Decide on a realistic long term goal weight.

Your ideal weight is almost impossible to calculate. Everyone is different, so plucking your ideal weight from a height-weight chart or by BMI or through some other means is difficult. Your ideal weight depends on how active you are, your fitness goals, how you want to look, your lean body mass, your genetics, and a host of other things.

So don’t try to pick your ideal weight. For your long term weight goal, pick the actual weight you can reach and maintain.

At this point you should have a feel for what you think a reasonable long term weight is for you. You’ve thought about your BMI and looked at the health issues. You’ve looked at why you want to stay on a diet. And you’ve thought about how hard it is for you to lose weight and how extreme you need to be.

Pick a weight that is doable and reasonable. Don’t try to be someone you are not, but don’t sell yourself short either. Your long term weight goal is something you will keep in the back of your mind as a source of motivation.

The larger point is to pick a target weight range you feel you can maintain otherwise all these fancy numbers and calculations don’t mean a thing. Let’s get real here. If you think a lower weight is better for your health, but you aren’t willing to do what it takes to get there, then why bother? We play too many games with ourselves. Be honest. It’s your life, you get to make the trade offs. At the same time, don’t be afraid to challenge yourself. We don’t get anywhere without a goal. Like most grown up stuff, picking a target weight is a balancing act.

You don’t need to say when you want to reach your goal weight because you can only lose weight safely at a certain rate. Losing the weight will take as long is takes.

Reduce Your Expectations? Target Keeping Off 10 Pounds

This is something to think about. We’ve seen how an average weight gain of 10 pounds created a large jump in the percentage of people who are considered obese. Reducing your expectations and going for a 10 pound weight loss target makes a lot of sense. Medically it makes sense too. Even a 10 pound weight loss reduces your chances of getting diabetes and can significantly help with other medical problems as well.

Once you hit your 10 pound goal you can go for another 10 pounds. And after you reach that can go for another 10 pounds. There’s nothing wrong with getting where you want to go 10 pounds at a time.

What is your long term goal weight?

My long term goal weight was 260 pounds. I felt I would be satisfied if I ever reached that while maintaining my strength and muscle mass. I wouldn’t be jumping for joy happy. I wouldn’t have a washboard stomach. And I wouldn’t be able to pose on the cover magazines. But at that weight I would help my diabetes and other health problems, look reasonably good in clothes, and feel better about myself. I also thought it would be a weight I could maintain for the rest of my life.

Don’t worry about picking too high a goal. Once you reach your long term goal, you can always set another one.