How To Lose Weight When Diets Do Not Work

One of the reasons diets do not work is that your metabolism rate varies according to your food intake. In other words, if you eat 2,000 calories a day, your metabolism will adjust to that level and burn that amount of fuel.

If you then cut your food intake to 1,000 calories a day, hoping you will lose weight, then that is what your metabolism will adjust to and only burn 1000 calories. This is why cutting back on food intake does not result in weight loss.

If that isn't bad enough news, here is some more. When you restrict your diet, either by straight quantity or by cutting out some part of what you eat (such as low fat, low protein, low carbohydrate - all of which are dangerous to your health), then your body sees that as a famine in the land.

It will respond to this calamity by trying to store fat as a reserve in case the famine extends for a considerable length of time. This is the opposite of what you wanted and means that you and your body are in a fight, which the body will inevitably win!

But things get worse still! When you get sick of sticking to the restrictive diet or your body screams at you to stop and you return to a regular eating pattern, your body moves fast to restore any weight you did manage to lose. But the worst part is that it remembers that famine and adds a few extra pounds to allow for the next one.

That should not mean that you need not bother to lose weight. It is terribly important that you do. Obese people, and especially the seriously obese, suffer a whole range of health problems including diabetes, sleep apnea, high blood pressure, high cholesterol and a lot more.

In addition, you are denied some of the best things in life - you lose freedom of movement, and in consequence you give up favorite activities like playing sport, bush walking, dancing, skiing, horse riding or what ever else you were into.

You should also be aware that the death rate by obese and overweight people is fast approaching cancer as the number one killer. So if diets do not work, how do you lose weight?

Well the trick is to find a system or program that is not based around a diet in the traditional sense. Much more important, that system must incorporate a TOTAL CHANGE OF LIFESTYLE.

When you see a diet and it is obvious it offers a temporary fix only, that it is not a program that you know you can stick to for life, this is the type of program to avoid like a plague. This is the type of program that will send your weight on the roller coaster ride we have just discussed.

Having said all that, if you can find a diet that is healthy and provides proper nutrition (like the raw food diet for example) and you have the will power and determination to stick to it forever, you will lose weight and keep it off, which is just great.

I am sure you are aware that thousands have managed to do just this. Unfortunately very few of us have that level of discipline.

So for those like me (and maybe you) who are without that amount of motivation, try to find a program that really will be life changing and not incorporating diets that you know you cannot sustain permanently.

Any program that does not offer a permanent solution is best forgotten about, for they will hurt your wallet and your health and your weight loss efforts too. Let me hasten to assure you this discussion is NOT going to lead to a program that will work for you, but here is something else that will.

Research by Harvard University has proved that being part of a group of people who would like to lose weight is the key to effective weight loss.

So if you have failed in your weight loss efforts in the past but really would like to shed some pounds, join a group of like minded people and find some buddies so you can help and encourage each other to success. That is what will make the difference.