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Eat Right – Tips That Shrink Your Waistline

Derek K. — Thu, 13 May 2010 00:59:28 +0000

Have an apple before every meal. According to a study performed by Penn State University, people who eat an apple before every meal consumed significant less amount of calories than those who didn’t. Basically, the chewing action to eat an apple will make you feel satisfied with a smaller meal. If you were not familiar with this concept, one of the easiest to follow and perhaps most effective way of losing weight is by chewing your foods longer than you normally do.

There is a delay in communication between your stomach and your brain. That means even if you have consumed enough to feel satisfied, your brain will not know that until it catches up with the delay. Chewing longer periods of time cuts down on the delay so you don’t eat too much. Eat an apple before every meal and you can cut down up to 15% of calories consumed on a daily basis.

Keep a separate cupboard with your family, partner, or anyone else you might share a dwelling. Everyone has their favorite snacks and most them are packed with tons of calories. It’s bad enough that you have to fight your cravings for sweets and other fat laden snacks, don’t add to the stress by salivating for other people’s snacks as well. Keep a good stock of healthy snacks in your cupboard and stay away from other people’s cupboards.

Set goals, it matters quite a lot. It is much less stressful to have a goal and to try to reach that, rather than simply setting out to lose weight. Set a goal to lose whatever pounds you would like to lose and never keep the objective vague. Many studies show that dieters who set specific goals were much less stressed out than those who did not set any goals. They also kept to their weight loss regimen much better as well. Set a realistic goal of how much weight you would like to lose and don’t let the disregarding of this simple task be the reason for a failure.

Read the calorie counts. Knowing the amount of calories you are consuming will make you eat less and eat healthy. In one study, when people who eat out quite often were shown exact calorie and fat figures to the corresponding foods in the menu, they ordered very differently from how they normally do. These people ended up consuming half the calorie and fat on average than they normally do. Read the nutrition fact labels when you are grocery shopping and if you plan to eat out, do a search on the internet on calorie figures on the food you plan to order.

How to Lose 10 Pounds in Just a Week – Things You Must Know to Achieve Success

slimdowncoach — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 22:05:55 +0000

Can a person lose 10 pounds in just a week? Sure, it’s possible. But is it advisable? I’m afraid not. It’s unnatural to gain 10 pounds in a week and just the same losing 10 pounds in a single week cannot happen under normal circumstances. Our body reacts to everything we do to it whether we realize it or not. The short term benefits of losing massive amount of weight in a very short period of time will have serious long term repercussion.

Just what do you think you will be losing if you try to lose 10 pounds in a single week? The answer is, mostly water and it’s also the result of your empty stomach due to severe starvation. The only way to lose 10 pounds in a single week is depriving yourself of food and drinking very little water. Your waistline might feel a bit slimmer, but that’s because you have excreted everything you have consumed prior to your extreme dieting out of your system. You have hardly lost any fat and your waistline will balloon back as soon as you start eating normally again. That is to say, you do not need to gorge yourself with food to experience a yoyo diet effect after such an extreme fasting, but just a normal diet would do the trick.

So your choice is very simple. Either you choose to lose weight very fast for some special occasion and gain them right back when you don’t have to fit in that special pants, or you can choose to lose weight not slowly but at a more natural pace and stay thin for the rest of your life. I hope you chose the latter because you can lose weight and stay thin without having to adopt the traditional diet plans that are painfully difficult to follow. The perfect solution is to adopt a diet plan that is flexible enough that you can live with it for the rest of your life.

Accompanying exercise with a sensible diet would be the most ideal way to lose weight, but if you are not big on exercise, you should look into a diet plan that takes advantage of foods and eating schedules that can enhance your metabolism. Click here to get full the full detail on this diet plan.

The Best Way to Burn Fat

Teri C. — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 15:15:57 +0000

So you’re ready to slim down and you need the best way to burn fat. It simply counts to look for the most efficient way to burn fat since we all have finite amount of time we can invest into it and when we do, we should insist on the best results possible.

