Weight loss really starts in the mind and the way that you think about your relationship with food. In my opinion a low fat, vegan, whole foods, plant based diet is the absolute best path to weight loss as well as the best way to fend off a myriad of disease. Here are my top 7 weigh loss secrets to implement if you are wanting to shed some extra weight:
1. WRITE DOWN YOUR GOALS:
What are your goals? Is it to lose weight, feel more self confident, be able to run a mile? Writing down your weigh loss goals, and then putting them somewhere you can see them daily will help you keep them in the forefront of your memory and more apt to stick to seeing them through. Then, take massive action until you get them. Massive action means taking action UNTIL you get the results you want. Try, fail, try again, but keep taking action until you get the intended results. Conversely, passive action doesn’t yield the results you want. It’s learning and consuming information about the thing, but not actually DOING the thing. Learning about nutrition is great, but its not actually eating nutritious food. Planning when you will exercise is wonderful, but its not actually exercising. Make a deal with yourself to commit to a healthy eating plan for 30 days, really go for it full force and you will begin to see your goals come to pass.
2. FOOD JOURNALING:
Use the method of food journaling to help you stay on track and really see what you are eating daily. It is important to be completely honest with yourself here. Write down your successes, but don’t forget to document your failures as well. It’s in these moments that you will truly see yourself and where you are likely to go off your plan. Document your starting weight, measurements, a “before” photo and put it in the beginning of your journal as a starting point. If you prefer, there are tons of free apps to track your food (my fitness pal, fatsecret, yazio, lose it!, my plate calorie tracker, fitbit, fooducate, my diet coach etc.). Journal what you ate, and try to answer some of the following questions to help you get out of the habit of “mindless” eating:
What am I eating?
Why am I eating?
Where did this food come from?
Is it locally grown?
Is it organic?
Can I pronounce the ingredients?
Is it from a factory farm?
Am I actually hungry?
Am I just thirsty?
Am I bored?
Am I craving something?
Am I feeling emotionally deprived?
The goal of food journaling is to help you locate where you are, your triggers, and help you make better decisions in the future. Food can only do one thing, and that is satisfy hunger. That’s it. It cannot solve any problem except for hunger. It won’t give you security, and it won’t make you feel emotionally better.
3. BE KIND TO YOURSELF:
What you have been doing, hasn’t been working, so it’s time for a change. It's really that simple….but I want you to remember that you didn’t get to the weight you are at overnight. Likewise, it will take longer than a 24 hour period to release the weight too. Don’t beat yourself up, you will run into obstacles, you will screw up, so be kind. Get back up, it is a process.
4. EAT WHEN YOU ARE HUNGRY:
…and only when you are hungry. Make sure you are getting in enough water to stay hydrated. Sometimes we mistake hunger for thirst. I like to encourage my clients to eat at the “whisper” of hunger. That is the point when you are just getting hungry. I find that when you eat at this point you are likely to stick to your plan as opposed to eating once RAVENOUS and completely allowing that feeling to derail all of your carefully laid healthy food choices. Then, stop eating when you are satiated, not completely stuffed. This will help you regain your natural self regulation when it comes to food.
5. EAT FOODS THAT WILL GIVE YOU THE RESULTS THAT YOU WANT:
I recommend eating a large variety of whole fruits, leafy greens, vegetables, as well as legumes, whole grains, and a small amount of nuts, seed, avocados, and coconut. Completely eliminating oils in your diet is a sure fire way to see weight loss, not to mention significantly improve your overall health in a matter of weeks. But if you are not ready to completely eliminate oils, drastically reduce the amount you use. I like to tell clients that their plate should be primarily leafy greens, veggies, and a moderate portion of grains or legumes with plant fats used sparingly.
If you are not vegan or have no interest in going plant based, then you need to decide what foods you want to eat to get the results you want.
6. DECIDE ON PURPOSE, THEN EVALUATE:
This tip is all about making a deliberate decision to eat or not eat in a certain moment. Deciding on purpose to have something healthy or not and then evaluating your choice, puts you in complete control. Only you can put food into your mouth to feed yourself. Only you will live with the consequences of what you’ve chosen to eat, so its about mindfully making that choice on purpose and then evaluating if it was a choice that furthered your goal or not.
7. IDENTIFY YOUR TRIGGER MOMENT:
This my friends could very well be the most important secret of all. A trigger moment is that time of day you may want to over eat or over indulge in your favorite not so healthy food. You may justify this moment by telling yourself things like: “I’ve had a hard day” or “I deserve this.”
Examples of this could be the 4pm boredom snack as you pass the candy bowl, or maybe after dinner snacking, a second breakfast, or just eating when you are simply not hungry. When you can identify your trigger moment and wake up to your time of habitual overeating, you can begin to make better, healthier choices for these trigger moments and start to see the needle move on your health. The reason we are overweight (barring hormonal issues) is simply because we are eating more than our body needs to maintain a healthy weight. Identifying your trigger moment is a great way to become aware of where you are sabotaging your efforts, and take action to make healthier choices by substituting a lower calorie, healthier option. When you can recognize the moment of overeating before you actually overeat, it can be revolutionary.
Overall, these weight loss secrets all have something in common. Bringing awareness to your thoughts about eating, and being mindful about what you put in your mouth are really the keys to losing weight. These tools are extremely powerful and really work. So I really want to encourage you, if you are trying to lose weight that you implement them. If you really put them in action, you will see results.
I hope that you found theses 7 tips of value, and if you are interested in working with me one on one, please visit here to find out more about my personal coaching packages.
Have a great week!
Watch here for my video on this topic:
