Are you trying to lose weight? 3 things you can do today for your weight loss.

Posted on January 27, 2012 by Simone Rivas, One of Thousands of Life Coaches on Noomii.

Weight loss has to be the number one New Year’s Resolution in America, at least in the back of our minds as obesity reached to one third of adults, and approximately 17%, or 12.5 million, of children and adolescents aged 2—19 years (CDC, 2011).

There is so much information in the media that by now most of us know that we need to get moving to lose weight, and that is absolutely correct, we need to understand the energy balance that there needs to happen in order for us to lose, maintain or gain weight. Nevertheless, nutrition is still 80% responsible for our weight gain, so there are three main notions that we need to understand and change in our nutrition in order to start losing weight:

1. Control your portions – portion control is absolutely the single most important nutrition concept one can understand and incorporate for life in order to have a healthy weight. Most of us don’t realize that we consume much more than our body needs. No wonder, there are so many temptations and the super sized portions at fast food and restaurants can contribute to that, but it is really up to us to control it.

2. Eat every three hours – in order for us to eat less at the bigger meals such as lunch and dinner we do need to eat in between meals, and that includes not skipping meals and having a good breakfast to get your metabolism started for the day. Eat wholesome snacks that will help keep your appetite controlled until the next meal. A few examples are: a low fat yogurt, a cereal bar, fruits, nuts, etc.

3. Limit your sugar and fat intake – is very important for us to understand that anything we eat that is high in sugar and fat are very high in calories. Sweets, fried foods and processed foods are the worst enemies for weight loss and health, so my recommendation for the “sweet tooth’s” is to start slowly decreasing the sweets, ice-creams, sodas and eating more fruits, low fat ice-creams or yogurt ice-creams and juices with no added sugar.

Weight management or weight control, is very hard for many people to achieve because is about understanding the effect that the foods have on our bodies, and it takes motivation and will power to start to change a lifetime habit. There are many things that can be affecting our weight gain, and one common factor is stress, but still that are things that we can start doing right now to start the change. That is why I am all about helping people to understand the concepts of portion control, eating every three hours and limiting sugar and fat intake including finding replacements for sugary and high fat foods. It can be hard just to think that we need to remove all of the things we like in life, and you don’t have to. Start small by incorporating the concepts I just described and you will see that in a week you will start to perceive the difference in your weight and your energy level.

Author:
Simone Rivas, MPH, CHES, CWC, CLC
simone@myliferesolution.com
www.myliferesolution.com