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Saturday, 6 February 2010
How to lose weight easily and healthily.blogspot.com
Do you look in the mirror and hate the person looking back at you? Have you tried to lose weight only to fail time and time again?

When we're overweight we become the butt of jokes, people laugh and put us down because it boosts their own ego. Do they know what it is like to carry too much extra weight, do they know what it is like to feel ashamed because of their figure? For the majority of them the answer is, no.

Losing weight isn't an easy task for many people, but it can be done. In fact it is easier than you think, and before you realize it, the person looking back at you in the mirror really will be you.

Diet and exercise are the corner stone to a healthy lifestyle, but many people simply get this wrong. When done right, you will be deflating that spare tire in no time. So let's look at both of these, shall we.

Diet

Diets don't work for a lot of people. There are several reasons for this, the first one is simple enough, the diet itself does not work.

Sure you can lose a couple of pounds by eating nothing but popcorn, but your intestines will also become clogged with the indigestible kernels. When this happens, you will need to take a trip to the hospital to have them removed. Stay away from these types of diets.

The other reason, and this is the one that fits for most people, the diet isn't making life enjoyable and they give up the diet.

But that doesn't have to be the case, you don't have to become a rabbit to get slim. You just need to know what to eat and what not to eat. This is the big difference between a diet and learning how to eat healthy. The latter will help you lose much more weight over the long run than sporadic dieting.

So what can you eat? Plenty of things, let's look at the list of things you should stay away from, it is much shorter.

Fried foods. Anything that was fried is defiantly a "no no", these types of food will put pounds on any body. Eat foods that are grilled or baked instead. For example eat grilled chicken rather than fried.

Beer is also one of the things you will want to skip. The reason for this is because you are consuming a lot of empty calories. The alcohol is also turned into sugar by the body, which in turn will be stored as fat. You can say the same for soda which is packed with sugar in the first place. The average can of pop has 17 cubes of sugar in it. You wouldn't put that much sugar into your coffee would you?

Processed foods, for example "ready meals" are packed with sugar which acts as a preservative and makes the food more appetizing to eat. Canned food also has a high amount of sugar in it.

There are other things you can consider leaving out of your diet, but most of them should be easy to spot.

Exercise

Many people think that they need to kill themselves in the gym to see any kind of weight loss. Well, this may work for some people but for the majority of us this isn't an option.

There is a belief that if you lift weights, you can magically turn your fat into muscle. I really hate to be the bearer of bad news, but that is a myth. You cannot turn fat into muscle, but you can burn the fat and there is a much easier faster way of doing it.

How? Let me walk out and get the newspaper first. Ok, I'm back. The best type of exercise to burn fat is through a good cardio workout. Can you guess what type I prefer? You guessed it, by walking. Make an effort to walk an hour a day, and you will be burning more calories than through bench presses and curls.

And it is far more enjoyable.

Don't go from 0 to 60 (minutes - pun intended) from today till tomorrow. If you are not used to walking, start smaller, walk for a half hour, then for three quarters on an hour, until you've reached the hour mark and beyond. If you feel it is too much, walk every other day until it becomes part of your daily routine. Just remember, the only real benefit comes if you walk for an hour or longer on a daily basis.Sticking to a diet plan is not easy, if it were then everyone would be thin and we wouldn't need to set diet goals for ourselves. We all need a little help to keep us on track with our diet plans sometimes. These 20 tips are meant to give you some additional ammunition in your war against the weight.

1) Make sure you eat a good breakfast. It keeps your energy levels stable and keeps your metabolism high.

2) Fill your plate with veggies and eat them first. If you split your plate into 4 sections two of them, or half the plate, should be veggies. That leaves 1/4 for a meat item and 1/4 for a starch.

3) Remove liquids with calories from your diet plan. This includes soda's and juices. Switching from regular Coke to Diet Coke saves you 180 calories from a 12 ounce can. That's 65,700 calories a year or almost 19 pounds.

4) Try to avoid caffeine. It will give you that temporary boost in energy and dull your appetite, but later you'll feel even worse and twice as hungry. And the more hungry you are the more likely you are to binge.

5) Switch from whole milk to 1% or skim milk.

6) Drink at least 64 ounces of water a day.

7) If you're feeling hungry have a glass of water first. Often we think we are hungry when in reality we are thirsty. Even if it is true hunger the water will fill you up a little and you'll be less likely to overeat.

8) Have a healthy snack at 3PM when your energy is low. Vegetables with low calorie dip, rice cakes and sugar-free jam, low fat yogurt or a small handful of almonds are all good choices.

9) Keep your portions reasonable. Portions should be the size of your fist or the size of a deck of cards. Stay away from "supersize" portions

10) Eat at a slower pace. It can take 15 minutes for our brains to register that we are full so if you're eating fast you're probably eating too much.

11) Eat more soup. They are filling and good for you. Stick with the non-cream soups that are low in calories and often high in fiber.

12) Eat every 3 hours to keep your metabolism high, hunger at bay and your blood sugar levels stable.

13) Use low calories condiments like mustard instead of fatty ones like mayonnaise.

14) Keep a food journal, especially if you're just starting to diet. There are lots of them available online. My favorite free one is at FitDay.com

15) If you're eating out get a doggie bag and put half your meal into it for later or even better for someone else. A typical meal out will have 1000+ calories, not including bread, appetizers, drinks etc.

16) When eating out skip the dessert. If you simply have to have that triple fudge chocolate layer cake share it with someone.

17) Treat yourself once a week. Even the strongest of us have weak moments. If you know that you'll get a break once a week it's much easier to stick with your diet for the other 6 days.

18) Exercise regularly. Even if you just walk 20-30 minutes a day the benefits are amazing. You'll lose not just from the calories you burn during exercise, but also from the boost in metabolism.

19) Find an exercise partner. It helps to know that someone is counting on you to show up at the gym. And it makes it more like an appointment and thus harder to skip out on.

20) Limit the amount of alcohol you drink. Try to drink only on weekends and limit yourself to one or two glasses.

Even using just a few of the tips can save you hundreds of calories daily and take off some unwanted pounds. I am not that overweight to begin with and dropped almost 10 pounds just by cutting soda out of my diet plan and drinking more water. Good luck with whatever diet plan you choose and I hope this list will help some of you to meet your diet goals.





Supplements

Diet supplements may also be an option if you need a small push to get the ball rolling. It is hard to lose weight when we don't see any results, some people look to diet supplements for help.

One supplement, Acai Berry is used to detoxify the body and encourage the metabolism to burn more calories.
Posted by Barbara at 13:53
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