Why You Need To Stop Looking At The Scale If You Want To Lose Weight

If your goal is to lose weight, you need to stop looking at the scale. I know that sounds absurd, but hear me out. One thing I know for sure is that you’re constantly thinking about how much you weigh and how much you look like you weigh. Even though you’ve made slight progress, you feel worse than when you started. I’m going to tell you how to help that.

Instead, Do This

First, stop relying on your daily scale weight. The reason daily weigh-ins suck is because there are too many factors that play in how much you weigh. You have literal food weight, water weight from water retention, etc. Your daily scale weight is something you should take with a grain of salt. Rather than relying purely on how much you weigh on a daily basis, start calculating your mean weight throughout the week.

How To Do It

How you do this is add up all 7 days of weigh ins, and divide that by 7. For example, in a week you could weigh 199 lbs on Sunday, 200 lbs on Monday, 201 lbs on Tuesday, 198 lbs on Wednesday, 200 lbs Thursday, 199 Friday, and 201 Saturday. If this were the case, you’d add up all of the values which will get you 1,398. Then, since the added number was from 7 unique measurements, you’d divide 1,398 by 7 to get your average weight. If we do that we would get 199.7 lbs as your average weight for the week. What you would do from here is do that consecutively for a few weeks. If the average seems to go down then you know you’re losing weight. Simple as that.

Along with inaccuracy, your reliance on daily weight fucks with the way you think, causing you to overthink. You see a high number and instantly think of what you need to do to fix it. Your reliance on daily weights causes your mind to see your weight loss journey as something that happens quickly. The reality is, weight loss happens with consistent effort over a period of time. Weight loss is a marathon, not a sprint.

The Process

You start stressing because you feel like you aren’t doing enough, or you doubt the process. You’re not realizing that you’re trying to fix something that was built up over years. The weight you have now didn’t come about in a week, so why do you stress about losing it in a week. It will all come together. Ease your mind. Trust the process. Trust your heart. Evolve.