From a trainer perspective, when we create exercise and nutrition plan for our clients, we are expecting for our clients to follow them 100% so they can have great results. But let’s be honest. How often does clients give 100%? Not that often.
Does that mean you would not get any results because you are not following the plan perfectly? Well, that’s not true either.
According to study done by Precision Nutrition, they’ve found that those people who follow the plan 10-49% of time for full year would have 5-6% of weight reduction. In other words, if you weight about 170, you would be losing about 8-10lb and keeping them off. Not a drastic change compared with extreme diet that promise you to lose 20lb in 8 weeks, but study has found that 8-10lb weight loss can happen even if the plan was followed less than 50% of time.
So, what does less than 50% effort looks like? Well trainers typically design for 4 times per week of workout and you may be doing 2 times per week. And if you were supposed to be following the nutrition plan for 7 days per week but you may be following 3-4 days per week.
According to the report even with this kind of effort you can still lose about 5-6% of your body weight and maintain because you have built a new habit. And good news is you can build on top of what you have accomplished.
Of course, if you follow the plan with better effort, like 100%, you can experience better results, but life does happen where you cannot follow the plan perfectly. Point of this is to have a plan to make a change then follow as much as you can. Work towards excellence and not perfection.
It doesn’t make sense to me when you follow short burst diet and then you gain weight back because you are not able to keep that habit. It makes more sense to learn the proper plan and stick with it according to your lifestyle.
Now this does not mean that you should slack off. It means put 100% of effort that you can. You do have busy life and priority may be on something else like work, family, and so on. Within that condition give your current 100% to the plan that will help your health, strength and physique.
At Mastering Body Institute, I create exercise and nutrition plans that people can follow and make the plan into their new habits. Plan is progressive in nature so you can build upon what you have accomplished from what you have already accomplished. If this is what you are looking for you can reach me at kotasmasteringbodyinstitute@gmail.com.
Strive for excellence!
Kota Shimada
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