The Weight Loss Blueprint To Shed 20 Pounds Of Fat (And Keep It Off)

A step-by-step guide that just works — Cutting out all the BS

Weight loss is one of the hardest goals to achieve in your life.

The thing is many people are facing this issue and it’s no wonder why the no. 1 New Year Resolution is to improve their fitness along with weight loss coming in as a close candidate. 3 of the top 4 resolutions are related to health and fitness.

But most of us are looking for a quick fix.

We want instant results with minimal effort. But I’m telling you that weight loss isn’t anything like that. It requires a lifestyle change, a shift in your approach towards living.

There’s no quick fix or magic bullet to weight loss but there’s a foolproof way to weight-loss such that anyone can see some form or results in as little as 1 month.

This is the guide that I’ve been following daily to keep me on track with my goals. I’m currently standing at 76kg at 180 cm and I’m able to eat and drink almost anything I want without fearing that I’ll gain excess weight. The same guide helped my mum lose more than 20 pounds at the age of 50.

Learning the art of weight loss is a skill.

Just like any other skill, it can be taught and learned.

This is a plan for people who:

• constantly experience low-energy
• have been on the weight loss rollercoaster
• are tired of not being able to achieve their goal
• have successfully lost their weight but immediately gain back the weight they’ve lost

It’s for people who want to know the steps to improve, to put in the work, and to reclaim the body they want.

This checklist isn’t a step-by-step plan you must follow for weight loss (although it can be). But rather, by checking off more and more of these pointers, you’ll have a higher chance of hitting your weight loss goals.

Here’s the checklist and how it has helped me and my mum.

1. Slow and steady. Aim to lose 10% of your body weight before moving on. It’s so easy to give up when you can’t achieve an overrated goal you set for yourself.
2. Take de-load week seriously. You don’t want to overwork your body when you hit your first goal. Give your body a break to set its new baseline and build muscle by recovering. Working out hard for long enough, I realize my body really needs time to recover, so taking a de-load week where I let my body rest and take a backseat further motivated me to get back to working out even harder since my muscles have time to grow and adapt.
3. Count your calories. You don’t need to do it often. I just did it once with a (Total Daily Energy Expenditure) TDEE calculator and jot it down somewhere so I know how many calories my body needs. Stick to it for a few weeks. Certain foods might seem to contain low-calorie amounts but are calorie-loaded so you’ll need to learn which option to choose from.
4. Limit alcohol. I know how much fun you can have with alcohol, I drink it too, but only on occasions. Not only does it affect my sleep and my energy levels, but it’s usually also loaded with calories.
5. Replace sugary caloric-dense drinks with 0 or low-calorie options. Liquid calories are so easy to consume. But there’s a ton of 0-calorie options out there these days. Again, it all relates to calorie in < calorie out.
6. Keep carb intake low. Bread, rice, and noodles are delicious. But keep it low within 1 cupped hand size.
7. Drink 500ml of water before each meal. It helps more than you think. It’s a natural appetite suppressant that lowers your daily calorie intake since you’ll consume fewer calories during meals. This was a game changer for my mum who was looking to lose weight and she naturally couldn’t consume as much food as she could after doing this, reducing her daily caloric intake.
8. Fuel your body with whole foods. They tend to be in higher volume with relatively much lower calories. In the past, we used to snack a ton which usually has excess calories but now we focus on whole foods which usually have lower calories and we have the same fulfilment from consuming them too.
9. Hit 0.8g of protein per gram of body weight every day. You don’t necessarily need any more than that because the benefits slow down after that unless you’re trying to maximize muscle growth. Protein helps with muscle building, and muscle maintenance and improves satiety. Hitting this goal every day transformed my body and I realized if I stopped hitting my daily intake goal, my growth would stop as well. Therefore, it’s a non-negotiable for me.
10. Dieting doesn’t have to be bland, it just needs to be within your calorie limit. Learn to choose food options that taste just as well but keep them within your calorie limit as per your TDEE results. Cooking at home, I thought I’d need to stick with the usual chicken breast and broccoli, but social media introduced me to a variety of food options that taste great while being able to stick within my caloric intake range.
11. Add friction to pick up snacks. Again, snacks usually contain high calories. It’s so easy to pick them up if they are easily reachable in a basket nearby. Try placing them high up in the cardboard, there will be a lower likelihood of you trying to reach for them. That’s how I helped my mum to limit her caloric intake as well.
12. 80/20 “diet” rule. For 80% of the week, try to hit those “dieting” steps but for the other 20% of the week, indulge a little in the foods you’re craving. Completing cutting out food that I craved 100% didn't work for me, 1 day I decided to give up and I started gaining back the weight I’d lost. So this 80/20 rule will help to keep you on your journey for a longer time.
13. 8/10 fat loss journey is down to dieting. The cherry on top is exercise.
14. Throw in 3 sessions of strength training a week. Drop the ego and focus on progressive overload each session. Use bodyweight exercises if you don’t have access to a gym because they work just as well.
15. Track your workouts. That’s how you know you’re improving. With each session, aim to increase your overall reps or sets, keeping in mind the idea of executing your exercises with perfect form. Again, it’s one of those pointers that you don’t necessarily take note of until you’re doing it. Otherwise, I realized you’d just blindly go about your training regime without thinking twice about it.
16. Measure your weight every day. The only way you know if you need to change your caloric intake or see if you’re making progress is to measure your weight daily, calculate the average each week, and compare it to the previous week.
17. Keep a food diary if you don’t know why you’re still gaining weight. It’s probably still down to caloric-dense foods most of the time.
18. Move 8k-10k steps daily. It’s a much lower-impact way of doing cardio and burning fat but it works if you stick to it for the long term. When my mum had her knee injury and she wasn’t able to do much cardio, she opted for this option instead which had a lower impact on her knees, which helped to maintain her weight during that period.
19. Ensure your workout schedule is non-negotiable. Make it a habit to exercise according to your plan, especially on bad days, once that’s done everything else can take priority.
20. Consistent sleep habits. Part of your weight loss journey is being able to sleep according to your circadian rhythm. It’s when you wake up and sleep at the same time each day.
21. Optimize self-talk. When the going gets tough, it’s who you say you are that matters.
22. Stick to the plan, and embrace the long game. It’s those who stick it to the end that wins. Aiming to achieve your goal in 1 month won’t cut it. My goals are structured in a 3-month to 1-year format where I take my time to hit my goals while ensuring that I enjoy the process because if you don’t enjoy the process, you’re missing the whole point of working out.
23. This is a lifestyle, not a 10-week program. Again, your weight loss journey isn’t a 10-week program. If you frame it as that, maintaining your weight goal would be an issue eventually.

Weight Loss Is a Lifestyle

I believe the main reason why people become obese or simply become unhealthy is because they have bad habits.

By recruiting more good habits into your life and making lifestyle changes, you’ll be able to achieve the body of your dreams. So be sure to start small, and choose 1 habit from the list above to focus on each week. Make sure it’s ingrained in yourself to stick to this habit without thinking twice about it.

Once that’s done, follow on with the next habit. Slowly but surely, you’ll achieve the weight goal you’ve set for yourself.

Part of learning how to lose weight is to know how to keep it off.

I know I’ve been there.

Most times, it’s so much easier to gain weight than to lose weight.

So as long as you make lifestyle adjustments and stick to them even when you’ve achieved your weight loss goal, you’ll feel healthier for a longer time.

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