Easy Ways to Lose Weight, lose fat and have your health
( adapted from Readers Digest - RD)
You
know the challenges and the setbacks in health especially when it comes to
losing body weight (weight loss). You will keep hearing stuffs like: eat lesser
foods, consume lesser calories, workout/or walkout to burn out more fat/or burn
out more calories etc. But you also recognize that best diets and rapid/fast
weight loss strategies have about as much substance as a politician's campaign
pledges.
If
you are trying to lose weight or shed pounds of weight, do not start off by trying
to renovate all your eating and physical exercise lifestyles. You are better
off finding numerous modest things you can do on a day-to-day basis — along
with following the fundamental guidelines of eating supplementary vegetables
and lesser fat and getting more physical body activity. Collectively, they
should refer the scale numbers in the accurate direction:
1. Once a week, indulge in a high-calorie-tasting, but
low-calorie, treat. This should help keep you from feeling deprived and binging
on higher-calorie foods. For instance:
Lobster. Just 83
calories in 3 ounces.
Shrimp. Just 60
calories in 12 large.
Smoked salmon.
Just 66 calories in two ounces. Sprinkle with capers for an even more elegant
treat.
Whipped cream.
Just 8 calories in one tablespoon. Drop a dollop over a bowl of fresh fruit for
dessert.
2. Treat high-calorie foods as jewels in the crown. Make a
spoonful of ice cream the jewel and a bowl of fruit the crown. Cut down on the
chips by pairing each bite with lots of chunky, filling fresh salsa, suggests
Jeff Novick, director of nutrition at the Pritikin Longevity Center & Spa
in Florida. Balance a little cheese with a lot of salad.
3. After breakfast, make water your primary drink. At
breakfast, go ahead and drink orange juice. But throughout the rest of the day,
focus on water instead of juice or soda. The average American consumes an extra
245 calories a day from soft drinks. That’s nearly 90,000 calories a year — or
25 pounds! And research shows that despite the calories, sugary drinks don’t
trigger a sense of fullness the way that food does.
4. Carry a palm-size notebook everywhere you go for one
week. Write down every single morsel that enters your lips — even water.
Studies have found that people who maintain food diaries wind up eating about
15 percent less food than those who don’t.
5. Buy a pedometer, clip it to your belt, and aim for an
extra 1,000 steps a day. On average, sedentary people take only 2,000 to 3,000
steps a day. Adding 2,000 steps will help you maintain your current weight and
stop gaining weight; adding more than that will help you lose weight.
6. Add 10 percent to the amount of daily calories you think
you’re eating, then adjust your eating habits accordingly. If you think you’re
consuming 1,700 calories a day and don’t understand why you’re not losing
weight, add another 170 calories to your guesstimate. Chances are, the new
number is more accurate.
7. Eat five or six small meals or snacks a day instead of
three large meals. A 1999 South African study found that when men ate parts of
their morning meal at intervals over five hours, they consumed almost 30
percent fewer calories at lunch than when they ate a single breakfast. Other
studies show that even if you eat the same number of calories distributed this
way, your body releases less insulin, which keeps blood sugar steady and helps
control hunger.
8. Walk for 45 minutes a day. The reason we’re suggesting 45
minutes instead of the typical 30 is that a Duke University study found that
while 30 minutes of daily walking is enough to prevent weight gain in most
relatively sedentary people, exercise beyond 30 minutes results in weight and
fat loss. Burning an additional 300 calories a day with three miles of brisk
walking (45 minutes should do it) could help you lose 30 pounds in a year
without even changing how much you’re eating.
9. Find an online weight-loss buddy. A University of Vermont
study found that online weight-loss buddies help you keep the weight off. The
researchers followed volunteers for 18 months. Those assigned to an
Internet-based weight maintenance program sustained their weight loss better
than those who met face-to-face in a support group.
10. Bring the color blue into your life more often. There’s
a good reason you won’t see many fast-food restaurants decorated in blue:
Believe it or not, the color blue functions as an appetite suppressant. So
serve up dinner on blue plates, dress in blue while you eat, and cover your
table with a blue tablecloth. Conversely, avoid red, yellow, and orange in your
dining areas. Studies find they encourage eating.
11. Clean your closet of the “fat” clothes. Once you’ve
reached your target weight, throw out or give away every piece of clothing that
doesn’t fit. The idea of having to buy a whole new wardrobe if you gain the
weight back will serve as a strong incentive to maintain your new figure.
