Fact ? Proper strength training exercise will trim your body not bulk it up. It is strange that someone who is overweight would choose to believe the opposite when their body is already ?bulked? up from excess body fat. A proper exercise program that includes strength training exercise is the only long term permanent solution to the problem of being overweight.

A restrictive diet combined with the wrong type of exercise will make excess body fat loss very difficult if not impossible long term. This combination works against the body not with it and will only lead to frustration and disappointing results.

Loss of muscle tissue is an important factor in weight gain as we get older. Muscle tissue demands eight times the calories that fat requires so, if we lose muscle mass, we lower our metabolism (the rate the body burns fuel). This can happen even if the weight on the bathroom scale does not change.

Someone who is overweight has an unhealthy body composition (muscle/fat ratio) and restricting food intake without proper exercise will only make this worse. The focus must be on correcting this underlying problem right at the source. Building back the muscle tone will increase the metabolism which is the body's engine so it burns more calories.

Some people especially women think that they have this genetic curse of ?bulking up? overnight if they even look at a weight. But that is not correct, lets repeat it ?proper strength training will trim your body not bulk it up?. Adding muscle tissue to the body is not easy, especially for women as they have approximately 18% the testosterone levels of men, the primary hormone related to muscle building. These levels drop in men and women as they age, an additional reason that muscle mass drops naturally with age unless you work to keep it.

For excess body fat loss any program that does not include strength training exercise will cause muscle loss and a subsequent reduction of metabolism. Ultimately, the dieter cannot sustain the lower calorie intake and thus slowly gains the weight back and usually adds some extra as well.

But is doesn't have to be this way. The solution is two fold ? a proper exercise program that contains strength training exercise and a balanced food intake that contains enough food to prevent hunger and enough energy to be able to perform the exercise program with enough intensity (degree of difficulty) to product results.

If you are new to exercise it is important that you seek the help of a fitness professional to set up your program and teach you correct exercise technique. This could save you months if not years of wasted time and effort.

The reason for all this weight gain in our population, however, is not an aging metabolism - it can be attributed mainly to our lifestyle activity levels or rather the lack of them. Inactivity results in loss of muscle, and a loss of muscle, not an aging metabolism, is the primary cause of creeping obesity that has become epidemic in our population. The muscle tissue that remains on a person is as metabolically active as ever, but in the majority of people as they get older they simply have less of it.

A well planned and executed exercise program set up by a fitness professional can be a virtual fountain of youth. There aren't any tricks or short cuts, but the benefits are numerous including, decreased risk of cardiovascular disease, diabetes, high blood pressure, obesity, cancer and metabolic conditions.

You can feel better, look better, and have better control of your body weight and your health by making fitness a part of your life. It is never too late to start, but the sooner you start the sooner you can reap the benefits.