Two weeks is really not a lot of time, but it is adequate time to get your weight loss program off to a strong start. You may already know what you are supposed to eat, when you will eat it, and how to prepare each meal. Perhaps you have planned out exactly when you will workout and your preferred forms of exercise. You are eager to get going and excited to see results as quickly as possible. The picture seems complete in your head: you are going to lose weight! Two weeks from now you will be an entirely different person.

All of this excitement and planning ahead is a great thing! It will carry you through the first couple of weeks and hopefully even longer. Yet there is one more thing you can do while making all these plans, which will help the weight to come off a little faster and keep you mentally and physically stimulated to keep going even when the excitement fades and you want to give up.

This one tip is simply to get out of your comfort zone and make your goals a bit of a challenge. It is a fact that if you do the same exercise routine every day or week, your body will get so efficient at performing that routine that it will not burn as many calories doing it anymore. Basically, your routine becomes too easy for your body as it gets into better shape.

For you starting out, this means you need to set your exercise goals so that they will challenge your body at least a little. If you have not exercised for a long time and are very out of shape, then simply walking for an extended period of time may be a challenge. That is fine, get out there and do it! But if you get out there and are still walking along easily after a half hour, then it is time to challenge your body so it is forced to kick up the metabolism and burn more calories.

You will also need to increase intensity the further you get into your program. How fast your body adjusts to an exercise and needs more will depend on many factors. It is different for everyone, so you will have to monitor yourself and judge when it is getting too comfortable for your own good.

Turning up the intensity is easy, once you realize it is time. If you have found a form of exercise that you enjoy, or at least can tolerate, then look for ways to make that same exercise harder. For example, if you start out taking a walk around the block after dinner there are several ways to start making it harder:

1. Walk for a longer period of time, or distance.

2. Look up the proper form for power walking and start that instead of leisurely strolling.

3. Add ankle weights, wrist weights, or walk with small dumbbells.

4. Add short bursts of jogging at regular frequencies (also known as interval training, look it up).

You get the idea! Step out of your comfort zone and keep upping the demands on your body to decrease your chances of hitting the dreaded weight loss plateau. Two weeks is enough time to do some serious damage to your fat stores, if you get your body pumped up enough to do the work!