Weight Loss

This diet review website needed a dedicated section on weight loss to cover areas other than what we eat and drink that can help us to reduce our fat store and get back into shape. So here it is!

Often, when we are starting out on a fitness program we are overweight and pretty unfit.

It makes sense to start any fitness program slowly but it's also important to start losing weight.

This will make it easier to progress with the fitness program and gradually increase the amount of exercise and the level of resistance training as well as the length of time spent exercising.

Here are some helpful tips to lose weight that you can use to shed some of those excess pounds to help the process along a little quicker.

Diet Changes

weight loss Getting overweight in the first place is usually down to a combination of poor diet and lack of exercise.

The first problem can easily be turned around by making some changes to your current diet. They don't have to be radical changes, not do they need to be so restrictive. It just means using a little common sense and applying some basic diet sense to what you are eating and drinking on a day to day basis.

The first place to look is not always at what you are eating... but what you are drinking. Many people habitually drink several cans of soda each day and without even realizing, they are piling on several hundred calories of nutritionally empty sugar.

Simply quitting this habit can send your weight falling at an amazing rate. So if this is you, then here is one of the easiest ways of losing weight without doing much else at all!

What Are You Eating?

The next place to look is how much you eat and how much of it is made up of high Glycemic Index (GI) carbohydrates.

These are generally foods that are based on refined white flour for our purposes, such as white bread, pasta, cakes, pie, biscuits and cookies, pastry dishes and many supermarket ready meals as well as anything that comes in breadcrumbs!

That probably sounds like a long list and it is. I'm willing to bet that many of these foods make up a goodly proportion of your diet if you are overweight. If so, then cut down on them.

If you find it hard to cut down on what you have probably formed habits of eating, one way to soften the blow is to switch to products made from wholegrain flour or oatmeal flour. The latter is best as it is made up of low glycemic carbs which release their sugars more slowly into the bloodstream and result in less fat being stored in the body.

If you must eat bread, switch to whole grain or wholemeal bread. There are still plenty of calories in there, but the sugars are released more slowly and there is more in the way of nutrients plus you benefit from an increase of dietary fiber.

More Exercise

It goes without saying that if you want to improve your fitness levels, the ONLY way of doing that is to exercise more.

You can choose your type of exercise but you must do some. If you are just starting out, then start out slow and build up gradually.

Try going for long walks at a brisk pace, or swimming three or more times a week. If you like cycling, then do that or try simply getting out of the house into the fresh air and maybe going for a slow jog around the block.

You can start running up and down the stairs whenever you come across a stairway in your path and if you work in an office building, take the stairs instead of waiting on the elevator. Whenever you walk, do it briskly and with your back straight and your shoulders back so that you breath more deeply.

These little things can all add up during a typical day and go towards you using more energy than simply sitting at a desk all day.

Drink More Water

If you are habitually drinking tea and coffee all day but little or no water to hydrate yourself, then you need to drink more.

It should be plain water for the best effect. You really need to be drinking around eight glasses of water every day. Don't try and do it all at once, spread it out through the day and you will hardly notice.

Water helps with digestion as well as helping to let your brain know that your stomach is full before you end up overeating, which is another common habit that you get when you are gaining weight. Always drink a glass of water before each meal and you will naturally eat less and still feel full up, just sooner.

In all cases, you need to keep an upbeat attitude towards getting fit and shedding weight, in order to keep up a good level of motivation to do the things you need to do every day to work towards that aim.

Additional Reading / Reviews