fitbit aria

Yesterday I wrote the new diet program I’m creating for myself called the Manifesting Body Diet.

Today I’m going to reveal the two platforms that I’ll be using to track my progress.

Before I go into that, I want to explain why tracking is so important.

Whenever we set a goal that we want to achieve in our lives, we must find some way to quantify our journey towards that goal so that we we know whether we are getting closer or further away from it.

When it comes to weight loss and fitness, it’s really important to track our progress so that we know whether the things we are doing are helping us to lose weight or not.

However, we also don’t want to over-complicate the whole process and make it really difficult to track things either.

The more automated we can make the process, the better.

For the Manifesting Body Diet, I am going to be tracking the following metrics:

My food / drinks / supplements
My activity / heart rate / sleep
My weight and body fat percentage

The first two metrics allow me to track my “input” into the equation – meaning what I’m actually doing, and the third metric allows me to track the end result – ie. my weight and body composition.

So how am I tracking these?

#1 – Food / Drinks / Supplements Tracking

Over the years I’ve tried various different software packages for tracking my food / drink / supplement intake.

I’ve tried everything for writing it down in a journal, to a desktop software, to Excel spreadsheets, to using cell phone apps etc.

One of the most accurate methods of tracking your food intake is to use a software that allows you to track calories, fat grams, carb grams, protein grams, fiber grams, as well as vitamins and minerals inside the food.

It’s a very accurate system of tracking, however the downside of it is that it is ridiculously time intensive to track all that food.

Trying to track calories and macro/micro-nutrient breakdowns like that would definitely be one of those things that would take energy away from me building my businesses – therefore it’s a NONO, so I’m not going to be doing that.

However, I still want to track SOMETHING so that I can quantify which foods are creating which result in my plan.

After doing a bunch of research, I decided to use the new WeightWatchers online tracking system to track my daily food / liquids and supplement intake.

By doing this I am essentially leveraging decades of THEIR experience working with thousands of customers, instead of trying to re-invent the wheel myself.

Remember, one of y primary goals with the Manifesting Body Diet is to make it simple, easy and time-efficient so that I can focus more time on making lots of money with my business, instead of farting around with food tracking systems.

WeightWatcher’s system seems to be doing the trick for me. It’s really simple. Here’s a screenshot from my tracker today:

Across the top you will see that Weightwatchers automatically calculated how many points I get to “spend” on food each day, based on the personal information I gave them like my weight, height, sex, and activity levels and my goals.

For me, they’re starting me off at 49 points per day that I can spend on various foods.

Then, in addition to that I also get an additional 49 points extra per week to spend on other stuff if I want to, such as for example if I want to have a “cheat day” or “cheat meal” etc.

With their new points system, they’re taking into account the fat grams, protein grams, carbohydrate grams, and fiber grams to calculate how many points a food is worth.

For example, a 355ml can of coke is 5 points. Two slices of Dominos Pizza with the toppings I chose is 11 points. Make sense?

It’s basically very similar to calorie counting, except for a few differences.

Firstly, I think it easier and faster than counting calories because it’s easier for me to remember that a can of Coke is 5 points rather than trying to remember that it’s 160 calories.

Secondly, on this program any fruit and vegetables that I eat are worth ZERO points, which means I can have an unlimited amount of broccoli if I wanted to, or any other veggies and it would still be zero points.

If I was doing calorie counting, I’d have to track my fruit and veggie calories as well. This makes it easier.

Thirdly with calorie counting, 200 calories worth of donuts is treated the same way as 200 calories worth of fruit for example, but they do not have the same nutritional value to the body, so reducing everything down into just the calorie content is too oversimplified in my opinion.

What Weightwatchers did is they took calorie counting and made it more simple, and also more effective by giving foods that are healthier for you a lower point value than foods that just give you empty calories.

The app also allows me to track my daily liquids, fruit & veggies, whether I took a multivitamin and my healthy oils intake.

Lots of cool tracking abilities, but also very simple and easy to use.

The system also integrates with the Fitbit platform to automatically pull activity data from my Fitbit tracker, and to award me with extra points on active days!

So for example if I walk 10,000 steps or more during the day, the system awards me with extra points I can use.

If you’d like to learn more about Weightwatchers, if you’re in Canada click here, and if you’re in the US click here.

Please note that I’m only using Weightwatchers strictly for their software and tracking system, but I have heard from people that their live meetings are also good.

I have no desire to go to weekly meetings, so I just use the online app for my Manifesting Body Diet purposes.

#2 – Activity / Heart Rate / Sleep Tracking

As far as tracking my activity levels, heart rate and sleep, I’m using the Fitbit Charge HR bracelet and website.

Here’s a screenshot of what my activity levels look like:

Here’s the sleep tracking it shows me:

I don’t have a screenshot of the heart rate tracker, but I do have that tracked as well.

Tracking activity is important so that you can measure progress and gauge how activity affects your results.

However, tracking activity can’t be time intensive or take up too much energy otherwise you won’t stick with it.

That’s why I’m using the Fitbit Charge HR tracker because it tracks all that for me just by wearing it, and it automatically uploads all the data to the website when my wrist band comes close to my computer and calculates and graphs all that data.

Finally, the third thing I track is…

#3 – Weight and Body Fat Percentage Tracking

I have also completely simplified my weight and body fat percentage tracking as well.

In the past I’ve tried all kinds of tools and devices from calipers to DEXA scans to track my body fat percentage.

They all work with varying degrees of accuracy, but the challenge with all those different systems is that they all take up a lot of time to do the tracking / measurements.

