There are many ways to lose weight sensibly without going through the fast lane of taking pills or detoxification programs that may sometimes be detrimental towards your health. Of course, trying to lose weight the healthy way takes a lot of time, effort and persistence. The sad fact in reality is that nothing is easy to achieve without perseverance and strong determination to your goal. I have came up with a program that will help you achieve your target in losing weight the most healthy way as possible. It is simply eating the right kinds of food, establishing an exercise and lifestyle program to fit in your daily life.
Here is how it works:
Step 1: Set your weight loss goal
Think about what are the specifics and realistic goals you aim to achieve. For example, you want to make sure you can lose 10kg before a wedding, be able to run for 10km straight in a race, lowering cholesterol, or be able to wear a pair of jeans in whatever size – perhaps small or medium.
Step 2: Go for medical checkup
Prior to altering your diet and beginning with any fitness regime, try to have yourself checked out by a medical practitioner. Be sure that a full diagnosis on your body is analysed, involving extensive blood analysis. Doing so you will be able to be improve on any deficiencies such as iron, folate, B12 and hormone imbalances – that includes high insulin levels, that can affect your fat loss, energy levels and general wellbeing.
Step 3: Create a plan
It is not an instant result for losing weight and becoming healthier certainly does not just happen overnight. It will take approximately twelve weeks before you start to see positive results in your body and health, so it is an ideal method to try set a plan every twelve weeks wherever possible.
Step 4: Maintaining the correct fat loss environment
Rearrange your fridge for the right type of food. Throw away all your junk food, such as chips, processed food, or any products that contain high in sugar. If your kitchen is free of junk, you will be less likely to eat junk. Then, you should try to fill up your fridge and pantry with healthy food containing low GI, fruits and vegetables, lean protein and healthy snacks, such as raw seeds and nuts. In order to maintain maximum freshness, try to keep them refrigerated.
Step 5: Flick away the fad diets
By definition, fad weight loss diet means any diet that promises fast weight loss without any proven scientific evidence. They can sometimes eliminate the entire food, replace it with supplements that provide insufficient unnatural substances, which makes your body almost impossible to absorb the correct amount of nutrients that your body needs to sustain energy and keeping you healthy. Fad diets usually are for people who are so desperate to lose weight, but the truth is it does not guarantee any results and often it could be detrimental to your health.
You will need to eat the right kind of foods that can help improve on your weight loss. Avoid the pills and start eating solid physical food that are rich in antioxidants, minerals, fibre, essential fatty acids, protein and omega 3. If your body lacks these substances, it will be difficult for your body to absorb all the important nutrients, and as a result, your body will not function effectively or be able to burn fat to the optimal level.
Step 6: Cook healthy food
It all starts in the kitchen if you want to know how to eat food the healthy way and losing weight. How do we know what is best to cook, make it tasty and healthy? Simply just refer to the healthy recipe, get into the kitchen and start cooking!
Step 7: Cook not just for the taste but for your health
Learn the healthy conscious way of the following:
Reduce saturated fat.
Reduce refined sugar.
Ditch the salt.
Ditch white refined flour.
Increase the protein.
Increase the flavour.
Increase the fibre and vitamins.
Step 8: Persistency is the key
Be persistent in order to achieve your goal. Try not to get yourself distracted with excuses like why it cannot be done, why you haven’t been exercising, why you went for the meat pie instead of the grilled chicken, etc. Ask yourself “Is this the best interest of my health?” Set yourself a routine so you will not feel obliged to do things in a daily/weekly manner. When it is time to exercise, your body will take you to the gym or at the park with your running shoes and start running down the track. Listening to your favourite music is always a great way to keep up your motivation during exercise. And if you have any friends who are on the same boat as you trying to lose weight, try share with each other great recipes to cook in the best interest of health.
Step 9: Take things into moderation (The 80/20 method)
While trying to sustain your weight loss regime, it is still important to enjoy your life with a bit of indulgence once or twice a week. That being either having an apple pie during a Sunday lunch, or having a piece of chocolate bar. If you’re the type of person who really cannot give up on chocolates, you can still eat but try to restrict yourself to a small proportion of your chocolate intakes. A few pieces of dark raw chocolates are great for its high antioxidant content (perhaps around 50 grams of it); or try go for a small batch of chocolate protein bar containing ingredients of fresh dates, raw cocoa and almonds. That way it not only satisfies your craving for sweetness, but gives your body a boost amount of antioxidants that are great for your body. The method mentioned here as the 80/20 means that you should eat only 20 percent of your usual full block of chocolates or an entire pack of biscuits/chips. Save the remaining 80 percent for next time and eat another 20 percent of the remaining proportion. “Moderation is the key to successfully living healthy for life”.
Step 10: Be active in exercise
Perhaps the greatest way to lose weight all comes down to tonnes of exercise. It requires a lot of self discipline and strong determination to get yourself into doing exercise and start burning those fat. Physical activity not only increases your stamina, it also allows you to burn more fat while using enough energy you have to sustain for a longer exercise. Choose a type of exercise you enjoy and do them at least an hour five times a week (everyday would be ideal). Set yourself a routine on specific times to exercise, even if it is raining outside, hail or shine. In long term, it will eventually become your habit and you will no longer feel that it is an obligation.
Interestingly, the after burn effects of exercise will take place. During physical activity our body uses mostly carbohydrates for energy. However, even after you stop exercising, the 24 hours following – your body is still burning fat stores even while you’re asleep!
Step 11: Lift weights to lose weight
Muscle is a metabolically active tissue, which burns energy (25kcal per kilogram per day of predominantly fat). So if you do lots of weight training, it will boost up your metabolic rate increasing your lean muscle mass, which in turn encourages your body to turn fat as fuel. Of course, it will also help shape up your body making you look great. While cardio workout is just as important to lose body fat, weight training is also a great way to increase your strength in burning fat.