Don’t use the Scale to Gauge Healthy!
The scale is your enemy.
It is not your friend.
There is No other “health” product has caused so much physical destruction and mental pain than this simple contraption that measures the force of gravity on your body.
How much do you weigh?
How much should I weigh?
These are probably the most irrelevant statistics of your health….next to that darn BMI!
Here’s a few reasons why you should DITCH THE SCALE and NOT use it as your ONLY guide to how healthy you are, the progress you’ve made and how successful your nutrition & workout plan is!
Weight Fluctuates
Your weight fluctuates by several pounds a day. I sometimes drop up to 5 pounds from the time I go to bed to when I wake up in the morning. I can drop 7 to 10 pounds in a week just by eliminating carbs from my diet. This weight means absolutely nothing. It will be put right back on the moment I start drinking water or adding carbs back into my meal plan.
Takeaway: Losing water is not what makes you look better naked (and with clothes) – losing fat does.
Measure Body Composition Instead
If you want a better measurement of your health and fitness level, you need to start paying more attention to your body composition. This is simply the ratio of fat to fat-free mass of your body. The problem? It’s much less convenient, and more time consuming to do these measurements. Most of the time, it takes a second person to help you take this measurement, and for many people, this is a deal breaker. A cheap tape measure can tell you more about your progress in 5 minutes (the time it takes to do your measurements) than the 60 seconds that you hop on the scale and let it ruin your mood for the day.
Takeaway: Use a tape measure to track your progress and take pictures bi-weekly or monthly to compare side to side how you’re progress.
Don’t Let the Scale Control You
Do yourself a favor. Take your scale and put it out of site, and don’t get it out to weigh yourself for the next month. Does this seem hard to you? If it does, then the scale is controlling you, and you have an unhealthy obsession with weight. At the end of the month, you can take it out and weigh yourself. However, you’re not weighing yourself because you care about your weight, you’re doing it because you need this number to calculate your total fat mass and lean body mass from your body fat caliper readings. Really, that’s the only thing a scale is good for – helping to measure different types of mass (fat and fat-free) and to help you make sure your macros (protein, fat & carbs) are adjusted correctly as your weight decreases.
Takeaway: Put the scale up and weigh once a month or bi-weekly at the most.
Don’t get discouraged if your weight goes up and beyond the imaginary ceiling you set for yourself. I know personally how frustrating it can be to see that number go up when you’re working your butt off.
Just remember that what you’re really trying to accomplish is not weight loss per se, but improved body composition and health.
Once you grasp that concept, you can turn the scale into a motivational tool instead of the dream-breaker you currently see it as.
I really hope this help remind you to keep the important thing (your health and body composition) as the main thing and not get sidetracked or discouraged by the tools that you’re using to track your progress along the way.
Until next time, take care of yourself and of each other,
