Exercise Plan to Lose Weight - How to Get Motivated To Lose Weight!

Finding the motivation to lose weight is different for every individual. For me, personally, I find that it is impossible to maintain and lose weight simply by eating healthy, I must also exercise. It can be discouraging some days because many of my friends can eat anything and everything and still maintain their shapes. That just may be one of the reasons why I struggled with weight when I was younger. I kept thinking to myself, why should I have to exercise and watch my calories when no one else around me does? Once I resigned myself to the fact I must exercise and eat healthy to BE healthy, this is when my progress started. This article is going to teach you how to develop your own exercise plan to lose weight. I cannot say it enough - you have to do what works for you. 

If you're anything like me, you have to be in a certain mood to get out to the gym. I cannot tell you how many memberships I've had and how many dues I've paid, only to go in a few times, walk around, do a little bit of cardio and go home. For some people, gym memberships do not work.

In order to get motivated to lose weight, you have to find something that you really love to do. Again, I do not really love to go to the gym. I've tried all different types. They don't work for me, simple as that.

I don't pay a monthly gym membership fee anymore. I've developed enough discipline to create my own plan that works for me and you can do this, too!

To get started, write down a list of activities that you love to do (not scrapbooking...physical activities).  Here is what my list looks like:

Pilates, Yoga, Wii Fit, Exercise videos, Dance, Cardio, Golf, Tennis, Walking at the park

That doesn't sound like a lot, but it's enough for me. Your list may be even shorter. So was mine at first. The most important thing is - don't do the same activity every single day. You'll get bored, you'll give up and be back right where you started. Trust me on this one!

Now that you have a list of activities that you like to do, either get a small notebook or if you're like me, open up a new Excel spreadsheet.

Write a few columns, "Date", "Activity", "Calories Burned". This is where you'll track your progress. 

If your piece of exercise equipment doesn't have a built in calorie tracker (in order to be accurate...make sure it asks for your weight), then you can find tons of free resources online to help calculate the amount of calories you burn during exercise.

If you're not into calorie tracking, that's fine - just record the activities that you do on a daily basis and the time spent doing each activity. If you would like to know how many calories you've burned (many find it a motivating tool to lose weight) than bookmark some of these websites which will help you calculate the amount of calories you burn for 100's of different activities. Whether it's cleaning around the house, gardening or even...kissing!

ProHealth Exercise Calorie Calculator

WebMD Calorie Calculator

Between these two calculators, you should be all set in finding the data you're looking for to fill into your daily chart.

Studies have shown that 60 minutes of exercise a day, even if split up into different sessions (two 30 minute sessions or three 20 minute sessions) are a heck of a lot better than not doing anything at all. Everyone has SOME time to exercise. Even if you just have twenty minutes, it is certainly better than nothing.

For my personalized exercise plan, I try to stick to the following plan:

Sunday - 1 'low effort' exercise - Walking, Wii Fit, etc. 30 minutes to 60 minutes

Monday - 2 forms of exercise to amount to an hour

Tuesday - 3 forms to amount to an hour and a half

Wednesday - 1 'low effort' exercise

Thursday - 2 forms of exercise to amount to an hour

Friday - 3 forms to amount to an hour and a half

Saturday - 1 'low effort' exercise

• This plan works well for me. Edit it so it works for you. Some people say that you should take one day of to give your body a 'break', but doing a low effort (as I call it) exercise such as walking or playing the Wii Fit is much better than taking a day off and will allow your metabolism to continue to function at an optimum rate for weight loss.
• On the days where I do three activities or more, I find that varying the activities give me the motivation to get an 90 minutes of total exercise time.
• If you can't commit to, or simply don't have the time - start with 3 days a week first. Keep increasing so your exercising 6 to 7 days a week. Again, it doesn't have to be a hardcore, full body workout.
• Try out new activities. I buy new exercise videos every few weeks to keep me interested in what I'm doing. I have lots of dance videos and even scenic walking videos.