12. Downsize your dinner plates. Studies find that the less
food put in front of you, the less food you’ll eat. Conversely, the more food
in front of you, the more you’ll eat — regardless of how hungry you are. So
instead of using regular dinner plates that range these days from 10-14 inches
(making them look forlornly empty if they’re not heaped with food), serve your
main course on salad plates (about 7-9 inches wide). The same goes for liquids.
Instead of 16-ounce glasses and oversized coffee mugs, return to the old days
of 8-ounce glasses and 6-ounce coffee cups.
13. Serve your dinner restaurant style (food on the plates)
rather than family style (food served in bowls and on platters on the table).
When your plate is empty, you’re finished; there’s no reaching for seconds.
14. Hang a mirror opposite your seat at the table. One study
found that eating in front of mirrors slashed the amount people ate by nearly
one-third. Seems having to look yourself in the eye reflects back some of your
own inner standards and goals, and reminds you of why you’re trying to lose
weight in the first place.
15. Put out a vegetable platter. A body of research out of
Pennsylvania State University finds that eating water-rich foods such as
zucchini, tomatoes, and cucumbers during meals reduces your overall calorie
consumption. Other water-rich foods include soups and salads. You won’t get the
same benefits by just drinking your water, though. Because the body processes
hunger and thirst through different mechanisms, it simply doesn’t register a
sense of fullness with water (or soda, tea, coffee, or juice).
16. Use vegetables to bulk up meals. You can eat twice as
much pasta salad loaded with veggies like broccoli, carrots, and tomatoes for
the same calories as a pasta salad sporting just mayonnaise. Same goes for
stir-fries. And add vegetables to make a fluffier, more satisfying omelet
without having to up the number of eggs.
17. Eat one less cookie a day. Or consume one less can of
regular soda, or one less glass of orange juice, or three fewer bites of a
fast-food hamburger. Doing any of these saves you about 100 calories a day,
according to weight-loss researcher James O. Hill, Ph.D., of the University of
Colorado. And that alone is enough to prevent you from gaining the 1.8 to 2
pounds most people pack on each year.
18. Avoid white foods. There is some scientific legitimacy
to today’s lower-carb diets: Large amounts of simple carbohydrates from white
flour and added sugar can wreak havoc on your blood sugar and lead to weight
gain. But you shouldn’t toss out the baby with the bathwater. While avoiding
sugar, white rice, and white flour, you should eat plenty of whole grain breads
and brown rice. One Harvard study of 74,000 women found that those who ate more
than two daily servings of whole grains were 49 percent less likely to be
overweight than those who ate the white stuff.
19. Switch to ordinary coffee. Fancy coffee drinks from
trendy coffee joints often pack several hundred calories, thanks to whole milk,
whipped cream, sugar, and sugary syrups. A cup of regular coffee with skim milk
has just a small fraction of those calories. And when brewed with good beans,
it tastes just as great.
20. Use nonfat powdered milk in coffee. You get the
nutritional benefits of skim milk, which is high in calcium and low in
calories. And, because the water has been removed, powdered milk doesn’t dilute
the coffee the way skim milk does.
21. Eat cereal for breakfast five days a week. Studies find
that people who eat cereal for breakfast every day are significantly less
likely to be obese and have diabetes than those who don’t. They also consume
more fiber and calcium — and less fat — than those who eat other breakfast
foods. Of course, that doesn’t mean reaching for the Cap’n Crunch. Instead,
pour out a high-fiber, low-sugar cereal like Total or Grape Nuts.
22. Pare your portions. Whether you eat at home or in a
restaurant, immediately remove one-third of the food on your plate. Arguably
the worst food trend of the past few decades has been the explosion in portion
sizes on America’s dinner plates (and breakfast and lunch plates). We eat far,
far more today than our bodies need. Studies find that if you serve people more
food, they’ll eat more food, regardless of their hunger level. The converse is
also true: Serve
yourself less and you’ll eat less.
23. Eat 90 percent of your meals at home. You’re more likely
to eat more — and eat more high-fat, high-calorie foods — when you eat out than
when you eat at home. Restaurants today serve such large portions that many
have switched to larger plates and tables to accommodate them!
24. Avoid any prepared food that lists sugar, fructose, or
corn syrup among the first four ingredients on the label. You should be able to
find a lower-sugar version of the same type of food. If you can’t, grab a piece
of fruit instead! Look for sugar-free varieties of foods such as ketchup,
mayonnaise, and salad dressing.
25. Eat slowly and calmly. Put your fork or spoon down
between every bite. Sip water frequently. Intersperse your eating with stories
for your dining partner of the amusing things that happened during your day.
Your brain lags your stomach by about 20 minutes when it comes to satiety
(fullness) signals. If you eat slowly enough, your brain will catch up to tell
you that you are no longer in need of food.
26. Eat only when you hear your stomach growling. It’s
stunning how often we eat out of boredom, nervousness, habit, or frustration —
so often, in fact, that many of us have actually forgotten what physical hunger
feels like. Next time, wait until your stomach is growling before you reach for
food. If you’re hankering for a specific food, it’s probably a craving, not
hunger. If you’d eat anything you could get your hands on, chances are you’re
truly hungry.
27. Find ways other than eating to express love, tame
stress, and relieve boredom. For instance, you might make your family a photo
album of special events instead of a rich dessert, sign up for a
stress-management course at the local hospital or take up an active hobby, like
bowling.
28. State the positive. You’ve heard of a self-fulfilling
prophecy? Well, if you keep focusing on things you can’t do, like resisting
junk food or getting out the door for a daily walk, chances are you won’t do
them. Instead (whether you believe it or not) repeat positive thoughts to yourself.
“I can lose weight.” “I will get out for my walk today.” “I know I can resist
the pastry cart after dinner.” Repeat these phrases like a mantra all day long.
Before too long, they will become their own self-fulfilling prophecy.
29. Discover your dietary point of preference. If you work
hard to control your weight, you may get pleasure from your appearance, but you
may also feel sorry for yourself each time you forgo a favorite food. There is
a balance to be struck between the immediate gratification of indulgent foods
and the long-term pleasure of maintaining a desirable weight and good health.
When you have that balance worked out, you have identified your own personal
dietary pleasure “point of preference.” This is where you want to stay.
30. Use flavorings such as hot sauce, salsa, and Cajun
seasonings instead of relying on butter and creamy or sugary sauces. Besides
providing lots of flavor with no fat and few calories, many of these seasonings
— the spicy ones — turn up your digestive fires, causing your body to
temporarily burn more calories.
31. Eat fruit instead of drinking fruit juice. For the
calories in one kid-size box of apple juice, you can enjoy an apple, orange,
and a slice of watermelon. These whole foods will keep you satisfied much
longer than that box of apple juice, so you’ll eat less overall.
32. Spend 10 minutes a day walking up and down stairs. The
Centers for Disease Control says that’s all it takes to help you shed as much
as 10 pounds a year (assuming you don’t start eating more).
33. Eat equal portions of vegetables and grains at dinner. A
cup of cooked rice or pasta has about 200 calories, whereas a cup of cooked
veggies doles out a mere 50 calories, on average, says Joan Salge Blake, R.D.,
clinical assistant professor of nutrition at Boston University’s Sargent
College. To avoid a grain calorie overload, eat a 1:1 ratio of grains to
veggies. The high-fiber veggies will help satisfy your hunger before you overeat
the grains.
34. Get up and walk around the office or your home for five
minutes at least every two hours. Stuck at a desk all day? A brisk five-minute
walk every two hours will parlay into an extra 20-minute walk by the end of the
day. And getting a break will make you less likely to reach for snacks out of
antsiness.
35. Wash something thoroughly once a week — a floor, a
couple of windows, the shower stall, bathroom tile, or your car. A 150-pound
person who dons rubber gloves and exerts some elbow grease will burn about four
calories for every minute spent cleaning, says Blake. Scrub for 30 minutes and
you could work off approximately 120 calories, the same number in a half-cup of
vanilla frozen yogurt. And your surroundings will sparkle!
36. Make one social outing this week an active one. Pass on
the movie tickets and screen the views of a local park instead. Not only will
you sit less, but you’ll be saving calories because you won’t chow down on that
bucket of popcorn. Other active date ideas: Plan a tennis match, sign up for a
guided nature or city walk (check your local newspaper), go cycling on a bike
path, or join a volleyball league or bowling team.
37. Order the smallest portion of everything. If you’re
ordering a sub, get the 6-inch sandwich. Buy a small popcorn, a small salad, a
small hamburger. Studies find we tend to eat what’s in front of us, even though
we’d feel just as full on less.
38. Switch from regular milk to 2%. If you already drink 2%,
go down another notch to 1% or skim milk. Each step downward cuts the calories
by about 20 percent. Once you train your taste buds to enjoy skim milk, you’ll
have cut the calories in the whole milk by about half and trimmed the fat by
more than 95 percent.
39. Take a walk before dinner. You’ll do more than burn
calories — you’ll cut your appetite. In a study of 10 obese women conducted at
the University of Glasgow in Scotland, 20 minutes of walking reduced appetite
and increased sensations of fullness as effectively as a light meal.
40. Substitute a handful of almonds in place of a sugary
snack. A study from the City of Hope National Medical Center found that
overweight people who ate a moderate-fat diet containing almonds lost more
weight than a control group that didn’t eat nuts. Really, any nut will do.
41. Eat a frozen dinner. Not just any frozen dinner, but one
designed for weight loss. Most of us tend to eat an average of 150 percent more
calories in the evening than in the morning. An easy way to keep dinner calories
under control is to buy a pre-portioned meal. Just make sure that it contains
only one serving. If it contains two, make sure you share.
42. Don’t eat with a large group. A study published in the
Journal of Physiological Behavior found that we tend to eat more when we eat
with other people, most likely because we spend more time at the table. But
eating with your significant other or your family, and using table time for
talking in between chewing, can help cut down on calories — and help with
bonding in the bargain.
43. Watch one less hour of TV. A study of 76 undergraduate
students found the more they watched television, the more often they ate and
the more they ate overall. Sacrifice one program (there’s probably one you
don’t really want to watch anyway) and go for a walk instead. You’ll have time
left over to finish a chore or gaze at the stars.
44. Get most of your calories before noon. Studies find
that the more you eat in the morning, the less you’ll eat in the evening. And
you have more opportunities to burn off those early-day calories than you do to
burn off dinner calories.
45. Close out the kitchen after dinner. Wash all the dishes,
wipe down the counters, turn out the light, and, if necessary, tape closed the
cabinets and refrigerator. Late-evening eating significantly increases the
overall number of calories you eat, a University of Texas study found. Stopping
late-night snacking can save 300 or more calories a day, or 31 pounds a year.
46. Sniff a banana, an apple, or a peppermint when you feel hungry.
You might feel silly, but it works. When Alan R. Hirsch, M.D., neurological
director of the Smell & Taste Treatment and Research Foundation in Chicago,
tried this with 3,000 volunteers, he found that the more frequently people
sniffed, the less hungry they were and the more weight they lost — an average
of 30 pounds each. One theory is that sniffing the food tricks the brain into thinking
you’re actually eating it.
PLUS: 15 Fat-Burning Foods
47. Order wine by the glass, not the bottle. That way
you’ll be more aware of how much alcohol you’re downing. Moderate drinking can
be good for your health, but alcohol is high in calories. And because drinking
turns off our inhibitions, it can drown our best intentions to keep portions in
check.
48. Watch every morsel you put in your mouth on weekends. A
University of North Carolina study found people tend to consume an extra 115
calories per weekend day, primarily from alcohol and fat.
49. Stock your refrigerator with low-fat yogurt. A
University of Tennessee study found that people who cut 500 calories a day and
ate yogurt three times a day for 12 weeks lost more weight and body fat than a
group that only cut the calories. The researchers concluded that the calcium in
low-fat dairy foods triggers a hormonal response that inhibits the body’s
production of fat cells and boosts the breakdown of fat.
50. Order your dressing on the side and then stick a fork in it —
not your salad. The small amount of dressing that clings to the tines
of the fork are plenty for the forkful of salad you then pick up.
51. Brush your teeth after every meal, especially after dinner.
That clean, minty freshness will serve as a cue to your body and brain that
mealtime is over.
52. Serve individual courses rather than piling everything on one
plate. Make the first two courses soup or vegetables (such as a green
salad). By the time you get to the more calorie-dense foods, like meat and
dessert, you’ll be eating less or may already be full (leftovers are a good
thing).
PLUS: 8 Ways to Control Your Cravings and Save Your Diet
53. Passionately kiss your partner 10 times a day. According
to the 1991 Kinsey Institute New Report on Sex, a passionate kiss
burns 6.4 calories per minute. Ten minutes a day of kissing equates to about
23,000 calories — or eight pounds — a year!
54. Add hot peppers to your pasta sauce. Capsaicin, the
ingredient in hot peppers that makes them hot, also helps reduce your appetite.
55. Pack nutritious snacks. Snacking once or twice a day
helps stave off hunger and keeps your metabolism stoked, but healthy snacks can
be pretty darn hard to come by when you’re on the go. Pack up baby carrots or
your own trail mix made with nuts, raisins, seeds, and dried fruit.
56. When you shop, choose nutritious foods based on these four
simple rules:
1. Avoid partially hydrogenated.
2. Avoid high fructose corn syrup.
3. Choose a short ingredient list over long; there will be fewer flavor
enhancers and empty calories.
4. Look for more than two grams of fiber per 100 calories in all grain products
(cereal, bread, crackers, and chips)
57. Weed out calories you’ve been overlooking: spreads, dressings,
sauces, condiments, drinks, and snacks. These calories count, whether
or not you’ve been counting them, and could make the difference between weight
gain and loss.
