real appeal’s top ten tips for lasting weight loss ten tips for lasting weight loss...

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Real Appeal’s Top Ten Tips for Lasting Weight LossCONGRATULATIONS, YOU DID IT!!!

You just spent weeks, months, maybe even a year changing unhealthy habits to healthy ones, learning to live a more balanced lifestyle, and losing a lot of weight along the way! You should be extraordinarily proud of your accomplishment.

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The Real Appeal Top Ten

S mall lapses—the birthday splurge dinner, the vacation week with

little-to-no exercise—are normal and inevitable. If you react quickly by getting right back on track, these lapses won’t show up on the scale.

For example, the day after the splurge dinner (or even that night, when you get home), write out a meal plan for the next few days and stick to it.

Or, when you get back from your travels, aim to get in a workout within 24 hours.

1. Rebound quicklyMeanwhile, keep tabs on your weight by stepping on the scale weekly, and noting when your clothes start feeling too snug. Up a pound? React right away by tightening up your calorie budget “belt” and upping your activity minutes. It’s a process of “fine-tuning” that’s oh-so-worth-it!

Review: Get Off the Slippery Slope of Relapse and How To Rebound Quickly from Any StumbleB ut which of the many skills learned

are the most essential to continued weight loss or maintenance? That was a tough call, but we pared it down to ten must-haves. Keep these top tips in your toolkit and you’ll be set wherever the rest of your journey takes you…

As you well know, your body weight hinges on two primary factors: Calories in (food) and calories out (exercise), aka the “Energy Balance Equation.” Going forward, to meet your weight-loss or maintenance goals, you must continue to hit the right calorie

level—your calorie “sweet spot”—and make sure to get enough exercise. Also essential: sufficient sleep and well-managed stress levels, so you have the energy and emotional balance to eat and exercise properly.

Your best plan for success incorporates the following ten skills you’ve mastered during the Real Appeal program.

You should also feel confident that you’re leaving Real Appeal with all the skills necessary to keep at it! Whether you still need to lose weight, or are maintaining your weight loss, you have what it takes to continue. Why? Because you’re a Real Appeal MVP now—that’s why!


S ome of the goals you set over this past year may be firmly ingrained

habits by now. For example, you are racking up at least 150 minutes of exercise weekly, you do eat five servings of fruits and vegetables daily, and you automatically know that a produce serving is ½ cup! Kudos to you for every goal you’ve achieved, both small and large!

But don’t stop now—keep setting new goals as needed, from eating out only two times per week or adding ten more activity minutes per day to longer term goals like dropping another five percent of your body weight in the next two months. Having something specific

3. Continue setting and resetting goals

to aim for makes it more likely you’ll choose the daily actions that make it happen. Just remember, you’re more apt to achieve your goals if they are:

• Attainable (“I’ll lose five percent of my body weight in two months” instead of “I’ll lose 50 pounds in two months”)

• Measurable (“I’ll do 10 extra minutes of exercise daily” instead of “I’ll get more exercise”)

• Positively framed (“I choose to pack a healthy lunch” instead of “I have to pack…”)

Review: Hit the Restart Button and Restart Your Weight Loss

T he four steps to problem solving—identify the problem, brainstorm

solutions, try out the best solution, and rate your progress—make you unstoppable! No gym in the hotel? Examine your options and…bingo! You lace up your athletic shoes and walk up and down a few flights of stairs for 15 minutes. Your spouse wants large fatty steaks and giant sour cream-and-butter-slathered baked potatoes for dinner most nights? Fine, you’ll grill your fish or chicken alongside the steak and enjoy a baked potato with a pat of butter instead. Who knows? Your dishes might be so tasty, you’ll convert him, too!

2. Problem solveThe same basic four-step process can help you conquer any weight-loss issue, from emotional eating, managing stress, and carving out time for grocery shopping and exercise, to dealing with people who try to sabotage your efforts, finding support, and lots more.

Review: Four Simple Steps to Solve Your Weight- Loss Problems

Measurable Attainable

Positively Framed

+10 min

I’ll lose 5%body weight in 2 months

l choose to


Y ou know what a balanced meal looks like. You even know how

to prepare it. But still finding it hard to resist fast food, the “calorie bombs” at restaurants, and all the other high-fat and too-much-sugar temptations that seem to be under your nose?

A good meal plan is your first line of defense. When you start your week with a filled-out meal plan, it’s easier to shop (you know what ingredients to buy) and it’ll make you more determined to stick with your plan when you eat out. If you write “Fish and vegetables at Chef Leo’s restaurant” into your meal plan, it will be easier to tell the waiter “Grilled salmon and salad, please!”

5. Plan and track your mealsThen, track! When you track what you eat, you tend to eat less. That was true on day one of this program, when we first encouraged you to log into your RealAppeal.com food tracker and record what you eat, and it will help you continue to lose and to maintain your weight loss well into the future. Tracking calories is one of the main ways “successful losers” in the National Weight Control Registry keep the weight off. Even if you don’t do it “perfectly,” tracking is a powerful way to help put the brakes on overeating because it affects you on so many levels. It helps you eat more mindfully, so you’re less apt to plow your way through a bag of chips on autopilot. It helps you tally the number of calories you consume and it makes you more accountable to yourself.

Review: Meal Planning Made Simple and Stay on Track for Weight-Loss Success

P icture your week unfolding like this. You’re on time for work and

appointments, and you’ve kept your “shopping date” at the grocery store. You’ve prepped your meals, hit every workout minute, gotten eight hours of sleep each night, and you still have time for some “unplanned” fun! This doesn’t have to be an imaginary parallel universe! However you envision your ideal Real Appeal life, you can make it happen, if you know how to manage your time.

