Imagine you trying weight loss challenges with your friends. Wouldn’t it be fun to lose weight by being motivated and enjoying the journey with your friends and colleagues? This article lists weight loss challenges to try with your friends.
Weight loss
Weight loss is a process that takes time and discipline for effective results. You would have to make some adjustments in your life to see visible weight loss from your body. With your current lifestyle, you might find it challenging to lose weight. Your current lifestyle includes sleepless nights, stress, and unhealthy foods which are major contributors to weight gain and an unhealthy lifestyle.
To ensure you lose weight you need to make amendments in your life that would drastically change your lifestyle. To lose weight, you would need to:
Eat healthy
A healthy and balanced diet is a must in your weight loss journey. You must think “Oh, I won’t get any healthy food here” but trust me healthy food sources are all around you, you just need to decide first that you want to include healthy foods in your diet.
Fruits, vegetables, legumes, whole grains, water, herbal teas, eggs, paneer, chicken, and lamb are easily available in the market. All these natural food sources are rich in nutrients like protein, fats, carbohydrates, vitamins, minerals, and fiber, which are necessary for your overall health.
Drink plenty of water:
Drinking water throughout the day not only aids in weight loss but also improves your overall health. You just have to aim to drink at least 8-9 glasses of water throughout the day to ensure weight loss and improve your overall health.
Move your body frequently:
Do you need to lose weight? For this, you need to move your body frequently. You would have to indulge in exercises so you can effectively burn more calories. But if you want to start, you can start by just walking, climbing stairs, or jogging.
Eliminate certain foods:
You have to say no to lots of foods if you want to lose weight. Sugary drinks and foods like sodas, chocolates, donuts, and cakes should not be a part of your weight loss regime.
Foods with unhealthy fats and complex carbohydrates would contribute to weight gain rather than weight loss. Processed and junk foods lead to more calorie intake.
Improve your sleep schedule:
Getting quality sleep is necessary for weight loss and management and to lead a healthy life. If you are functioning on 3-4 hours of sleep every day, that is totally not a thing to be proud of. You need to improve your sleeping schedule and get quality sleep of at least 7-8 hours, 9 if it is absolutely necessary.
Quality sleep ensures a decrease in both the stress hormone cortisol and hunger hormone ghrelin. It ensures you do not indulge in emotional eating or overeating at all.
Manage stress:
Stress management is crucial for a healthy lifestyle because being stressed means your body is releasing cortisol, the stress hormone that will lead you to eat food as it is your body’s way to cope with stress. Stress leads to an increase in the production of hunger hormone ghrelin.
Manage stress to control your appetite and also your sleep cycle.
So, basically all the adjustments in your life to attain a healthy weight are linked to each other. The healthier you will eat, the more energetic and full you will feel. When you do not feel like eating frequently you will eventually eliminate unhealthy snacking from your diet. This will lead to a decrease in the overall calorie intake.
But how can one ensure that they stay on track and lead a healthy lifestyle? How about taking up some challenges but with your friends?
Challenges could be an effective way to help you achieve your health goals and doing it with your friends will make it more fun and your competitive spirit would want you to actually give your best while doing a challenge.
Weight loss challenges to try with friends
We have a list of weight loss challenges to try with friends and family if you want:
One-week challenge:
Start challenging yourself and your friends with small but effective challenges. Keep track of the progress for a week and after every week take it a step further.
Try this: Tell your friends to decide on different challenges that you all can work on together to achieve health goals.
Keep a record challenge:
Weight loss challenges need to be recorded to analyze your progress.
Try this: Keep an app, or note it in a diary to see which challenge is going on and how much you are complying with it. It will help you make yourself more accountable to complete weight loss challenges with friends.
Sugar detox challenge:
The first challenge you would focus on would be to leave sugar. Yes, sounds easy but could be a bit challenging.
The goal would be to avoid refined sugar but not abruptly. You can’t say to your body “Oh we are leaving sugar from today” It won’t listen.
Try this: for a week eliminate cakes, pastries, and donuts from your life. Start to include a fruit instead to fulfill your body’s craving for sugar. For a week, drink coffee, tea, or other drinks without sugar or with less sugar.
