Best Healthy Weight Loss Tips

Time Out!

Everyone needs to take time out from the day-in, day-out routine. I don’t know about you but I sometimes forget that there aren’t 8 days a week and I go charging off exercising like a maniac.

Do you know how to spell “burn-out”?

Yes, you want to get that weight off in the worst way. Yes, exercise is the best fastest way to do so. But, sister (or brother), take a day off from exercise. Plan to take one day off per seven days. It will give your body and mind a much deserved mini-vacation. And the added benefit of throwing off your body’s tendency to adapt, too.

Atheletes and body builders know from experience that if they work out day after day without a break, their bodies “rebel”. It sort of says, “give me time out or I will force a time out”.

Same with your food plan. Your body will adapt and your weight loss will plateau if you eat the same breakfast, lunch and dinner, day after day.

Change the food types. Surprise your body with something new. Eat a large clump of grapes one breakfast with yogurt, for example, if you are used to two eggs, wheat toast and milk.

Try not to get into a rut in anything you do. Surprise yourself!

Motivation For Weight Loss

We all need motivation to get through tasks that are “unfun”. Starting a new good habit is not always easy so really knowing the ‘why’ of weight loss is important.

Obviously, we want to lose weight or you wouldn’t be here and I wouldn’t be writing this. But the time comes to put those walking shoes on and the excuses begin!

My feet ache from yesterday
I see clouds in the west
I’ll do it after (fill in the blank)
Oh, today can be my off day
I need to read that book again about how often I should walk per week
What are your excuses?

Come on, be honest with yourself and get off it and get on with it! Who are you fooling anyway? You’re doing this for YOU! (and if you’re not, then, maybe you need to reassess!).

You want to look better.

You want to feel better.

You want to live better.

You want to live to see your grandkids grow up.

You want to be attractive.

You want to ….

So, now you know the why. Now you might be lke me and need a little nudge; some accountability; something or someone that you have to answer to for your progress. That can be as simple as a journal to write down what you ate all day and what exercise you did (or will do). It can be the daily visit to the gym. It can be a diet club or an online forum where you can find partners to keep tabs on you.

For me, it’s this blog! Yes, I am in process. I am losing weight by adjusting my old eating habits to more sensible ones. I am adding a daily walk, except Sundays. I will do strength training 3 days a week with stretching each day.

There now you know! I can’t NOT do this now. You know about it!

So, remember who you are doing this for – you! Then get accountable!

Weight Loss Diet = New Lifestyle

You have to look at your “diet” as a new lifestyle. This is the way you will be eating for the rest of your life. Exercise will be part of our life. The first clue that your diet is not a lifestyle is that you cannot stay on it! Your new lifestyle should include elements of healthy eating habits and exercise you will carry on for the rest of your life.

Gone are the days of sugar sweetened everything. No more regular munching on potato chips. No more leisurely Saturdays without a good walk around the park.

Life will be different from now on. You may even gain new friends and acquaintances as you change habits. You will be changing gears all over the place. You might as well begin to adjust your way of thinking. Depending on how heavy you are, you may make amazing shifts. Like any new path in life, you will need to cover new ground and it may even be “scary”.

But it’s OK to change. This is good and though it may be uncomfortable at first so is any new venture. Stay with it. Keep your goals in view. Remember why you are doing this. Better health. Better body. Better quality of life. More attractive.

Your diet is the training ground for the rest of your life. Like any training situation, you need to allow yourself to mess up. Fall down. But get back up again. Just keep trudging forward. Sooner of later the training will take hold and it will be part of you. Just do it!

Getting Started on Real Life Weight Loss

It’s a big confusing world out there. Lots of advice on how to exercise to lose weight. What types to do: Cardio/aerobics, strength training, intervals, low impact, etc. Even whether you should exercise at all??

Whoa! Let’s just be real here. Healthy fat loss includes some exercise and plenty of it. NO short cuts here. Yes, I have heard of HCG and Kevin Trudeau. I know HCG works to help the body lose weight and if you are determined you can lose fat using his plan but it isn’t real life. Real life is not eating 500 calories and injecting Pregnyl daily (if you can even get it). And as you know, I am a proponent of “real life”.

Real life consists of eating plenty of good food in smaller meals throughout the day. Real life means adding movement and exercise that at the very least mimics what our bodies are designed to do: walking, reaching, lifting, throwing, hauling, and so on.

Now, how you accomplish this real life type exercise is rather open. But walking is probably something you will add to your real life exercise plan. The goal here is to walk at least 20 minutes daily and up to 60 minutes. You should be walking briskly enough to feel only slightly winded. You should be able to talk in sentences without huffing. That is a rule of thumb for moderate aerobic exercise.

To make it really “real” add a jog or sprint every so often. Take off into a 30 to 60 second run so you get panting. Then back it down to a walk. Do the jog/sprint sprinkled throughout your walk. This is what intervals are!