Make plans. The key is to mix it up into a well thought out routine of aerobic exercise with weight training to zone in on the best way to burn fat. Your body needs to increase heart rate through aerobic exercise in order to burn more calories and fat. Interval training is the best way to burn fat introducing short intervals of high-intensity moves into your regular routine, challenging your body. By optimizing your routine you will experience the afterburn whereby you continue to burn more calories than at rest even after the exercise is done. However, aerobic exercise by itself is not enough to burn fat most efficiently. Weight training can pick up the pace to burn fat since not only do you burn calories through the exercise itself but your muscles burn more calories at rest than fat so by making your body leaner, your body will burn more calories even at rest helping tap into the fat storage and burn fat faster.

Discriminate. Drink the good stuff. Water has been shown to have the ability to accelerate metabolism. It’s thought that keeping the cells properly hydrated may be the key. Drink green tea. Green tea is not only is rich in anti-oxidants but much like water, it has shown some ability to possibly increase metabolism. Avoid alcoholic beverages since alcohol depresses the central nervous system and in turn slows your metabolism. By simply reducing the number of alcoholic beverages and increasing plain water or green tea, not only do you keep your body healthier, you hit the bull’s eye in the best way to burn fat.

De-stress. When you subject your body to stress, there is an increase in hormones like cortisol which unfortunately can stimulate appetite and slow down your metabolism. Cortisol is also known to encourage fat to store around your midsection so it pays to de-stress so you do not increase your chances of adding on fat where you least need it and slow down your metabolism all at once.

Fuel your body right. Avoid refined carbohydrates which are a form of fuel for your body that is pretty much broken down already. Unlike whole grains and fruits which carry with them the benefits of fiber the simple carbohydrates tend to spike up your insulin levels which then has an effect of driving down your metabolism.

Eat all day. Grazing all day can help signal your body that you are constantly eating avoiding slowdown of your metabolism. Eat smaller meals throughout the day or eat your main meals sensibly and squeeze in healthy snacks in between. Plan ahead. This is not to encourage vending machine purchases. With the right fuel, your body is better able to burn fat.

Introduce these simple things into your daily routine and you would have reached the best way to burn fat. Not only are these tips helpful in keeping you healthier but will help you slim down, look great and feel good about yourself. Build a stronger body that you can depend on. After all, you’re not getting another one of them.

Plan Your Meals Ahead of Time

Derek K. — Sat, 13 Feb 2010 19:23:39 +0000

If you really want to stick with a healthy diet, it’s important that you stick to a diet schedule rather than a principal of eating healthy. I had made this mistake myself and I’ve seen too many of my friends make the same mistake. They make this big announcement on that they’ll start to eat healthy, but they have absolutely no idea what those diets are going to consist of.

You don’t have to plan all your meals ahead of time. In fact, you don’t even need to keep a weekly schedule. What’s important is scheduling your daily meals before you start the day, or the night previous.

It’s much easier to stick with healthy diets if you plan your meal ahead of time. Without this diet schedule, it’s impossible to keep track of your daily calorie intake and you’ll end up eating what is convenient rather than what is healthy.

If you plan your meals ahead of time, you can indulge yourself a little in the morning and consume a bit less in the afternoon and or in the evening to balance out your calorie intake. Without a diet schedule, you’d be like an NLF coach without his playbook and you’ll end up indulging yourself far more than is ideal to lose weight effectively.

Scheduling and organization is far more important than you’d give credit for. Many hospitals around the country are now employing scheduling and organization methods which forces all their employees (including doctors) to go over simple checklists which include things like washing hands and this has led to some 30 percent efficiency increase and has helped save many lives.

Make a list of meals you’d like to have on a particular day and stick to that diet. Many studies show that people who plan their meals ahead of time lose weight much more efficiently than those who don’t have a plan. Get planning today and drop those unwanted pounds quickly.

