Walking to lose weight blog often mentions the advantages of using the relatively anonymous  support available on the Internet. This is because the influence of friends and family is not always the right sort for effective weight loss or walking.

A Colorado State University study looked at the influence of overweight friends and states that friends, family and social groups are the main determinant when it comes to being overweight or successful in losing weight and particularly in maintaining weight loss. In other words if your friends are fat the chances you are also increases. If they lose weight so will you. In this study the results suggest that even normally weighted individuals will eventually put on weight if surrounded by others who are overweight.

There are many programs designed to utilise positive influence in weight loss. Just as with other systems or techniques buddying up has successes and failures. Weight loss friendships can provide needed motivation. The down side of this dependency is the lack of self discipline. Walking to lose weight does challenge us in some ways. For every negative there is a potential positive and vice versa. In the case of friendships, social influences, media and weight loss buddies what is ideally positive influence and role modeling behaviour, can be the reason a goal of walking for weight loss, or simply losing weight itself, is a failure.

Often the overweight feel vulnerable when exercising-this is one of the attractions of walking and exercise dvds which are relatively easy  and if occasionally you do look silly, or red in the face, or have to sit down and rest while others are still walking, it doesn’t matter. The advantage of at home solutions for exercising is the lack of public exposure, including no fear about what you’re wearing, or how you do it. The same can apply to looking for support in online groups or Twitter.

Happily you may find others with similar goals and approaches online who are there to encourage you and field questions. However even in weight loss chat rooms and forums some people are very specific about the way they believe weight loss works. Ignoring other people’s attitude to your weight loss method, unless it helps you keep doing what you need to do, is a skill necessary for success, whether online or not.

As you get the wanted result and start to look and feel fantastic the sensitivity about other’s opinions will matter less and less. The result is worth it.

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Day 4-

Setting Goals and Recording Progress

Previous posts on 31 Ways to Lose Weight Walking.

Walking: As you walk today, note the time, distance or steps. (Whichever you can do today. By Day 6 you will have a pedometer to record this information for you.) At the end of tomorrow you will be able to find the averaged results over the 5 days of walking. That will become the basis of the goals you set for the next 5 days. It is best to look at the goal as a unit that is equal to how much you would like to achieve in the 5 days totally and then divide it to find what you have to do on a daily basis to achieve that. Then each day you will know how much you need to do and the affect on the next day of what you have done today.

Weigh In: Do this today or soon, record and and then forget about it for the time being. This is not to be your major weight loss indicator or record of progress. To maintain a positive uplifting approach which we’ll discuss more another day avoid the pressure which constant monitoring on the scales produces. You’re walking enough now to have a feel for your abilities and the sort of distance/time you have been doing and what would be doable but stretch you. You will find that by investigating some of the suggestions below and seeing what other people have done when walking for weight loss, a huge range of choices exist to choose or modify some goal setting and reporting techniques to suit you.

Refer to my previous post on setting up walking to lose weight goals and keep record of your daily walking. There are a number of different ways you can do that. It is also beneficial to use more than one way. Many people do this, me included. Starting off though choose one way. You can even use the comment form on these posts to tell me how much you have walked today.

If you have bought a pedometer, many of these come with a record keeping suggestion. Check out exercise DVDs and other walking websites. Some other options include:

Post a Comment: A walking to lose weight blog provides a wonderful opportunity to write down goals and report back. Choose an appropriate one and start writing regularly.

Diary or Journal: Using anything from an exercise (!) book to your most intimate journal to record goals and achievements, plans and check lists.

Friend: If you have a friend also walking or losing weight arrange to phone daily with your walking results. There are two prerequisites-

1. Both of you must maintain a positive and cheery tone. The purpose is to encourage your efforts and complaining can be contagious and discouraging.

2. Don’t weigh in daily or even weekly. Do not talk about body parts or weight other than to acknowledge how good you are looking!

Forum: A better idea could be to be a participant in an appropriate forum. There are many and I am enjoying this one from About Walking.

Twitter: Tweet your results to friends or me- Twitter ID: walk2loseweight.

All: Of course you could do all of the above and more besides. If so tell us!

It makes the whole walking to lose weight process more game-like if you set up specific goals, increasing as you go, until all your goals are achieved.

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