how much you consume every day. This method will usually allow you to just maintain your weight or maybe lose some of it.
Next up is the most important factor in losing weight. We must be clear on how much intake we have and ensure that these calories can be burned. Most of us who are working in the corporate world will have very limited movements daily. Hence, the amount of calories burnt is less than the calories consumed. Exercise is the way to burn calories & fats fast. Apart from burning calories, regular exercise makes you feel more energetic and young. Personally, I do only 2 sessions of exercise per week, 2 hours of basketball & futsal each. During the session, I personally set a target of the amount of calories to be burnt. If this target is not met, I will immediately find an alternative way to burn calories, for example, by jogging.
Finally, I think discipline is what makes it happen. We know that we need to control our diet and exercise but how many of us are able to do it consistently? We must remember we don’t get fat in one day and same goes for losing weight. All of us know what has to be done to lose weight but we are just not disciplined enough to do it consistently.