If your body craves for a donut, eat it but delve completely into it. Instead, try to eat as little as you can just to satisfy your cravings. And if you do, note it so you can know your progress.
Healthy eating challenge:
You have to choose healthy foods to include in your diet to aid weight loss. But you will fail because you do not know if healthy foods are available in the market or how to know if the food you are consuming is healthy.
Try this: you and your friends should make a list of healthy foods. Include different fruits, a variety of vegetables, whole grains, herbs and spices, and animal sources of protein (lean protein specifically).
Now you know which foods you need to add to your diet for a healthy body. Challenge each other to use maximum healthy ingredients for cooking your foods. Note the ingredients of every meal and see how much you have complied to this challenge in a week.
To ease this challenge you should go grocery shopping with a list of healthy food items in your hand and shop accordingly. In fact, this could be another challenge.
Go for grocery shopping together:
grocery shopping could be a reason why you have unnecessary and processed groceries in your kitchen. Why? Because you go unprepared. When you do not know what to buy, you end up buying random things.
Try this: Go grocery shopping with your friends so you can keep an eye on what the other person is buying and ensure they do not buy unhealthy ingredients.
For this, make a list of foods that you want to have in your kitchen cabinet and avoid refined sugar, grains, or other products. Include healthy fats like avocado and olive oil.
Protein like eggs, lean protein, tofu, or tempeh. (if you do not want to add animal products to your diet you can always choose plant-based protein sources).
Include fruits like bananas, berries, apples, papaya, and many more for essential vitamins and minerals and they also have antioxidative properties.
Make a list of legumes to include in your diet this week. Go for black lentils, chickpeas, moong dal, kidney beans and others that would provide you with protein content and a lot of fiber content in your diet.
Whole grains are a great source of fiber and simple carbs, do not forget to add them to your grocery list.
Step count challenge:
Moving your body and ensuring physical activity is necessary to burn calories for weight loss. Start by simply walking. Yes, count your steps to ensure you are moving your body frequently. Walking 20-30 minutes after every meal is not that tough if you try it.
Try this: You can track your steps using a smartwatch or with an application on your smartphone. Walk 10,000 steps every day and increase these steps every week.
So the goal is to complete 10,000 steps a day. You can take walks on your own, or take them with your friends or pets. Choose to climb stairs rather than take elevators. You should try to attend to your phone calls while walking. A 15-minute phone call can become a 15-minute walk.
Hydration challenge:
Hydration is necessary for your body to function properly and also for weight loss. Take up a hydration challenge so you can ensure to drink 8-10 glasses of water in a day.
Try this: if you “forget” to drink water after intervals before meals, keep an application that can track your hydration and could also remind you to drink water after intervals.
Apart from water, you can also include herbal teas or some other weight loss drinks that can help in weight loss and management. Green tea, detox waters, and smoothies could be effective ways to keep yourself hydrated and in fulfilling your fluid requirements.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do I make a weight loss challenge with a friend?
Ans. Weight loss challenges with friend(s) could be fun if you make them fun. If only you and your friend were the ones who want to try weight loss challenges starting with small. Keep challenges that are attainable and won’t lay heavy restrictions on your current lifestyle. You can start with a hydration challenge, count your steps challenge, and include more fruits and vegetables in your diet challenge for the beginning.
How do I motivate my friend to lose weight?
Ans. If your friend finds it difficult to stay consistent in the weight loss journey, and you want to help them, then step up for them. Suggest to them that you both should start weight loss challenges so they don’t feel alone in their journey. You both can take up some challenges or come up with your own that can help them lose weight and help you to stay fit. They will get effective results and you will lose nothing.
How can a lazy and unmotivated person lose weight?
Ans. A weight loss regime needs you to be consistent. But if you think you are lazy and motivated which is a huge hurdle in your weight loss journey, then start simple. Start by cutting your portion size in every meal. Keep a fruit or healthy snack handy, so whenever you feel hungry you consume healthy food. Start to take your coffee without sugar. Include more water in your day and herbal teas as well. Once you see the effects of these little changes you crave success and take your journey a step further.
