5 Weight Loss Tips You Can't Ignore

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Being overweight can lead to health problems. Many fad diets are available, ultimately a balanced lifestyle combined with a good diet and weight loss regime is the key to controlling your body weight. In 2015 - 2016 39.8% of the United States population had obesity. Carrying such body weight increases the risk of health problems such as high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes and heart disease.

To lose weight safely it’s important to make permanent but gradual lifestyle changes. Let’s look at the top 5 weight loss tips to help you achieve your weight loss goals.

1. Eat nutritionally dense, varied meals

The foundation of our diet should be made up of healthy food and snacks. A good rule of thumb is to make sure each meal contains at least 25% protein, 25% whole grains and 50% fruit or vegetables. This equates to around 25-30 grams of fibre on a daily basis.

Examples of food that are rich in nutrients are fresh fruits and vegetables, fish, nuts, seeds and whole trains such as porridge or oatmeal. This type of diet naturally eliminates the intake of saturated fats which are linked to heart disease and obesity.

While eating nutrient dense food try and stay away from foods with added oils or sugar, processed foods and baked goods.

2. Physical activity and exercise

This step is vital for weight loss. Having a regime in place that you can stick to will guarantee that you maximise the amount of calories burned. Cardio Capital suggest a strong protocol for weight loss using a cross trainer. In which you can burn up to 500 calories in one hour of moderate exercise on an elliptical machine.

People who are not typically physically active should not start here, but should slowly increase the intensity as their stamina increases.

Along with excellent food choices, you might want to delve into the world of diets and weight loss programs. However, before embarking on any of them, it's best to consult with a professional and select a weight loss program backed by extensive scientific research to ensure you're on the right track.

Weight loss fasting is a popular and effective method to help you burn fat and maintain a healthy weight. As its name implies, fasting involves periods of minimal to no food consumption. Fasting has had different variations and modifications, such as water fasting, alternate-day fasting, the 24-hour fast, and more. 

After 16 hours of fasting, you’ll enter the ketosis state, where your body starts burning fat to serve as fuel and energy. Ketones are an efficient energy source for your brain and organs, people under prolonged fast are known to gain energy boost and increased alertness. 

At the beginning of your weight loss fasting, you’ll face challenges such as food cravings, physical and mental fatigue, sleep disruption, and headaches, to name a few. However, it’s important to keep going while eating the right foods during your consumption periods, and most importantly, know your limitations. Pushing your body past its limits won’t bring any benefits, and will even cause problems such as headaches, muscle and joint pain, insomnia, appetite loss, decrease in performance, and more. Since you’ve overtrained yourself as a beginner, this bad experience may stop you from trying out physical activities and working out further. 

3. Portion control

Eating too much of any food can cause weight gain. Therefore it’s important that people should avoid estimating their serving size. Use measuring cups to control your portion size. Guessing your portions will often lead to eating larger than necessary portions.

Therefore, people should avoid estimating a serving size or eating food directly from the packet. It is better to use measuring cups and serving size guides. Guessing leads to overestimating and the likelihood of eating a larger-than-necessary portion.

4. Cut out liquid calories

It is the forgotten calorie intake by many, but it’s possible to consume hundreds of calories a day just from sugary drinks, juice and alcohol. These are often referred to as empty calories as they do not offer any nutritional benefits, only energy. This is not to be mistaken for smoothies which are designed as a meal replacement, as these are generally nutritious. You can make small adjustments by removing milk from your tea or coffee and switching to sweetener from sugar. Instead, make smarter food choices with metabolism-boosting foods that support your weight loss journey.

5. Positivity

Perhaps the most important of all is staying positive. Losing weight is a slow and gradual process. It’s common for someone to feel discouraged from their weight loss efforts having made all the sacrifices and not seeing results. But things take time, consistency is key and when you look over a long period you really see the results of your efforts.

Final Note

With this in mind, set weekly, monthly and annual goals. This will help you stay consistent and keep you positive throughout your weight loss journey.