If you can’t do 20 minutes or even if you can’t make it past your mailbox, that’s OK! Just make it to your mailbox today. Tomorrow try to make it a bit further. Make some progress each day. Challenge yourself to go a bit farther. Hey, your doctor already told you to lose weight or you’ll die, right? So, go for it!

The Two Changeless Pillars of Healthy Weight Loss: Sensible Diet and Regular Exercise – Part 2

Regular Exercise. Oh boy. If anyone came up with a way to lose weight safely and effectively and permanently without exercise, that person would become a hero and instant millionaire. After all, we want it to be as easy to lose the weight as it was to put it on, right?

Well, I know most of you reading this realize exercise is part of the weight loss picture. As a matter of fact it is, of the two pillars of healthy weight loss, the most essential. While you can lose some weight cutting calories it ends up being a long hard journey. Add exercise to that equation and – BAM – you just cranked it up.

And to top it off, you can effectively lose weight just by adding exercise and not making big changes in your diet.

The kind of exercise is what is most important. There are two types of exercise that are prescribed in weight loss circles to burn fat and tone muscles.

One is aerobics. That is exercise that increases your heart rate into safe levels of efficiency. This is the best way to “burn” fat of the two. When you sustain your heart rate at 60 – 75% of its maximum heart rate for 20 or more minutes, it causes the body to delve into fat stores for energy rather than glucose.

The other aspect of weight loss with exercise is more correctly termed muscle toning and defining. When a muscle gets more tone and strong, it gets more dense and lean. The net result is that you lose inches so you can fit those jeans again.

So, exercise is an essential part of long term safe weight loss. The sooner we come to terms with that, the sooner those pounds can fall off.

Exercise Tips For Fat Loss

Healthy weight loss must naturally include exercise. There can be no quibble about this. You can go on a restricted calorie diet for weeks and have some success in weight loss but for those who are really committed to losing weight there comes the time when we just know exercise will make the difference between a slow frustrating progress and maximum burn.

The trouble is with getting started. Another problem is what program do I use?

I hope to shed some light on these and other typical road blocks. You know that you need to exercise but just which plan do you use?

Let’s face it, any new habit that is “good” for you is often the toughest to begin. This is just one of those times that you will have to talk to yourself and say the same thing you tell you child, “do it because I said so!” Just do it! No more excuses. No more whining. Assuming you are healthy but fat, you just pick yourself up off your rusty dusty and do it.

OK, so you are doing it. What is “it” that you are doing? Just what program should you do? There is a lot of flexibility here. But you will need to include aerobic exercise of some sort. Either brisk walking, jogging if you are in shape, biking, hiking, swimming, cross country skiing are just a few.

Walking is the best place for beginners to start, though. You already do it even if it is only down the hall to the garage. Hey if you can make it there you can make it there and back.

If that is still too big for you to handle, try getting one of those stationary bikes that you can set on your lap (otherwise called an arm cycle). The super obese can use and have used these with great success when starting out their new lifestyle. You can begin with that and then add other exercise as you are able.

The Two Changeless Pillars of Healthy Weight Loss: Sensible Diet and Regular Exercise – Part 1

Anyone who has tried to lose weight can probably vouch for the fact that trying to lose weight is a true test of character. For someone who wants to lose weight safely and permanently, must come to grips with the fact of two rock solid truths.

Eat right and Exercise.

You simply cannot divorce the one from the other. Oh, how I wish there were some way around it but the fact remains we must change some things, namely: what and how we eat and add regular exercise/activity.

Let’s take on one of these “pillars” of a healthy lifestyle (notice I didn’t say “diet”?)

Facing facts, we cannot continue to eat brownies and large chocolate shakes, bagels and lattes and top the day off with a dessert of cheesecake and a triple mocha. Oh, I know you had a tuna salad on wheat bun and a fruit cocktail for lunch and a heaping plate of fish and chips for dinner – oh, yes, and the coleslaw.

Just writing that made me gain a pound! Phew! OK, so most of us know we need to change the eating habits. Away with the sugar; in with the sugar free!

Ummm… Hate to break it to you but using sugar free anything isn’t getting to the crux of the problem. The problem being undisciplined eating habits. Sooner of later, my friend, you must let those yummies go. Oh, not forever. There is nothing wrong with a dessert every now and then – just don’t justify your every now and then to be every night…and coffee break and …

The idea is to have a healthful sensible diet MOST of the time. A good breakfast of some kind of protein, cereal or bread/muffin and some fruit. A light mid morning snack of half a bagel and cream cheese. Lunch of creamy chicken vegetable soup with cucumber and onion slices in rice wine vinegar. Around 3 o’clock a cheese sticks with fruit juice. Then dinner of a sauted chicken breast or lean beef steak, steamed broccoli with butter (yes!) and a good sized salad with vinaigrette. You Go!

And…why not have a brownie – one brownie on Monday night or what ever night you choose. Just not every night and every break and every in between.

It’s time we stop acting like a kid who has constant access to the cookie jar. It’s time to say, ‘no, save room for dinner’, to ourselves. Deal?

Hey, next time I want to take on the weight loss twin sister – regular exercise!