For most people, losing weight is an ongoing struggle. You may find some success with a particular diet or weight loss plan, but as soon as you return to a "normal" life, the weight will go back up. This is too familiar a scenario for most people and the challenge of losing weight is not only losing weight, but also keeping it off.

Not all diet tips and weight loss plans are realistic, are you ready to eat nothing but grapefruit for weeks? And what happens when you decide to eat something else? This is the cycle that most of us have fallen into and creates the yo-yo effect, making it even more difficult to lose weight.

The big news recently is the danger of carrying excess abdominal fat, but many people don't even know how to lose abdominal fat, they believe there is a magic pill or potion that will give them the flat stomach they craved. I'm sorry to be the one to tell you, there is no quick fix, losing abdominal fat is no different than any other plan designed to show you how to lose weight. You need to change what you eat and what you do. It's that easy.

Each pound of weight you carry equals 3,500 calories. No matter how much weight you need to lose, the best way to lose weight is to start calculating how many calories your body needs just to maintain your current weight. Once you know how many calories your body needs, you can calculate how fast you want to lose weight. Let us begin.

There are three things that will influence how many calories your body needs. These are BMR, or basic metabolic rate; physical activity, how active are you; and the thermal effect of food, this is the energy your body needs to digest the food you eat.

The first element, BMR is fairly easy to calculate. This is the amount of calories or units of energy your body burns while you are at rest. Your basic metabolic rate will include the calories used to perform the necessary functions, such as pumping the heart, stabilizing the temperature, and working the lungs. All of these activities require energy or fuel for your body to perform. The amount of fuel or calories used through BMR is approximately 60 to 70 percent of the total number of calories your body will need in a day come perdere peso .

A standard and accepted formula for calculating TMB is the Harris-Benedict formula:

Adult male:

66 + (6.3 x body weight in pounds) + (12.9 x height in inches) - (6.8 x age in years)

Adult female:

655 + (4.3 x weight in pounds) + (4.7 x height in inches) - (4.7 x age in years)

You can easily use this formula to calculate how many calories your body will need for BMR.

The next factor that affects the calories you will need is physical activity. Everything you do will require fuel for your body. It's not just exercise that burns calories, dressing, washing your face, or attending an aerobics class; they will all require fuel or calories for your body to burn. The more physical activity you do, the more calories you will burn in a day, and the more calories your body will need.

The last element that comes into play is the thermal effect of food. Your body uses energy to digest food and break it down into usable elements. This energy is known as the thermal effect of food and is calculated by multiplying the total calories consumed by 10%, so basically 10% of all calories consumed are used in digestion. Some foods will take longer to digest, making their thermal effect slightly higher.