The 80/20 Rule For Weight Management
It’s appearing in so many places in my life. Maybe it wants some attention from me. The most recent one came last week at work: 20% of the work a person does makes 80% of the impact. So, there’s no point in focusing your efforts on the 80% of the work that no one notices, especially if you neglect the 20% that someone is watching!
But more commonly, I’ve heard it in terms of weight management: eat until you’re 80% full and 20% empty. And, my favorite, eat what you should [ie, on whatever plan you choose] 80% of the time, and what you want the other 20%.
The idea is that this will help us to manage our weight without making ourselves stark raving mad.
So, with this in mind, I’ve looked at some recent writings on the internet. One was a plea from a woman who has decided that, since she refuses to eat fruit and veggies, there’s no point in her dieting. Someone suggested that she simply reduce her portions. For her, it sounds like following the 80% full/20% empty rule might work.
Other people get hung up on the ‘can’t have this, can’t have that’ denial thing. Giving themselves permission for a treat 20% of the time might help stop that hang up.
Even with exercise, we’re told to have move for at least 20 minutes on ‘most’ days of the week. Let’s see – 20% of 7 days is 1.4 days. That means that we get a day off a week, and an occasional 2 days off!
But it can also apply to that work/play balance that we ALL struggle with that. Between family, work, other commitments, we have little or no time to ourselves. Maybe we should declare that we each get 20% of our time to ourselves to do with whatever we want. Let’s see [don’t you love all this math talk?] 24 hours in a day. 8 hours for sleeping. 8 hours for work. That leaves 8 hours. 20% of 8 hours is 1.6 hours. Can we manage an hour a day to ourselves? Sounds like a challenge to me!
And I’m going to propose another 80/20 rule: 80% seriousness and 20% fun, especially in exercise. My goal this week is to start having more ‘fun’ in my exercise routine. Hiking is great [Magnolia Louise was especially happy last evening!], the elliptical is not. Weights have to happen. But that purple hula hoop I bought over the weekend. …Anyone remember how to hula hoop???
Authors Details: The 80 20 Rule For Weight Management – Jane – Web Site