4. Manage your time effectively

Use your scheduling skills! Whether it’s the app on your smartphone or an old-school day planner, open up your calendar, highlight your top priorities and delete the unimportant time-sucks. That may mean saying “no” to people who are making unreasonable demands. And it certainly hinges on taking action. But, hey, life really is more fun when you’re organized!

Review: Manage Your Time, Manage Your Weight

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A ccurately estimating portions is a skill that needs periodic

refreshing. It’s always a good idea to get out your Perfect Portion Plate and Real Appeal measuring cups and spoons every month or so, and do a little measuring of cereal, grains, olive oil and other foods. With the out-of-control portion sizes that confront you every time you go out, it’s easy to forget what a “real” portion looks like! And remember to use your cheat sheet

6. Avoid “portion creep”of photos of proper portions you’re keeping on your smart phone.

By regularly testing your portion eyeballing skills, you make sure portion creep—and subsequent “pound creep” —doesn’t creep up on you.

Review: Design Your Own Meals and Smarter Portions, Slimmer Waistline

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T he good news: You can eat bigger portions—if you choose the right

foods. Fruits, vegetables, nonfat or low-fat milk and yogurt offer lots of volume for relatively few calories. That’s because these foods contain so much water and so little of the elements that hike up calories: fat, sugar and starch.

Likewise, by choosing lean protein, like fish and skinless poultry, you can put twice as much on your plate vs. fatty protein, such as burgers and cheese. For example, for about 220 calories, you could have 6 ounces of trout but just a 3-ounce burger (no bun).

7. Fill up on fewer caloriesThese bulkier-but-lower-calorie meals help you stay within your daily calorie goal in another important way: They stave off hunger. These meals tend to leave you comfortably full (but not stuffed), and able to go about your business for hours afterwards without hunger pangs.

Review: Design Your Own Meals, Lose Weight Without Feeling Hungry, and Fill 'Er Up (on Fewer Calories)

1 cup(2 servings) of

chopped fruits or vegetables

= 2 cupped hands

1/2 cupgrains, fruit or vegetables

= most of your clenched fist

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9. Develop a positive body image f

A t all stages of your weight-loss journey, no matter what your

size, having a generally positive view of your body can have a huge impact on your weight-loss (or maintenance) journey. Sure, you might wish you had longer legs, a smaller butt, or that certain parts of your body were different in some other way (we all do sometimes)! But obsessing over these thoughts, or disliking your body in general, has a dangerous spillover effect. You wind up disliking yourself. One of the many repercussions is that you might not treat yourself well—including ignoring your health, or giving up on your weight.

Boost body image by silencing your inner critic and not comparing yourself to others (especially those on retouched magazine covers). Instead, focus on the positive, such as your beautiful singing voice, your strong arms, or your smooth skin.

Review: Love Your Body, Keep Off the Pounds!

8. Silence your inner criticS till find yourself saying things

like, “I should have been able to resist that second cookie, I’m so weak!” or “I’m up a pound. I’ll never be able to keep off the weight!”? These types of destructive messages can be self-fulfilling prophecies, setting you up for failure. Catch yourself when it happens, and do an internal “re-write” along the lines of, “It’s just one extra cookie. I’ll make sure to have fruit instead of dessert at the next meal,” or “So my weight is up a pound—glad I caught it early. I know what to do to turn this around and I’ll start right now.” As a 2012 report from the National Weight Control Registry found, successful weight-loss maintainers regularly rely on positive self-talk as one of their long-term strategies.

Review: Trash the Trash Talk: How to Silence Your Inner Critic


E motional issues around your body weight can poison your weight-

loss efforts, unless you confront them and put them behind you. A classic example: A woman who has been nagged about her weight since childhood by a parent, and now by her spouse. Understandably resentful, she rebels and gives up the weight-loss effort, thinking “no one is going to control me!” If this sounds like you, know you can overcome these roadblocks by letting naggers know their behavior is unacceptable, and finding your own motivating reasons to stay the weight-loss course. You deserve to feel happy and healthy—for yourself, not anyone else!

10. Overcome emotional roadblocks and limiting beliefs

Also, half-truths and limiting beliefs can strike a blow to weight loss. Ideas like “It’s stress not calories that is packing on the pounds” or “I can eat whatever I want as long as I exercise,” can derail our healthy eating efforts. Giving yourself permission to reconsider these ideas and take another view will clear the path to weight loss.

Review: Overcome the Roadblocks that Stand in the Way of Lasting Weight Loss and Rethink Weight-Loss “Truths” (That Aren’t)

Talk to your Real Appeal coach whenever you need help

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A s long as you keep using your skills, you can meet your weight- loss goals

and maintain your success. Appreciate both the journey and the destination! Managing weight is something we do every day—it’s a continuous process. The tools, inspiration and motivation of Real Appeal will always be there to help you live your healthiest, happiest life for the long run!

Your Real Appeal “know-how” will be with you forever

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Commitment Contract I've come this far and I want to hang on to my success! In order to lose more weight or to maintain my weight loss:

My signature: ______________________________

I will continue practicing the skills that have proved most helpful.

I will zero in on five skills that have been most helpful to me and keep them in plain sight as a reminder to keep using them. (If I need a refresher, I’ll look back at the relevant sessions in my Success Guide.)

Skill #1:

How this skill has helped me succeed:

Skill #2:


Skill #3:


Skill #4:


Skill #5:

How this skill has helped me succeed:I will hang on to my success


real appeal’s top ten tips for lasting weight loss ten tips for lasting weight loss...

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