What I’m using instead is the Fitbit Aria scale which handles everything for me.

I step on the scale in the morning when I first wake up, and the scale automatically measures my weight, body fat percentage and then when I step off, it automatically uploads that data to the Fitbit website where the system graphs my weight

It also graphs it for you automatically on a nice graph so that you can see your trends.

Here’s my graph showing an upward trend of gaining weight over the last year or so:

Of course the goal of the Manifesting Body Diet is to LOSE excess body fat, not to gain it so I’m hoping to see that graph start changing direction very soon, but I just wanted to show you how easy it is to track your weight with a simple device that takes literally less than 10 seconds per day to track your weight and body fat percentage.

If you want to learn a bit more about the weight loss tech gadgets I’ve mentioned in this post, check out this blog post here.

So what about you? What are YOU using to track your weight loss / activity progress?

I love gadgets.

If you ask any of my friends and family members, I’m always playing with some new fitness gadget, tracker, system or website.

Sadly, in reality, the majority of the gadgets I end up buying or getting sent to me for review end up sitting around collecting dust.

Most of them I never use for more than a few days, or perhaps a few weeks.

However, there are three gadgets that have stood the test of time and I think are absolutely essential to helping you achieve success with your weight loss plan.

#1 – The Fitbit Aria Wi-Fi Smart Scale

This scale is just awesome.

It connects to your Wi-Fi network and allows you to automatically track your weight so easily that you’ll actually step on it on a daily basis.

Over the years I’ve had many different scales, and I’ve tried various ways to track my weight, and my body fat % etc., but I always ended up giving up as the tracking process just took way too long.

Meaning, I would go into the bathroom in the morning and step on my scale, and then look at my weight and then have to remember what I weighed and what my body fat % was…

…THEN I would have to walk from the bathroom to my computer, load up a tracking spreadsheet of some sort and type in my new weight…

…that’s IF I wasn’t interrupted by someone or a phone call, or if my dogs didn’t need me to let them out or if someone didn’t text me or some other interruption didn’t cause me to completely forget what my weight was.

I hated the process tracking my weight using such a manual method, so I ended up giving up.

Since getting the Fitbit Aria Wi-Fi Smart Scale though, it’s been super easy to track my weight.

I simply step on the scale, it automatically detects that it’s me (based on my weight), and it measures my weight, my body fat %, and it connects to my Wi-Fi network and uploads my data to the Fitbit website where I can get a detailed analysis of my weight, and my body composition.

It’s simply awesome.

And the FitBit website is a great tool as well for tracking your weight and activity levels.

Although I haven’t actually been on a weight loss plan for the past few years, since getting the scale about a year ago I’ve been tracking my weight pretty consistently every few days and now I have all that data available to me, so I can see exactly how much weight I’ve put on in the past 12 months etc.

I’m a firm believer that in order to lose weight you must track your progress regularly on a daily basis while on a weight loss plan, and several times a week if you’re just on a maintenance plan.

This scale makes that easy.

If you don’t keep track of your weight daily, it makes it way harder to lose weight as you then have no idea what’s working and what isn’t.

This brings me to the 2nd tech gadget that I think is a must-have for a weight loss plan.

#2 – The Fitbit Activity Trackers

The Fitbit family of activity trackers is awesome for tracking your daily activity.

I had a Fitbit Force activity tracker for the first half of 2014 and loved it, except for the fat that there was a recall on the rubber they used for the band which caused a little bit of irritation in some people.

I ended up sending mine back in order to get a $140 credit from Fitbit as I wanted to try out using the Samsung Gear watch instead, which also tracks activity and also heart rate.

I like the Samsung watch I have, as it syncs with my Samsung cell phone and I can answer calls on it, read emails and text messages, but I’m not too impressed with it’s activity tracker system.

Yes it counts steps like the Fitbit, but what I like about the Fitbit system of activity trackers is that they integrate with the Fitbit website.

This way I have my weight tracking and graphing and my activity tracking and graphing all in one place.

I can also track my meals on the Fitbit website as well, or track my meals using MyFitnessPal and then synchronize automatically with Fitbit.

Overall, after testing several different bands from Nike, BodyMedia, Samsung etc., I still like the Fitbit system the best.

I’m currently using a Fitbit Flex but will be upgrading to the new Fitbit Charge HR bands when they come out in the near future.

#3 – The MyoTape Body Measuring Tape

The MyoTape body measuring tape is not really a “tech” gadget but it’s still really cool and I think it deserves a spot in my top 3 favorite weight loss tools.

This very simple tape measure allows you to easily measure your body measurements such as your waist, hips, thighs, biceps, forearms, neck, chest or whatever else you want to measure without the need of a second person.

Ever try measuring your bicep with a regular measuring tape? It’s nearly impossible.

With this tape it’s really easy!

And it’s very inexpensive, so I definitely recommend getting one of these.

Keeping track of your measurements is extremely important especially if you’re embracing on a weight loss program that is going to combine dieting and exercise/fitness.

The reason for this is that if you’re building muscle, your weight might not drop, but your body measurements will improve.

By combining the scale measurements you get for body weight, and the body fat % and your body measurements with this tape you’ll have a very good way to measure your weight loss progress with a lot of accuracy.

These are the three tech gadgets that I recommend picking up if you want to lose weight in 2015.

Out of all the things I’ve bought and tested, these are the gadgets I have used the most and continue to use.

Manifesting Body Diet – Tracking Your Progress