So, i'm sick of being a fat bastard. Many years ago (10-15ish) I was doing Tae-kwon-do and Dancing (all kinds, don't ask.) during high school. I then discovered the internet and my computer/electronics interest became .. hardcore.

Two years of Hungry Jacks (USians: Burger King) later, and I was tubby. Not tubby tubby, just tubby enough to be tubby. You get the idea.

Anyway. I'm 26, and I've decided enough is enough. I've joined the campus gym here and I'm going to start weight training and cardio work.

I'd like some opinions from others who have done this: what do you use as your motivation? How did you start and keep it going? What kind of things did you have to overcome?

Well, despite me not doing this on a large scale like other people (I know Richter is exercising and I think Lyco does some muscle building), I'd say your first goal should be some exercises goals. Like how much you want to lose, what you want to gain in terms of muscle (if anything), and just set a schedule you can stick to.

If it were me (And I need to put on some muscle) I'd just set your motivation on how great you'll feel physically and mentally. The biggest thing in my opinion is just sticking with it. That first week is going to be awful as you're trying to adjust, but if you stick to it and get into the routine it won't be a problem.

I'd start out light though, and probably focus on different areas every other day. Like, for example, a Monday might start out with light cardio (to up the heartrate), followed by light stretching, and then maybe focus on the arms, upper back, lower back, and abdominals. Then maybe the next day you'd do your lower half and abdominals, and alternate each day. I'm sure there's a better way to separate it up, but um.. not really a pro at this.

I think the biggest thing for anyone to overcome who's just doing it for themselves it the commitment factor. It's easy to say you want to do something, but keeping up with it is probably going to be something that keeps a lot of us down.

Don't worry about your weight. You'll probably be eating more and actually gaining weight while you do sport. Muscle weights more than fat
Probably you'll have more fun on group activities, if you know there's a teacher waiting for you you feel less inclined to stay at home playing computer games

The more you work out, the more weight you lose. The more weight you lose, the better you feel. The better you feel, the more you can work out. It's an upward spiral man, only the starting up of it is hard. Once you're past that, it's easy.

Oh and if you're looking to burn some fat real fast, and pick up your bulk, look into some creatine or ephedrine. It helps, and it's not illegal.

I've started playing dance dance revolution! It is awesome for losing weight!

I got diagnosed with a fairly annoying chronic autonomic nervous system condition when I was about 16. The neurologist said the best thing for me to do to control the dizzy spells and passing out and fatigue was to exercise as it increases blood flow through the body and back to the brain. So, I've done a fair bit of reading and I will share a little bit of what I learnt:

Your top priority should be your diet. If you're not eating right no amount of exercise will make a great deal of difference and you will still be unhealthy, even if you do lose weight. For the best results you should try to eat 5-6 small healthy meals a day. A heck of a lot of fruit and veggies; nuts are great; fish, not friend - and this goes for all the food. If you do have to fry use a good quality extra virgin olive oil - eating fish about two times a week is great for your heart; brown rice and wholegrain bread, but not too late in the day, can go with many meals; chicken breast; mushrooms; soy products; etc. Try to eat food with little to no processing - avoid anything white, really, most of it has been bleached and processed.

Do 30-60 minutes of cardio every single day. Every little bit counts of course, but the best workout comes when the heart has to maintain a constant elevated rythm. Start it out slow. If you cannot handle 30 minutes to start with, do 15 and work your way up. You know your limits. Mix it up a bit too. Walk the dog some days, go for a swim another day, do boxing (fantastic workout for the muscles too) another, join a yoga class (believe it or not many styles of yoga do get the heart going) or go for a bike ride. Don't do the same thing day in day out or you will get bored.

Join the gym and get someone to show you how to use the free weights. The machines are good, but using the free weights is far more efficient. Be careful though, if you do not use them right you can do more harm than good. Don't do more than you can handle but always work your muscles to failure. For arms I would not do any more than 12 repetitions and 3 sets. It might take a little practice getting the right weight level sorted but once you do and lifting the weight 7-12 times on the first set brings you to the point where you could lift no more, you're right. After the first set of about 10, wait about a minute and do it again. You should not be able to lift the same number of times. Take the break and do it again. As you keep doing this you will be able to lift more and more, so make sure you adjust the weight levels. Lifting a high number of times is good for toning the muscles, but lifting heavier weights a lower number of times is for building muscle.

