You were initially very pleased with your results as you were steadily losing 1 or 2 pounds per week until suddenly, you begin to notice that your weight loss is getting slower and slower until it grinds to a screeching stop and no matter what you do, the number on your weighing scale refuses to go down. What happened, you wondered in exasperation.

Well, this phenomenon quite a common phenomenon for people who are trying hard to lose weight and yes, you have hit the dreaded "Weight Loss Plateau".

So how can you overcome the weight loss plateau? In order to overcome the plateau, you need to understand why you are at this stage. The answer is actually rather simple.

I believe that you probably know that in order to lose weight, you have to consume less calories than what you burn for energy. So if you were losing weight effectively before and now your weight simply refused to go down anymore, that could mean only one thing and that is that you are longer on a caloric deficit situation, meaning you are no longer burning more calories than you consume. Yes, you can say that you are still eating the same thing and amount of food as when you were losing weight steadily. However, I can tell you this is exactly the problem lie and here are the reasons why.

You see, if your diet requires you to curb calories and since you wanted to get faster result, you cut down your calorie consumption more than what was recommended, your body adapts to this drastic caloric deficit by decreasing your metabolic rate known as "starvation mode" or "adaptive thermogenesis" in the weight loss the industry.

Your body's adaptation is actually a natural survival instinct because your body instinctively reacts as though you are starving and thus is conserving your body fat to keep you alive.

Now, you may not be aware that as you were losing weight, you were getting smaller and therefore you need lesser calories than before when you had a bigger body frame. As this being the case, if you are eating as much as before when you were bigger, then you are now consuming more calories than you are burning. So how can you lose weight if you are eating more calories than that which you are burning? Common sense isn't it? The problem is that most people do not realize this implication or even thought about it this way.

Since now that you have a smaller and lighter body frame, your body will burn lesser calories when you are moving about or when you are exercising. This means that you have to tweak your exercises to burn more calories, don't you agree?

These are commonly overlooked reasons why you often hear people say that it is most difficult to lose that last 10 pounds or so. It is not difficult at all, it is just that they have overlooked these not so obvious but simple facts. So the answer as to why you have hit the weight loss plateau is that you no longer in a caloric deficit state, simple as that.

So how do you overcome a weight loss plateau? For starters, you can get started by giving your body a break. Take a week or two off your program since your body has adapted to it. This is also to give your body a physiological break from the stress of dieting and exercising. It is also time to let your body reset some of those starvation hormones and start stimulating your metabolism again. So when it is time to get back to the state of calorie deficit after your much needed rest, your body will be responsive to your efforts again. Good news isn't it?

So when you return to your weight loss program, tweak it to reflect the current state that you are in and watch your body fat melting away again.