How to Lose Weight Without a Personal Trainer

https://www.facebook.com/GimmeFit/videos/2114414395248681/Weight loss is hard work, and that’s a hard pill to swallow. But it shouldn’t be. Diets, pills, or quick fixes that promise you results in a few weeks-you know exactly what I’m talking about. Those fat-burner pills, crazy master cleanse, or that workout routine that promises you’ll drop 20 pounds in 28 days all seem to lead us right back to where we started. Successful weight loss is a combination of habits and behaviors that will not only help you drop a couple inches around your hips, but will also boost your confidence, energy, and overall quality of life.

How to succeed without a personal trainer

For anyone who might be new to my content – Hi, I’m a personal trainer who dedicates most of my time working with people to create lasting weight loss results in their lives. So instead of trying to convince you not to pursue a route of working with a trainer, I’m going to break down the common reasons why people look to me for help and share with you the same tactics and strategies that I use to help them out.

Information

Thinking back to where I started out in my own fitness and nutrition journey tells me two things:

1. That I’m getting old
2. I have really learned a lot of information

I’ve also had the opportunity to listen to countless stories of clients and people who have struggled through their own journeys. This really helped me separate what works from what doesn’t. Unfortunately, I probably won’t be able to hash out all of that information right here without getting you in trouble for reading a 10,000 word article at work. So instead, let me give you this: “Weight loss success is 100% founded on having the consistency to keep up with the fitness and nutrition protocols that you decide to build into your lifestyle.” Take a moment and really let that long sentence settle in. It’s really the simplicity of it that catches people off guard. There is no shortcut. And anyone who tells you otherwise is probably trying to sell you something within the next 15 minutes. By the way, wanna buy my magic weight loss pill for $999? Once you understand that, then you can start the process of research. A quick Google search of “How to Lose Weight and Keep it Off” will do the trick.

Accountability

Here’s the tough part. You knew it was coming – accountability. Accountability will make or break your success. It’s one thing to know what’s right, but then you’ve got to act on it. If you’re looking for help on goal setting, I dove into that a bit deeper in my article of how to Skyrocket Your New Year’s Resolutions This Year.

Staying on track

There’s a cool study at braveheartsales.com that I want to summarize. The study allowed five groups of people to use different strategies that would help them stay accountable to goals that they set for themselves. These are the different strategies that each group implemented:

• They mentally kept track of their goals and what it would take for them to accomplish them
• They wrote down their goals and what it would take for them to accomplish them
• They created actionable commitments to reaching their goals
• They created actionable commitments to reaching their goals and sent those goals and commitments to a friend
• They created actionable commitments to reaching their goals and sent those goals and commitments to a friend as well as a weekly progress report of how they’re performing

The results of the study showed that group five had accomplished significantly more than any other groups. Although I was not aware of this study when I built my system, I definitely noticed that awareness was critical to success.

How to track results

I built a simple little checklist that each of my clients follow. It starts out with a set of simple behaviors and gradually builds up to more advanced activities that allow them to track and measure their results. If you want a copy, you can grab it at gimmefit.com/freebies. The results of that checklist is then sent over to a tracking software that I put together. The combination allows them to recognize how their performance affects their results. This gives people the opportunity to visually understand the implications of their behaviors. You won’t have to go out and build an entire software to use this. You can easily keep note of how you’re performing, week by week, and then compare that against the results that you’re seeing on the scale and with a tape measure. If you graph those data points out, you’ll be able to see the same thing! If you’re really looking to step it up, send that progress report over to your accountability buddy to help you keep you on track.

Do you need a trainer?

If you’re able to accomplish the above on your own, then my answer is no. Personal training is not a quick fix. It isn’t a way for you to pay for results. It’s a way for you to maximize the effectiveness of your effort spent, so that you don’t have to go through as many of the curves and turns in the road. Thanks for taking the time to read this article. If you have any suggestions of what you would like to hear next, help me out by dropping a quick comment down below. I love being able to answer questions and helping people take their fitness to the next level!

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