Planning things, as I've said before, helps you achieve your goals.  Particularly if they are "SMART"

                S = Specific

                M = Measurable

                A =Agreed

                R = Realistic

                T = Time-Based

I've got part way there.

My "Specific" parts was that I wanted to lose 15kg by the end of March 2020.

My "Measurable" part was the 15kg.

My "Agreed" was kinda agreed, my GP thought it would be a good idea.

Is it "Realistic"?  I think it is.  To achieve my goal I need to lose 1.36kg per month

And the "Ttime" frame is reasonable.   I'd like to achieve the 15kg goal before October and maintain that weight.

Looking at it all together, I think I can do it.

I've had a few attempts at starting, but I haven't planned it very well.   So I'm going to have another crack at it but put a plan in place first.

Snack Attack!

One thing I've come to realise (or to be a bit more honesty stop denying) is that I have a weakness for snacks.  Particularly chocolate.  I wondering how many calories there are in some of my favourite snacks.  At Christmas we tend to accumulate packs of snack size chocolate bars, so i think that's a great place to start.

I checked the nutritional information on the packet and 3 of the little bars (approximately 25g) contain 511 kilojoules, or in shorthand 511kJ. Or 122 Calories (to be absolutely correct we should call then kilocalories).

I guess the next question is : Is this a lot of energy?

According to The National Heart, Blood, and Lung Institute a person with a sedentary lifestyle (my work doesn't require any heavy work at all, and I don't do much exercise) should take in around 2200 Calories a day or 9200kJ.  So the 511kj is around 5.5% of my daily energy intake.  So not a huge amount by itself, but if it's in addition to my usual energy intake it can be a problem.  Particularly if it's over a long period.

Increasing Exercise

On way of losing weight or maintaining weight at a stable level is increase exercise so that energy burnt by your body better matches what you take in.  If want to "burn off" the 122 Calories/511Kj.

Here's a neat table of energy values of some exercise. As you'll see from the table how much you burn depends on your weight (my 95kg translates to 209 pounds, and 185lb translates to 83kg).  As you'll see from the table

• an 83kg person walking for 30 minutes at 5.5Km/h will burn 200 Calories or 836kJ.  
• My guess is the 3 snack bars I had will take about 15 minutes walking at a brisk pace.  
• To give the idea a real world setting walk around a 400m athletics track about 7 times in 15 minutes.

Back to the plan!

I started about atwo weeks ago with the intention of sticking reasonably closely to a plan.  Problem is I didn't have it sorted.

So this weekend I'm going to be trying to get one sorted.