About once a week, ignore everything I said an just enjoy yourself. Eat a pack of chips, sit around the house and don't go for that run, watch a dvd instead of doing situps. You need to take a break and you are allowed to spoil yourself from time to time.

I know what I said is a bit muddled - I'm fighting with friends atm, really can't be bothered worrying about my grammar a great deal - but the info is there. Just make sure you mix it up a little and don't over do it. Oh and do NOT start out too much too quickly or you will burn out within a month.

- Gav.

Oh one final thing, set yourself little goals. For example, if you can run for 15 minutes this week, aim to get to minutes within two weeks. That sort of thing. Nothing huge, but just little milestones that you can measure your progress by and give yourself a sense of achievement with.

I've been steadily growing more fat ever since I was 20. I could exercise.. or.. I could do what I am doing.. which is just accepting that by the time I'm 30, I'll have a huge paunch. Lucky for my I'm tall.. so it slows the whole fat thing down a bit.

Depends on the quality of life you'd like to have I suppose.

Make sure you start off slow and build up to more reps and weights. I was a retard and did wayyyy too many of these little leg exercises. I ended up spraining most of my lower leg, which hurts really really bad, so yes.. don't be stupid and think that you can do 300 of any excersise the first day.

It's not about building up to higher reps, but starting off at a level that is what you need. For legs I would lift pretty heavy but not a great deal of reps, maybe about seven to failure. Sprains and strains happen mostly when you do it wrong though.

Guy's can lose weight alot easier that girls trust me. Now I'm not excatly a picture of health but I learned things in acting like I was being active.

Eat a few small meals a day. Or have a healthy snack between regular meals. Never give up food it makes your body want to hold onto what is has and slows down your metabolism.

Even if the gym doesn't work out walking does agdd up. I had a job standing in one place for 7 hours. I lost 30 lbs in around 2 months. which was extreme for me. Ok 7 hours is extreme heh.. But I ofter think if I could stand at my computer I'd lose alot >.>

Have friends join you or make friends in the gym. I'm alot more incline to do stuff if someone is with me. Even just my dog.

No pain no gain is a lie. If it hurts, stop. You could hurt something

I laugh at myself for this. now if I could ony take my own advice.

a. Creatine supplements can cause people to have acute kidney failure due to water retention, aswell as there is an (unproven) theory that it can cause strokes. If anything creatine sold by these 'sport supplements' companies is unsafe. The only way you should use creatine is prescribed by a good doctor and if it is truly a good doctor he will not prescribe creatine for athletic purposes.

b. Medicative weigthloss will mainly make the weightloss temporary (just like liposuction is only temporary). While sports is indeed a good way to lose body fat, this alone is not enough. You will need a serious diet change (eg. no more burgers) and for that I suggest you consult a dietist who will ask you what you like and stuff and then make a diet that includes some of that stuff so you can keep it up. Another interresting point It's better to have 6 smaller meals a day then 3 major meals. Make sure your food is filling (eg. salads are not filling so while you get some of the stuff you need, you will still feel hungry and it's hard to stick with the diet then).

get RL friends/family to support you in this, if you life together with someone, see if they are willing to join the sport activities and diet with you. Two is always more fun then alone.

Weight don't come back if you don't stop working out.

I started when I was young, my father was big into old traditions and had me in martial arts since five and up. I've never quit. However, there was a rebellious stage of my teen years that I put on some weight due to smoking loads of pot(and eating afterwards). Though she didn't require it or seem much to care, my inspiration was my girlfriend at the time. I wanted to clean up for her, look better. As it was, I didn't feel I deserved an angel like that. That carried me through for a while, but in the end it's got to be for yourself, otherwise it won't be permanent.

Really it's just like how you would coach Leonias IG, yknow? You wanna be good? You wanna be better? Work at it. Keep all your bases covered. I'd say you're fine in the mental and emotional departments, looks like physical is all you're lacking. So get it taken care of. Just a simple, masculine "do it" attitude should keep you real.

The fastest possible way to loose weight is through mental exercises. No other part of your body can burn more energy than the brain. So since you are in college, you can try studying really hard, best of all - something that you are absolutely unfamiliar with and believe yourself to be completely incapable of ever understanding.

