Goal Setting for Teens

Weight loss is referred as the reduction of total body mass to improvise fitness, health, and overall personality. People spend around $30 billion every year on weight loss programs, diet food and drinks .If you are a person in maintaining good physical well-being and also want to prevent diseases, it is essential that you have a healthy body with proportionate weight.

A food combination in a proper way helps you in preventing weight gain and also promotes weight loss. Planning for meals with right food combinations results in healthier body and good lifestyle. If your weight is constant, then the amount of calorie consumed is burnt on the same day. But if you are gaining weight slowly, then it means that your calorie intake has increased. The amount of food consumed is in our control so do the calories in our control. Burning of calories on a day depends on Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR) and physical activity level.

If you are burning fewer calories than what you eat then the extra calories available will be stored in your body as fat. Over weight and obesity increases the risk of high blood pressure, diabetes, increase of cholesterol level in blood, cardiac diseases and certain type of cancer. Balanced diet and exercise play as key factors in weight loss and fat reduction.

Many people who have lost weight have reported that weight loss increased their mood, self-esteem, motivation and healthy feeling. If you are interested to lose your weight successfully, then the below mentioned tips about weight loss will be of great help to you.

The desire for weight loss should come from you and practice a system that is suitable for you. If you plan to lose weight for change in life style or to please somebody then it may not work out. It’s not advisable to follow other persons diet and plan of exercise, as it will not get along with your habits and lifestyle.

Stop blaming yourself for not being successful and accept that your choice is poor. Failure at one trial doesn’t mean that you can give up. Weight loss does not mean making perfect choices at all time but to attempt good choices than poor choices.

Try to avoid the surroundings, which influence you to overeat like coffee breaks or parties. Plan for distractions or plan ahead for other activities and stick according to it.

Make yourself comfortable with supporting people around you who encourage your efforts. Even best friends can sabotage your weight loss schedule. It will be easy for you if you spend your time with people who understand your efforts and not pressurizing you on food choices.

You can reward yourself with any non-food and selfish rewards when you achieve interim goals like a book or beach holiday.

Stock your refrigerator with plenty of healthy foods like popcorn, cheese with low fat, fruits, yogurt, etc so that many options are available when you are in need of a snack. Don’t forget to dispose high-calorie and low-nutrition munchies like candy and chips.

Start with small goals and try to focus on them and then aim for big goals. Set time frame for your efforts like a week or fortnight rather than aiming to total weight loss which you have desired. So the goal of weight loss if turned successful will make you happy with your desired size and shape.

With television shows like “The Hills” and “90210″, teens are looking at their favorite star, and wondering why their body isn’t like the actors and actresses on these shows. They look at these people as their idols, and want to look and be just like them. It is important to educate our teens on the dangers of certain diets, and what it takes to lose weight in a safer, and more health conscious way.

A teen’s healthy diet plan shouldn’t be any different than any average adult. The right foods combined with a good fitness plan can help mold their body into a fit and healthy form.

Education: Start by educating yourself. Find out what a proper diet and fitness plan for your teen should consist of. Speak to your family physician; see what he or she feels is the right course of action. Ask about a dietitian, a dietitian can help plan a menu that will be conducive to the type of lifestyle your teen leads. Also, educate yourself about fad diets, and eating disorders.

Make a Plan: You then need to find out your teen’s intentions for themselves. Do they want to lose a large amount, or just drop a few pounds to fit into that prom dress? Whatever their intention, make sure to sit down with them and discuss goals, and timeframes. They are not going to lose 50 pounds in a week, make sure they realize this. Use what you have learned to set up a plan that will work for them.

Family Fun: Once you have set into place a plan, the next step is to do it. Make it a family activity, take walks together after dinner. Set up activities that involve everybody. Go to the park, on a hike, or a leisurely bike ride. Whatever you choose, do it as a family and enjoy yourselves.

Just remember, teens, just as any other child learns from what they see. In these formative years, it is important to teach our children what is right and wrong. A healthy lifestyle instilled into the mind of a growing youth can stay with them for the rest of their life.

Body Image is an issue which can be of primary importance to teenagers. It not difficult to see that this is priority due to the medias unrealistic interpretation of how a typical female or male is meant to look like. We frequently see these size 0 women and incredibly masculine men in TV shows, covers of magazines, Music videos and practically all types of image related  advertising all of which teens have impressions on everyday.

What is important for teens to understand is that these Bodies are usually that of highly paid fitness models who dedicate their lives to achieve their physique. While it is possible to achieve this physique with a lot of work it is not realistic for most teens. For example, just because your a swimmer doesn’t mean you have to swim like Michael Phelps!

Personally, during my teenage years, I disliked my body. I had a fixation with getting a big muscular physique. Of course I made Loads of mistake but eventually after about 2-3 years I achieved a lean 210 physique. Was I happy?! No! I felt like I had too much Body Fat. As a result, I spent some time losing the excess Body Fat. Was I content now?! No! My chest was too small, I couldn’t see my lower abs, my shoulders weren’t in good proportion to my arms… I could go on… Are you starting to see my point!

Eventually, I realized that I would never be 100% satisfied with my body. There would always be something I wanted; a bigger chest, lower abs, Bigger Biceps etc. At that point I began to look at the bigger picture and say;

“Hey, I have a great body, I’m proud of it and I’m not going to spent my whole life being obsessed with it!” 

This is exactly what I want teens understand. Your never going to be totally satisfied with your body. There will always be something.

While there’s nothing wrong with trying to achieve a better Body Image, don’t strive for a cover model Body unless your willing to put in years of effort and sacrifice a lot of your youth. Strive to lose a few pounds of fat or to put on a few pounds of muscle.

My message to all you teens is that you should be proud of your body, and if your not, set a realistic goal where you you WILL be proud of your body!

Of course, The most important thing when setting your Health and Fitness goals is Information and Knowledge. Without Information and Knowledge of the three aspects of Dieting, Exercise and lifestyle the effectiveness of you losing weight or building muscle is going to be severely hindered. So get the right Know-How!

With so much information bombarding us from TV, magazines, radio, supermarkets etc. telling us to eat this and to follow that program it becomes difficult to see the underlying, simple truth behind Fat Loss.

As a Final Note…

If your a teen, don’t let low self-esteem due to your Body image restrict aspects of your life in anyway. Life’s too short!

All the Best,

Kieran from Body2Shape 

Body2Shape provide Free, Impartial, tired and tested Body Image Advice.

http://www.body2shape.com/