Healthy Lean Chicken for Dinner

slimdowncoach — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 20:09:53 +0000

Not all diet meals have to taste like paper and come in portions so small that a 3 year old couldn’t be satisfied. Prepare your supper as instructed and you’ll enjoy a healthy, lean, and satisfying meal.

Grill 4oz. of organic chicken. Organic chicken are fed pesticide-free feed and some studies suggest it may be more nutrient-rich than the conventional chickens.

Cook 1/2 cup to 3/4 cup of brown rice. You can find ready for cooking brown rice in your local supermarket packaged for individual meals for ease of use.

1 1/2 cups to 2 cups of fresh organic greens to accompany the meal. These greens are grown without pesticides which creates less chemical pollution and it may be more nutrient-rich than the conventional choices.

Try it out, it’s delicious and filling, yet it will help you get slimmer.

Lose the Clock to Lose Weight

Derek K. — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 16:19:14 +0000

Do you find yourself constantly looking at the clock to find out how long you have been on the treadmill or doing any other exercise? It is extremely difficult to concentrate on the task at hand if you keep repeating ticktock, ticktock in your mind.

Here’s a piece of advice for you, hide all the clocks in and around your workout area. Keep a single timer or a clock that has a timer feature, then set it to the desired amount of time and forget about it. If you keep looking at the clock, 5 minutes will seem like 5 hours and the workout will become more and more tedious.

If you want to see the best result for any amount of time you spend working out, you have to concentrate on your form and your balance. The right motivation is to think how long you can workout at a strong pace rather than timing how long until you stop.

When I used to have a large wall mount clock in front of my treadmill, my twenty minute run seemed to take forever and I would always wait until the last minute or two to start upping the intensity, as if that would make up for my lackluster performance. It wasn’t until I had gotten rid of the clock that I actually started to not only concentrate on what I was doing, but I was also enjoying the workout.

Try this on your next workout and don’t abandon it on your first try because you didn’t like it. With time, you’ll get used to this and eventually you’ll feel much more energized on every workout. You have nothing to lose but the false sense of time and you will burn through calories much more efficiently with better form and balance.

Easy Fat Burning Exercises You Can Do at Home

Derek K. — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 19:42:35 +0000

Having spent half your day working hard at your job, it’s difficult to make the time to go to the gym and get a good workout done. Unless you live right next to a gym, half the time is spent getting there, changing, and getting home after the workout. So here are some easy, but effective exercises you can do at home that you will find easy to follow.

Warm up – You should always warm up before workouts, because not only would this prevent any unnecessary injury, but it also helps burn through calories more efficiently in a shorter time. If you want to save some time or you just want to speed things up, then just speed walk your way back home from work. If you drive yourself home, just speed walk for 5 minutes before entering home and that will get you all warmed up for a workout.

Wall push-ups – If you are able to do the traditional floor facing push-ups, then you should do that. But many people find it hard to do the traditional push-ups and that’s where the wall push-ups come in. Stand facing a wall with your feet about two feet away from the wall and your hands placed on the wall at a width slightly wider than your shoulder. Just imagine doing the traditional push-up and let gravity move your body forward and push yourself up before hitting the wall. For best results, you should do it slowly at a constant pace. Also, if you still find it challenging, just stand about a foot or a foot and a half away from the wall and it will be easier to do since the range of motions become smaller.

Squats – Pull up a chair with the backrest facing your forward. Hold on to each end of the backrest as support and place your feet about shoulder width. Keep your upper body vertical and gently bend your knees. The goal is to go as far down as your thigh would be parallel to the floor, but for now, go down only as far as you feel that is your limit. Push yourself back up to the starting position using your leg power and balance yourself by holding on to the chair. You can get rid of the chair as you get stronger and you can even use weights to increase the difficulty. Just fill couple of bags with books and hold each bag on each hands and squat.