I think the best proof of this concept I've seen was during one of the world sail races. They weighed the teams between stages and found that navigators lost on average three times as much weight as any other crew member. The paradox being that all the navigators ever do is eat, sleep, and sit in front of computers - they barely ever even go upstairs to breath fresh air, while the other crew members can hardly walk from physical exertion by the end of each shift

If only that were true.

A little over a year ago now, I got a job sitting at a computer all day. I started eating worse, and my sleeping habits were never good. I went from biking every day to doing absoloutely nothing.

After my girlfriend broke up with me, I decided I wanted to change a number of things, one of them was my weight. Currently, I'm at about 220lbs, and at 5'11'' that's not -horrible-, but it's not fun.

I started playing DDR again, tooks walks, took the stairs instead of the elevator, stopped seasoning most of my food, stopped eating junk food (except that I might on the weekends a bit), I started drinking 4-10 glasses of water a day (reccomended is 6-8). When my girlfriend called me, and I came over to work things out *glee* she hugged me and noticed I'd lost weight.

In six days.

So, keep at it, don't get lazy. This weekend I didn't do exercises at all, and I ate crap the whole time.

There are some things you might want to take into consideration as well, however. My dad knows a good bit about dieting and weight loss, because he weighed over 300lbs, and had a double bypass surgery within the last year or two. He started exercising, and within a few months, he'd lost 70lbs. He's done a lot of reading, especially with Men's Health magazine, and the book they put out called The Abs Diet.

He told me that after a certain amount of aerobic exercise, you started to actually burn muscle. He said weightlifting was better for you (though it doesn't mean stop doing aerobics) because for every pound of muscle on you, you burn about 50 calories a day just from being there, because your body has to keep it alive. Six extra pounds of muscle on you, and you burn 300 calories a day from just hanging around. Also, because when you're weightlifting, you're actually tearing down the muscle, and letting it build itself back up stronger, so you can burn calories up to 48 hours later, from the initial exercise.

I'll eventually get around to reading that book, so I can figure out how to properly exercise, and get into a good routine, but even simple things like walking can help. Just make sure you keep at it, and eat healthier, and you can start to see results within a week or two.

QFE. Do what he said to begin with. He knows what he's talking about.

Another thing that is important is what Richter said - which is to keep at it. It is only human nature for you to get lazy after a while, and put off your entire routine of working out and eating healthy. This equates to failure, which is bad. You need to be disciplined to be successful.

So, whenever you're feeling like, "I should probably exercise, but I don't feel like it," think in your mind a motivating word. Such as DISCIPLINE. Keep repeating that word and hopefully you'll get off your ass and start working out. Once you do start working out, you should be alright.. Hard part is getting off that chair and actually exercising. If you still have a difficult time getting off that chair, think of all the sexy girls that will be awaiting you when you have your six pack abs and athletic, muscular body once all of this is done. If that isn't enough to motivate you, I'm sorry bro - you're hopeless.

Nutrition is also key. Eat a lot of vegetables and fruits. Eat whole grain. Eat a lot of vegetables. Eat meat, but not a lot. And not fried stuff either. Avoid fatty food. Did I mention eat a lot of vegetables? Also, don't eat a big dinner. A lot of Americans do this and I do not understand why they do. There is no need to eat a ton right before you go to sleep. Instead, have a big breakfast, a good sized lunch and a small-medium dinner. Or do what Quidyboo said and snack on food throughout the day.

Just eating well isn't going to cut it though. You also have to do your share of cardio vascular work outs. People say walking is good but you know and I know that walking is for pansies, so I suggest you start in a 2 minute walk before going into a steady pace of jogging.

Free weights are also good but if you really want to burn fat, it's all about cardio vascular. You should also try to work out 6 days a week.

Good luck. Discipline is key.

Well... This is kinda wierd, but unlike everyone else in the world, I'm looking to gain some weight!

When I was very young, like 3ish, I had a very bad virus, and I threw up half of my body weight. I gained it back, but since then, I've never been very big. I just turned 14 about 5 months ago, and I just bairly reached 100lbs. I'm looking into healthy ways of gaining a little bit of weight, and not pigging out on fat and junk food, cause my mom won't let me (she's kinda a health nut). Does anyone have any good tips on gaining a few pounds?

EDIT: I feel so out of place. I'm asking how to gain weight on a post about losing wieght.