How do you eat an elephant?

After weeks of no change on the scale or tape measure I have to admit that I was getting a little despondent with the whole dieting and exercising thing.

But a comment from a friend the other day prompted me to have another look at what I was doing. And what I noticed was interesting.

As the challenge has progressed I noticed that I am actually doing far less cardio than before. I might run three times a week - but before the challenge I was also adding cardio to the end of my weights programme. Now my muscles are totally spent, there is no way I can do much in the way of additional cardio. But there is an added dimension and one that I must admit floored me for a while.

So what is the added dimension? Well I am not eating the right foods at the right time. I am eating the right kinds of foods most of the time, just not consistently. So the muscle stores have actually run out - oops.

The recommended intake of food is every 2.5 hours, with the breakdown being some form of protein, some form of carbohydrate and some form of fat. (Cheese and tomato sandwich, apple and handful of nuts etc).

So I re-evaluated what was going into my mouth and therefore into my body - and I noticed that the carbohydrate component had slowly creeped up, with the protein component reducing slightly. It's hardly rocket science, yet I got it wrong again.

I also noticed in my re-evaluation that I had forgotten the magic ingredient. Ah - I can "see" the raised eyebrows from here - I thought there was no magic ingredient to the weight loss, are we talking pills and potions here?

Actually no - it's far simpler than that...and much, much cheaper...

So what is it?

WATER

Water - we are composed so much of the darn stuff we actually slosh when we walk. No I am just kidding.  But it does make up a significant portion of every cell in our bodies. It is so essential that sometimes we think we are getting enough from the foods that we eat, and the endless cups of tea and coffee that we drink. How wrong can we be.

We reach a plateau and think that we're doing all that we can - when it is so easy to slide back into old habits - eating two slices of bread instead of one, not drinking enough water. Doing a little less at the gym than we did a few days ago.

One other thing that I have noticed is that - the challenge is a challenge because the support system is not in place. The other magic ingredient in achieveing goals is to ensure that your support system is in place. Mine is sadly lacking at the moment - and it is hard to be your own cheer leader - all the time.

So what can you do? Well there are another couple of suggestions to help you stay on track. One is to get your old photos out - and you will see how far you've travelled. How many words are now on the computer? How many walls have you painted? How many weeds have you pulled out of your own garden. One comment from a colleague at work sums it up nicely - How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.

Little steps, repeated consistently = big results.