Arm exercises – For beginners, I would advice that you use elastic exercise bands for arm training rather than going straight to dumbbells. Step on one end of the band with both feet spread shoulder width. Hold on to the opposite end of the band with both your hands and spread your hands apart about shoulder width as well. Now raise your hands up and down repeatedly using the resistance of the band to give you a full workout. Keep the motions even, slow, and at a constant pace for maximum result.

All workouts described here are weight free workouts and therefore each set will consist of 15 to 20 repetitions for all three workouts. Start the first week with 4 days of workout. Each day you will complete one set of each workouts. Week two you will exercise 5 days out of the week and you will complete 2 sets for all three workouts. After week two, increase the amount of sets if you feel stronger than the week prior, or you can just keep the same pace until you feel that you can tackle bigger challenges. Think twice before purchasing an expensive workout gear or gadget, there are many effective exercises you can do at home.

Simple Slim Down Tips You Can Live With

Teri C. — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 20:10:26 +0000

So the summer is fast approaching and you need to drop the holiday pounds. Maybe you have been planning to slim down now for a while without much success. Don’t despair. When in need of a jump start to the slim down process there are a few quick things you can implement that will give you just what you need: a head start.

The breakfast of champions

Stop snoozing that alarm and get yourself up just a little earlier in the morning for the most important meal of the day to help your body slim down. Let your body rev up with the necessary energy. It will pay you back for the time and effort with the full on metabolism and you will be less likely to go for high calorie grab-and-go breakfast or a binge-fest at lunch.

Timing is everything

It’s well known that most Europeans consider lunch their biggest meal of the day and some believe this contributes to the fact that obesity is not as severe a problem there. Now that you’ve treated yourself to a nice breakfast, indulge. It’s better for the larger portion of your daily caloric intake to take place earlier in the day, giving your body the chance to process and utilize the energy from it. But at dinnertime, make adjustments. And on that note,

Don’t listen to your mother

I know. Mom always said: “clean your plate”. Well, this is the one time we can say she was wrong. Don’t feel the need to finish it all. Throw out your notion of a portion size based on today’s restaurant standards. They have become anywhere from double to triple the size they used to be in the 1950s. Supersizing everything is really not helping anyone slim down, especially at dinner time. Be ready to pack a doggy bag for 1/2 your meal when dining out. Better yet, remove the temptation and ask for a box ahead of time to pack away 1/2 at the beginning of dinner.

Fill up on the good stuff first

Start your meals with a great salad. A Salad with plenty of greens, vegetables such as peppers, topped with slivers of crunchy nuts and a light dressing is definitely a winning combination. Forego the usual selection of salads offered by fast food joints as they as very deceiving in that they often times end up close to 1,000 calories. One of these salads alone can make up about 1/3 to 1/2 of the necessary daily caloric intake. You can also opt to start your meals with a soup. Here, the obviously better choice would be a broth-based soup rather than a creamy soup. Either the salad or the soup at the beginning of the meal can help you slim down also by making it easier for you to pack that doggy bag instead of finishing your plate.

Drink up

Drink water or caffeine and sugar free drinks liberally throughout the day. You will become less likely to confuse the “I’m thirsty” messages from the “I’m hungry” ones from your body curbing extra calories. Of course, here it is also important that you make a conscientious choice. Skip the sugar-laden drinks. These are empty calories that you can’t draw any benefits from. They are not going to help you reveal the slimmer you.

Brush your teeth

No, really. If you brush your teeth between your meals, it is less likely that you will snack on unnecessary things. You might skip the couple of potato chips you wanted to indulge on because they just don’t feel like worth another trip to brush your teeth. You can actually derive another benefit from this: heart health. Some studies suggest that people who have gum disease may be at a greater risk of developing atherosclerosis and heart disease. So in helping yourself slim down, why not help your heart out too?

The gym is not the answer

An opportunity for your body to slim down is around every corner. Don’t let yourself believe that you can only “exercise” at the gym. You may take the stairs instead of the elevator from your office to the conference room. You might choose to walk for 15 minutes out of your lunch break. Get up from your chair at least once every hour and shake it up. This will not only help you burn a few extra calories to slim down but also help improve posture.

