If you are one of those people that hits the gym or does some form of exercise at least an hour a day, perhaps 5-6 days a week, and you're still wondering why it is you haven't managed to lose the weight, as much as you may want to tear your hair out to hear this, the answer may be that you aren't doing enough.
It seems unimaginable that all your hard work at the gym or the track or in a class isn't quite yielding amazing weight loss results, but here is something to think about. You probably know by now, that one pound, just one pound of fat, is the equivalent of 3,500 calories. The average person in a gym session, depending on how hard they are working out, burns on average about 150-500 calories in an hour.
The heavier you lift, the more intense you workout, the more calories you burn. However, if after that hour session, you then go to a job where you are quite literally sitting on your butt for the next 7-9 hours, then come home and veg out on the couch, I hate to tell you this, but your weight loss efforts may be going to waste especially if you're going into that office with a huge jug of Starbucks in hand, going out to eat on your lunch break, and eating some processed higher calorie dishes for dinner.
Getting in that one hour a day and then killing it with your diet, or getting in that one hour a day and then doing no other physical exercise is not going to convince the evolutionary mechanisms in your body designed to ensure your survival, that they need to work real hard to keep that weight off you. Weight loss is counter intuitive for your body. Your body thinks of it as a form of starvation, so you literally have to convince "it" that you need to get the weight off so you can "survive." For that one hour a day, your body will realize it needs to work hard and burn those calories, but for the rest of the day, you are a vegetable essentially and there is no vast energy expenditure to be found from typing on a keyboard.
If you have gone from a completely sedentary lifestyle to, now you workout six days a week, of course initially, if you start hitting the gym, you will see weight loss because your body is having to work harder to ensure your "survival," but once that initial high wears off, you'll find yourself in this position where you can't seem to lose the weight no matter what you do because you aren't actually doing anything to continuously change up your routine and force your body to work harder instead of just comfortably acclimating to the changes you made 4 months ago.
You need to force your body to do more in order to burn more alongside eating a healthy whole foods diet that is not processed and filled with sugars, salts, and fats. There is a reason people use pedometers, because they make you cognizant that you haven't yet done enough exercise in your day. Apps are helpful for that too. Pace around the office, do some push ups in the break room, lift some weights while you're on that conference call, stand instead of sit as much as you can to get more of a workout out of your day and to expend more energy.
This is one of the biggest challenges for those going on a diet/exercise plan and one often times people trying to lose weight fail time and time again to realize. You must implement change over time in terms of the weights you're lifting, the amount of exercise you're doing, what you're doing, the intensity, your caloric intake, what you're eating for your bodies needs, and as always getting in more water and regulating your sleep. It's not just losing weight, it is absolutely a lifestyle change, emphasis on the word, "change."
When something isn't working, look at all the pieces of the puzzle and be honest with yourself. Keep that food journal, document all your workouts on an app right when they happen, and don't fear switching things up or needing to work harder throughout your day to yield more results.
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