Start Dropping Pounds Fast With These 13 Simple Weight Loss Tips You Can Try Today

Aug 13, 2018

You’ve made a conscious choice to change your diet regimen and start exercising daily, but you are still struggling with hunger pangs in the late afternoon and binging from time to time, mostly because our body is still craving that overabundance of sugars, carbs, and “bad” fats that you have been consuming for so long. Consider the following 13 tips to curb those cravings and get yourself on track to a long-term healthy diet:

Open all your kitchen cabinets and take an actual food inventory. Remove all the foods that are cluttering your junk food cabinet and replace them with healthy alternatives. This includes your refrigerator bins that are stocked with foods high in sugar and packed with sodium. Replace them with fresh vegetables and fruits, yogurt, and “good” fats like hummus.

An irregular sleep schedule means that your body’s metabolism function doesn't give the proper amount of time to process fat that you consumed throughout the day. So, keeping a regular sleep schedule that ranges from 7-9 hours per night will result in immediate weight loss of 1-2 pounds per week and reduce cravings for sweet and salty foods.

One of the biggest mistakes that anyone beginning a new diet regimen can make is completely eliminating all the “bad” foods immediately from their diet. Our bodies crave what we are used to having, so putting yourself in a situation where you remove all those foods at once makes it that much harder for you to stick to a new diet routine.

Give yourself a break and “cheat” about 20% of the time at first until your body adjusts to having the “good” foods at least 80% of the time. Eventually, the cravings will go away and you will be eating healthy 100% of each day.

Adding all kinds of the “extra” foods to your basic meals in where the additional weight gain usually occurs. Foods like ketchup, sauces, canned toppings, pickles on the side, and any number of added foods pack on the sugar, sodium, and unnecessary fats that lead to additional weight.

There are any number of ways to add flavor to your food with spices that have zero calories and a ton of flavor like oregano, parsley, pepper, and a number of low-sodium salts you can use.

Beginning a diet regimen as well as a daily exercise routine can be a daunting task to do all on your own. So, it is very important to have a clear set of goals in mind and also an authentic reason for doing it. If it is for a special event like a reunion in six months, then that is an important goal, but it will only motivate you to continue your diet and exercise regimens up until the day of the event and not much past it.

Set your sights on finding a long-term goal for continuing your healthy routines long after a special day has past or whatever may be motivating you in the short-term.

The absolute worst aspect of dieting is the moments when the cravings take over and trying to fight them off consumes your every thought. Use a mindful approach and put yourself fully in the moment by telling yourself that a craving is only a momentary feeling that will pass. Then, give yourself about 15 minutes to work through it before you physically move to a place where there is food.

You will find that within 15-20 minutes after the cravings began, you no longer have a need to eat and you have saved yourself from consuming a bunch of excess calories.

Eliminate habits that trigger food consumption like always eating when the television is on or stopping at a fast food restaurant on your way home from work to “tide you over” before dinner. These are all habits that pack on the additional pounds that can be eliminated from your daily routine. According to the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, the more focused you are on just your eating a meal and how much you are consuming, they less likely you are to overeat.

Imagine sitting and just focusing on how you are chewing your food and only eating what is on your plate as opposed to getting another helping because the show you are watching isn’t quite over yet. That all stops when the distractions of sitting at your desk at work and eating while you work or watching the television when you are at our kitchen table all stops and your food becomes your main focus.

If you have a favorite vending machine at work full of junk food that you frequent on a regular basis, then find a healthy substitute instead that you bring to work every day in case you get the feeling that you need to visit it. Additionally, if you tend to fall for those buy 10 for a $1 sales at the supermarket, you need start to look away from those advertisements and opt for buying just one or two at a time so you don’t feel obligated to overconsume food products that contribute to gaining weight.

Part of not being distracted when you eat is actually focusing on HOW you are eating your food. Our body actually is structured to take in food at a certain pace in order for our digestive system to be able to properly process the food we are eating. Studies have shown that when you consciously eat a slower pace, chew your food more slowly, and are actively aware of this process, you will find that you become full quite quickly and naturally consume less food resulting in a reduction in weight. 

What most dieters tend to do is think about what they can’t do anymore as opposed to what they have to do to see results. Studies say that changing your perspective on dieting and staying away from negative words like “can’t” and phrases like “ I’m not allowed” and saying things like “I don’t need that” instead gives a whole new perspective on your long-term goals and a feeling of not being deprived but instead working to eliminate what is bad for you.

You may not be the most motivated when it comes to eating new foods that may seem bland to you compared to what you had been eating before with added salt, butter, and other fatty additions to your regular diet, but you can “spice” up your new foods with a variety of low and even zero-calorie additions that are probably sitting in your cupboard like turmeric, cinnamon, Italian seasoning mixes, dried parsley, black pepper, cumin, and fresh garlic, and even lemon juice to name few. Find a combination of additives you like and stick with it to add flavor without the additional calories.

Research results have proven that lean proteins such as eggs, chicken, and red meat are far more filling than a eating a bagel to curb your hunger. They are also foods that metabolize much more efficiently in the body and lead to greater reductions in weight over a shorter period of time. So, skip the empty-calorie foods like bagels that only give you a boost of carbs and then let you down by noon and lead to cravings. You goal should be instead to consume 1 gram of protein per pound based on your weight goal.

One of the ways to immediately set yourself up to fail at a new diet regimen is to make your food schedule so complicated that you can’t make heads or tails of your new routine. Choose a diet that adds a manageable amount of new foods to your daily meals including ones that are easy to find in your local supermarket. If you have to search for what you want to eat, you tend to give up and buy what you are used to eating which will put you right back to square one when it comes to losing weight. So, keep it simple and you will see results.

Let us know what you think of these tips, and make sure to show this to your friends and family who are trying to lose weight! It might help them, too.

Our content is created to the best of our knowledge, yet it is of general nature and cannot in any way substitute an individual consultation with your doctor. Your health is important to us!