You’re not perfect

Well, last time I checked, we as humans are pretty riddled with faults and frailties. But, luckily, we also possess a bit of grace. Know that you will sometimes fail. This is not a might or a maybe but you will. It’s really a given. But don’t let it keep you down. Be okay with yourself. Bounce right back up. Understand that by doing right thing most of the time, you are making a difference in your waistline. Just because you didn’t do so well with lunch, don’t give yourself permission to just go for it with abandon. Compartmentalize. A failure at lunch is just that, a failure at lunch. It does not need to bleed into dinner nor the next day.

Happy slim down!

So go forth and, uh, subtract from your excess poundage. Enjoy yourself. Visualize the new and improved you and tackle every task as efficiently as you can. Much like we think before we speak, think before you eat and take the stairs. Celebrate the smaller milestones along the way with that blouse you really wanted or the suit you thought you’d really cool in when you’re slimmer. Even better, for somewhat significant goals met, schedule a vacation to somewhere you always wanted to go. Keep the carrots coming literally as well as figuratively. It will help you slim down that much faster with conviction.

Slim Down Your Way

Teri C. — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 19:15:23 +0000

Know yourself

Slim down strategy is no different from plans for other things we conquer in life. There is the old saying from The Art of War: “If you know your enemies and know yourself, you can win a hundred battles without a single loss”. First, acquaint yourself with your enemies, that is, the factors that contribute to your weight gain. Then, analyze how they affect you, that is, how do you react or not react to these factors. This simple step will guide you in devising the best plan of action in slimming down your way.

Time Management

Most of us can agree on time as a major factor impeding our slim down. After all, most of us don’t spend our days wondering how come we have so much spare time. The scenario may play differently for every one of us. So do you take the back seat or take charge and put yourself first?

Start Small

Your aim may be high but don’t try to shoot high at one shot. Just like an arrow shot straight up, your weight is likely to respond very quickly then come right back to its starting point. Don’t make unrealistic goals that will not be met anytime soon. It’s safe to say that you can’t slim down enough to be 4 sizes smaller in one week. Instead, make small changes that you can live with. If you’re a soda drinker, you may want to replace your can of soda a day to maybe just twice a week. If you like sweets after each meal, you may cut this down to once a day only. When you see gradual positive changes from the things you commit to, you are more likely to stick with it.

Food Is NOT Your Enemy

Don’t suck the fun out of eating. There really is no such thing as a truly “bad food”. If you like chocolate (and I think I speak for most of us when I says “yes”), don’t make it your enemy. Better yet, make it your friend. Reward yourself when you have had a successful run in making changes in your life by allowing yourself your own “chocolate”. If you make it taboo, you’re more likely to crave it and crash when you finally reach for it sabotaging your slim down.

The Buddy System

Most of us know someone who wants to slim down as much as we do. It could be that friend from school, or a co-worker, or a spouse. Employ the buddy system. Make it a group thing even. There definitely is strength in numbers. When one of you is experiences the lack of motivation, the other can pull you forward and vice versa. Seek out for synergy in slimming down.
Slimming down is a personal experience. After all, no one can do it for you. Simply delving into it isn’t necessarily the best approach. Ensure that you are ready and look to see what changes and support systems you can utilize to guarantee the best outcome possible.

Slimdown101′s First Post

slimdowncoach — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 19:04:45 +0000

Hello and welcome to Slim Down 101. This is our first post of many more to come and we plan to fill this blog with rich information on healthy diet, fitness regimen, and general tips on staying slim. If you have any suggestions or questions, please don’t hesitate to contact us by using the “Contact” form on your right pane of the site. We can’t wait to show you all we have planned for in the upcoming days and we hope to influence you to develop a healthier life style. I’ll keep the introduction short, so welcome and please keep visiting us for updated information on a regular basis.

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