To lose weight is a goal of nearly everyone at some point in their lives. For some, it may be acute, like shifting the pounds after eating a few too many candy bars at Christmas. For others, losing weight turns into something more chronic as their weight fluctuates, and it always becomes a trigger for stress and anxiety. The chances are that you may have tried faddy short term quick fix diets like the cabbage soup diet, the cereal diet or the skipping breakfast diet. These might give you some weight loss initially, but they are unsustainable and often unhealthy because they don’t contain the nutrients you need. This can result in headaches, nausea and low mood.o
Instead, you need to be tackling your weight loss goals with a more sustainable long term approach. This doesn’t mean just changing your diet, but revolutionizing your whole life, and adapting your relationship with food, exercise and your well being for the better. Take a look at these ways you can lose weight with long term goals rather than short term fads.
Don’t Skip Breakfast
In the Western world, we tend to view breakfast as a pit stop refuel rather than as a meal to savor and enjoy like lunch and dinner. Often you are running late and pick up a slice of toast or a muffin on the way to work. This needs to change. You need to get up earlier and make time for a healthy start to the day. Grab some rye bread and have some avocado smash and an egg to boost your energy levels and give you the much needed slow release nutrients you need to fuel a busy morning. The temptation will be there to simply skip breakfast. However, by doing this, you are not receiving the calories you need first thing in the morning. This will result in an unhealthy snack come mid-morning, lower mood and a decreased ability to function at your optimum level.
Spread Your Calories
Most people who struggle with their weight load up on calories towards the end of the day. You might pride yourself on being good in the morning, snacking on fruit, having a healthy salad for lunch and enjoying sugar free drinks. However, come the evening you load up on carbs, have a mammoth dinner and snack until you hit the sack. This isn’t healthy. Instead, try and spread your calories throughout the day. Have a larger five hundred calories breakfast, the same for lunch and the same for dinner. While it may feel alien to have such a large breakfast, you will end up snacking less and having fewer calories at the end of the day.
Be More Active
Not all people are born natural gym bunnies. For many, heading to the gym can be intimidating and stressful. For others, they simply don’t see the joy in spending an hour indoors on a treadmill and a rower. However, the gym can be the perfect focused place to knuckle down and be more active. For a full body fitness routine, have a go at a kettlebell workout that you can do in front of the mirrors in the gym. Get a friend to tag along and keep you company. This moral support can spur you on and help you keep your mojo.
Alternatively, if the gym isn’t your thing, just be more active by getting outside more often during the day. When at work in the office, it’s all too easy to stay sat behind your desk for eight hours without moving. Instead, make it your mission to get outside for your lunch break. Take a thirty minute brisk walk, burn a few calories and return to your desk rejuvenated. If you like being outside, head for a jog in the evening, get back on your bicycle or take public transport to work instead of your car. Get off a stop early and walk the rest of the way. Build up your physical activity, and you could soon be shedding the pounds.
Get Educated
There is plenty of information out there now to help us make wise choices when it comes to the sort of food we put into our bodies. The traffic light system will tell you how much saturated fat and calories are in each food stuff you like the look of. If you see that the slice of chocolate cake you have your eye on contains a week’s worth of fat, you might be less inclined to eat it.
Consider downloading a free app for your phone that will allow you to input what you are eating. This way, you won’t miss any calories when trying to follow your eating plan. By making a note of everything, you can follow the most accurate calorie allowance. If you are holding some back for that cheeky glass of wine at your end of the week work drinks, an app will help you do this. You can even use the app to plan your meals in advance. By having a weekly schedule, you can place little treats in there to look forward to. Banning food will only make you crave them more, so be wise and place them into your eating plan while sticking to your calorie allowance.
Fruit And Veg Is Key
It sounds boring, but you have to start eating your greens. The chances are that your plate of food for dinner consists of a protein like meat or fish, a few bits of veg, and then the majority carbs like chips, potatoes or white rice and pasta. You must change the ratios on your plate. For some, this means scrapping carbs altogether. For others who can’t manage this, it means upping the vegetable section of the plate, so it takes up over fifty per cent of what you’re eating. This way, your carbohydrate source stays at only around a quarter of your meal. If you can, experiment with the vegetable side dishes you are eating. There are plenty of incredible recipes online now that veganism is such a massive trend.
If you enjoy your food and love rustling up a storm in the kitchen, have fun with your meals and experiment. Many people are choosing to forego the meat element of their diet for one or two days a week, to save money and to help them lose weight.
Losing weight is only hard if you foresee it as a short term goal. However, by changing your lifestyle so that you are eating better at all times, you are more active, and you are outside a little more, you can change your mindset towards your food. Follow this guide and lose weight with long term goals, not short term fads.
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