Trying to reach your ideal weight is very difficult in today's world of fast food, and supermarkets that are stocked with processed foods and sugar.

The world is full of man-made pollution, resulting in many diseases and ultimately raising the death rate. For living in such an environment, we must try to be physically fit in order to fight these diseases. This is the reason why our youth, and elderly are now targeted by our governments to become fit and healthy.

Two Methods to Calculate Your Ideal Weight

The best way to know whether if you are fit, or not, is through the "Ideal Weight" concept. Ideal weight means the weight representing the lowest death rate for individuals of a certain age, height and gender.

There are many ways to figure out your ideal weight, but the one most followed is the "People's Choice" formula for ideal weight, designed by doctor S.B. Halls. The formula tries to predict what people of a specific height, weight and age would choose to be their ideal weight.

Another important tool for measuring your fitness is the BMI (Body Mass Index). BMI is the relationship between the weight and height of individuals, so as to determine their body fat and health risk. It's calculated by the formula:

1. Divide your body weight by your height (in inches).

2. Take the results of your body weight and height and divide that by your height.

3. Now, take the results from Step 2 and multiply it by 703.

4. Now you have your BMI

Example:

If your weight is 210 and your height in inches is 72

210/72 = 2.91

2.91/72 = 0.040

0.040 X 703 = 28.1

28.1 would be your BMI.

A BMI of less than 18.5 reflects underweight, 18.5 - 22.9 reflects normal, and 23.0 - 24.9 reflects overweight and above 25.0 reflects obesity.

So a combination of a BMI, and ideal weight study can help you determine the most appropriate and suitable weight, depending on your age, gender and height.

Having studied the above mentioned concepts, it is determined that most people are suffering from the problem of being overweight as compared to underweight. Obesity is a great challenge that many are facing today. For such people, weight loss is immensely important, because being overweight is what eventually kills many of them.

Tips on Achieving Your Ideal Weight

Losing weight can be difficult, as it requires a lot of discipline. Most of our bodies gain weight due to overeating, thyroid problems, and a lack of exercise. In general, a man requires 2700 calories and a woman requires 2000 calories intake to maintain his or her weight. However, if you are overweight, you can begin eating a healthy balanced diet, like most recommended by physicians.

There are many diet plans available on the market today, but remember, most don't contain balanced diets, but resort to starving your body. You can lose weight quickly with many of them, but you will gain all of that weight back as soon as you stop your diet.

It's an excellent time to realize the importance of meditation, Yoga and exercise, too. A good amount of exercise can always help reduce weight faster. The easiest exercise that you can do is a morning walk. Not only it is good for weight loss, but it's also great for your cardio vascular system.

You can also turn to gyms and fitness centers. Professional trainers will teach you a lot of fat burning exercises, and give massages that help reduce weight. Body weight exercises, cycling, and jogging are also some effective weight loss methods.

Apart from maintaining a good fitness level, it's of vital importance to maintain the nutrition level in your body as well. Nutrition plays a very important role to support life, and many health problems can be prevented or alleviated with a healthy and nutritious diet.

In order to maintain proper nutrition in your body, it's important to get a proper intake of nutrients like protein, carbohydrates, fats, vitamins, minerals and water.

A balance between the carbohydrates (sugar, starches and fibers), protein (milk, cheese, egg, legumes etc), fats (oil, butter, ghee etc), Minerals (calcium, sulfur, chlorine etc), Vitamins (sunlight, oranges, lemons etc) and water (minimum 6 to 8 glasses daily) is needed to maintain proper nutrition in your body so that you can prevent diseases and stay fit.

So mere exercising or nutrition is not enough to maintain a healthy body, but, a combination of both is required to stay fit and trip. Your ideal weight can be achieved by proper exercising, nutrition and weight loss techniques.