A combination of healthy eating and exercise is the only way to lose weight quickly and efficiently. Fad diets may knock the pounds off fast, but they will soon go back on if you don’t make basic changes in your lifestyle. If you are serious about losing weight follow these 7 healthy weight loss tips.
- Eat a good breakfast
Healthy Breakfast Cereal. Photo Credit: PxHere under Creative Commons CC0 License
Many people mistakenly think that skipping breakfast will help to reduce their calorie intake and so help them to lose weight. However, studies have revealed that not eating a well-balanced breakfast often leads to high-calorie snacking to abate hunger. Eating a healthy breakfast of fruits, eggs, and whole-grain cereals or bread will give you everything you need to get through to lunchtime. Make breakfast a calm unrushed affair. Encourage your family to get up a little earlier to enjoy breakfast together and prepare yourselves for the day ahead. If this is not possible, at least make yourself a smoothie with different fruits and yoghurt and add some ground flaxseed, before you head out the door.
- Make lunch your main meal
Healthy Sandwich Wrap. Photo Credit: PxHere under Creative Commons CC0 License
This can be a little harder to implement, but studies show that by making this simple change in your eating habits you can lose weight without even having to eat less. The reason is that eating a good lunch enables your digestive system to make the best use of your food and take full advantages of the nutrients. Eating later in the day, your digestive system does not work so efficiently, so instead of utilising food, a lot of it just gets passed through and turned into fat.
- Change your eating habits
Cooking with Healthy Ingredients. Photo Credit: PxHere under Creative Commons CC0 License
Be aware of what you are eating. Steer away from anything fried or loaded with sugar. Increase the amount of fruits and vegetables in your diet and eat as many as possible raw. An easy way to do this is making juices or smoothies. You can ingest a large amount of fruits and vegetables in this way. Have fun trying different fruits and vegetables that you are not accustomed to. Savour your food, concentrate on the flavours and enjoy every mouthful. Make eating something you are conscious about not just something to satiate hunger while watching the TV or conversing. Make mealtimes a pleasurable event, and only eat until you feel pleasantly full, never until you’re stuffed!
- No snacking
Grocery Shopping. Photo Credit: Pixabay under CC0 Creative Commons License
Just don’t buy any snack items. Even ‘healthy’ snacks add lots of unnecessary calories to your diet. You will find that by eating a good breakfast and making lunch your main meal, you will not feel hungry throughout the day and so won’t be tempted to snack. In the evening eat lightly, a mixed green salad, steamed vegetables or a clear soup is ideal and will be sufficient to get you through to breakfast.
- Don’t be too hard on yourself
Strawberry Cake and Coffee. Photo Credit: Pixabay under CC0 Creative Commons License
Don’t deny yourself something you know you shouldn’t eat. Just serve yourself a small portion and savour each mouthful. You will never be able to maintain your weight loss if you are constantly battling with yourself. By including more healthy elements in your diet, you will find that your body will naturally guide you away from calorie or sugar-laden foods. However, if a slice of grandma’s coffee and walnut cake is crying out to you, make her, and yourself happy and enjoy a SMALL slice.
- Exercise is essential to weight loss
Couple Exercise and Fitness. Photo Credit: Pixabay under CC0 Creative Commons License
Exercise is imperative to shed pounds quickly and to keep the weight off. Exercise can take many forms, from joining a gym or setting up a home gym, to taking up a sport, walking the dog or washing the car. Being active is what is important. Don’t get the car out to go to the local shop, walk. Taking the kids to soccer practice? Don’t sit in the car and read, put on your trainers and jog around the pitch. Make physical activity a natural part of your life. Getting your children active from an early age will help them to maintain this healthy practice throughout their lives so avoiding problems such as obesity and diabetes in the next generation. If you live on your own, getting a dog can be a great motivation. Dogs need regular walking, and they are also great jogging companions. Just seeing how happy he is will make you feel good about getting exercise. House and garden work are both great ways to exercise. Don’t look on them as chores, turn them into opportunities to stretch, bend and build up a sweat.
- Attitude
Positive Attitude. Photo Credit: Pixabay under CC0 Creative Commons License
Losing weight and keeping it off is simply a question of attitude. Don’t let it be a calorie counting self-denial battle that you can’t win. Let it be a chance to discover new flavours, habits and enjoyments that will naturally take the pounds off and keep you healthy and feeling good about yourself.
Leave a Reply