The battle of the bulge is a losing battle for many people. To lose weight, they subscribe to a near-crash diet, exercise like crazy, and skip meals. At best, any weight loss they achieve is temporary. This approach to weight loss is also not healthy. If you resonate with any of this, chances are you’ve been on and off the weight loss bandwagon with little success to show for it. If you want to get slim, you’ll need to change your diet habits and lose weight the healthy way. Here are five tips for healthy weight loss to get you started.
1. Pack Your Lunch
According to a Yahoo News article, the people who find weight loss success pack their own lunches. The reason seems clear. The brown-bag crew tends to pack healthier food and avoids weight-loss pitfalls like soda and processed food. If you normally buy lunch at a restaurant somewhere, try brown-bagging it instead.
2. Water, Water, Water
If you want to lose weight, be sure to stay hydrated. However, you want to do it in the right way. You’ll increase your metabolic rate by 30% if you drink two cups of H20 before you eat. Drinking water also makes you feel fuller so you eat less.
On a related note, it’s better to drink water when you’re dieting than to grab a diet soda. Artificial sweeteners have actually been shown to make a person crave more sugar. Replace your soda with water. If you must have flavoring, try slicing some apples or oranges and putting it in the water. It’s still low-calorie and much better for you than soda.
3. Careful at Happy Hour
Xyngular’s Tumbler blog reminds people to be careful at Happy Hour. That’s a time when lots of seemingly healthy food isn’t so healthy. It’s easy to pack on the calories and the pounds by overindulging at Happy Hour.
The blog suggests that Happy-Hour-goers avoid fried foods, even if they’re fried veggies. It also suggests ordering lower calorie alcoholic beverages. Finally, for those who have trouble saying ‘no,’ it’s best to plan something immediately after Happy Hour. This puts the kibosh on overindulging.
4. Fit in Mini-Workouts
Most dieters know that a weight loss plan that’s coupled with a workout routine works far better than dieting alone does. However, many dieters have trouble fitting in the time to work out. If you fall into this category, try fitting in four or five mini-workouts throughout the day. The cumulative effect is the same. You can climb the stairs 10 times or do squats in the bathroom or sit on an exercise ball if your office allows it.
5. Say ‘No’ to Dessert
If you have a real sweet tooth, you know how hard it is to say ‘no’ to dessert. However, forgoing the sweet stuff helps you lose weight faster. So avoid the cakes and cookies and all things sugary.
If you must indulge, try a natural sweet treat like a piece of fruit or make frozen fruit N’ice cream. If you haven’t tried N’ice cream, all you need to do is put some frozen fruit in the food processor, add a nut milk like almond milk, and blend. This healthy dessert has the consistency of ice cream, but without the processed sugar.
A successful weight loss program depends on a number of factors. If you haven’t had as much success with your weight loss as you’d like, check what you’ve been doing against this list. You may find that you discover the thing that’s tripping up your weight loss. A slimmer you could result from it.