Are you a Tortoise or a Hare?

 

If there was a weight loss race, what would you be – a Hare or a Tortoise? Think carefully before you answer this, because if you’ve never managed to lose weight permanently in the past it could be because you took the wrong path.

 

Hare’s tend to look for the quickest and most radical way of losing weight, cross off all social events for the next few weeks and really get stuck into the challenge. On the face of it, not a bad approach; with all that enthusiasm and determination you would probably expect the Hares to be run away winners! Tortoises tend to plan things out for longer, research, study and find ways of achieving their targets without life coming to a standstill. Their weight loss goals are usually nowhere near as aggressive as the Hares’ and are set over longer periods of time.

 

So who wins? Well, it’s not as easy as that because there are both positives and negatives for each approach. Let’s look at them now…

 

Hare Positives…You know what you want and you’re ready to get started straight away. This is going to be big – wholesale changes and life will never be the same again! You’ve found this amazing new diet that has worked for everyone else you know that’s tried it. Nothing’s going to stop you this time – this time it will be different. Hare Negatives…There’s been little or no planning gone in to this – it will be the same as every other time in the past! There is no miracle diet – it doesn’t exist. If the results don’t come fast, you’ll quickly lose interest. You’ve set a finish date and everything has to be done and dusted by then.

 

Tortoise Positives…You look into reasons why diets haven’t worked for you in the past and find a solution that does. You know this isn’t a quick fix – anything worth having takes time. You don’t expect miracles. You aren’t changing that much in your life so this means that you can keep going longer. Tortoise Negatives…Setting too low targets can become very demotivating when you don’t see any improvements. Nobody can see any change in the way you look – at least not enough to make any real difference. Your diet and exercise regime is so lax that it quickly blends back in to life as usual. You’re not excited by the possibilities of change so you never really buy in to your new regime!

 

In reality there isn’t a winner because most people will have elements of the Hare AND the Tortoise in their weight loss efforts, so the key is to pick the best traits of them both to get real, long term success. Choose as many of the Hare and Tortoise positive’s when you look at losing weight and you’ll get the best of both worlds. If you recognise yourself in either of the above, that’s a good thing, just take your time to fix the bad bits that always let you down.

 

To your health and fitness – Jago