Recently I was interviewing prospective business coaches in my quest to turn my passion for healthy living into a profitable venture. I figured that a business coach might be able to do the same thing for my business as a personal trainer had done for my fitness. One of the questions she put to me was “But you must have followed some kind of plan?” “Um, I guess I kind of followed the shock your body plan!” I mumbled. But the truth is that I didn’t really follow a plan at all! I may have used some vague guidelines about how to lose weight, but I never followed a strict diet or exercise plan – and that, I think, is one of my secrets.

Last year I went to a seminar on communication, motivation and personality types. The course convenor (a middle aged man who certainly would have fallen into the category of being overweight, if not obese) said that he already knew how to lose weight – eat less and exercise more. He said he didn’t need to pay Jenny Craig or Weight Watchers to tell him that, he already knew it. And he has a good point! EVERYONE already knows how to lose weight. EVERYONE knows that we should eat more fruit and veggies, switch to low fat products, eat less salt and sugar, consume less alcohol and do more exercise. Most people even know how much exercise they need to do. Yet, many people are still overweight.

For me, part of the problem lies in societies brainwashing. We are constantly told that it is hard to lose weight – and it isn’t. We are constantly told we need to follow plans for diet and exercise – and I am living proof that we don’t!

According to self improvement coach, Michael Beck, one of the reasons that people don’t follow through even though they have the knowledge is that they lack the motivation to do what needs to be done. You may be wondering what I used to motivate myself in my weight loss journey? When I began and had a lot of weight to lose, I made losing weight the top priority in my life. This became my basic underlying principle. Later, as I maintained the weight, or had to lose the last little bit, I still made it a high priority in my life.

Overall, it doesn’t matter what particular exercise you do, or what particular food you eat, provided that you have this principle in mind. Making losing weight my top priority, meant that I would snap up those spare minutes between students and use them to do planks to work on my abs; that I would walk to post a letter instead of driving to the post box (like I used to do); that I would eat an apple instead of a piece of cake. I did what I felt like at the time – but just always kept in the back of my mind that my top priority in life was losing weight.

I did what worked best for me at the time on the day – I just made sure that I was doing something. If I didn’t feel like training my legs, then I might just go to the gym and use the rowing machine, for example. If you go to the gym and you are forcing yourself, you are never going to enjoy it - it is going to feel like hard work. You need to be creative as to how you approach the task at hand. Even today, if I’m in the middle of a boxing session and I’m not enjoying it anymore (which is rare but it does sometimes happen), then I just throw down the gloves and say “Let’s do abs” (or calves, or something else). As long as I am still doing something, it’s ok. If I were to simply throw the gloves down and walk out – then that would be another story - the story of how someone tried and tried again to lose weight but never did!

Easily, my least successful and least enjoyable times during my journey were when I had to stick to a diet: for example, I tried one of those “complete 7-day meal package” programs a couple of times. Today, I write down what I eat – after I’ve eaten – just as a way of keeping track; but I don’t start the day thinking, “Right, today I’m going to eat this, this and this”. Similarly, with exercise, when I began walking by myself to lose weight, I didn’t think “Right, I need to do 30 minutes of this three times a week”. I think one reason that I was so successful with Jason, the trainer I worked with when I lost a lot of weight, was because he didn’t write me a program! I didn’t go to the gym thinking “I have to do 3 sets of this with 12 reps”. I was pretty much a gym-novice when I started with him, yet still this lack of program worked, even though it goes against all the established rules.

Even today, when I am training by myself, I will follow some basic guidelines (eg. don’t train the same body part two days in a row – it needs time to recover; and make sure you train for balance – so what you do to your right side, you need to do to your left; or what you do to your back you need to do to your front), but I don’t follow a set plan. Sometimes I count – but more just to distract myself – but most often I just train to the beat of the music. I work hard during the chorus and not so hard during the verses!

Recently, while doing my personal training course, I realized just how ingrained this notion of following a specific program is: I had to write about 50 million (perhaps I am exaggerating slightly) different exercise programs for everyone ranging from overweight to injured to training for triathlons to older populations to professional athletes. Some of the programs lasted as long as 26 weeks! Now maybe the serious professional athletes would follow them to the letter, but maybe not! Moreover, I am probably currently as fit (or fitter) than some professional athletes – and I still don’t follow a plan.

The nutritional approach to weight loss is much the same. They tell you how much you need to eat, what you need to eat and when you need to eat it! I don’t know about you, but sometimes my body has “hungry days” – I need to eat more on those days. Sometimes if it’s rainy – even though it may be summer – I feel like soup! And on the days before my periods, my nutrition might be all over the place!

Furthermore, I don’t have the time or patience to sit and calculate points or calories – but I do read the nutritional panel on the labels at the supermarket. Instead of working out how much I had eaten in terms of calories or fat, I would instead just look at educating myself nutritionally for the future. I would read calorie counting books and make a mental note of foods that I liked that were good for me (and another mental note of foods that I liked that weren’t so good for me or that had surprisingly high amounts of calories or fat). The focus, if you like, was long term, not day to day.

Although setting goals and making plans works for many, it does not work for all. Find your motivation and make your underlying principle your priority. Increase your knowledge and motivate yourself to use that knowledge.

Sally Symonds is founder of Sally Symonds Healthy Life Mentor and specialises in helping people lose weight and attain a work/life balance. Sally offers an online healthy life club, individual mentoring sessions and corporate / group services. Her focus is on showing people how they can become a fitter and healthier version of themselves in time-efficient ways and how this can benefit them financially as well. www.sallysymonds.com.au.

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