If you’re like me, you’ve spent the last few weeks excessively indulging in the wrong kinds of food and drink. It’s fun while it lasts, but the holidays are over and it’s time to get back to the business of taking care of ourselves. After weeks of centering our lives around food and parties, it’s not easy! At least not for me.
So how do we shed the extra pounds that so easily accumulated through the holidays? Well, I know the secret for how to lose weight. I’ve shared this secret with the students in my weight loss classes, my exercise and yoga classes and personal training students. The secret is..... drum roll, please...
The secret is, there is no secret! It all comes down to diet and exercise. I’m sorry if this disappoints you. When you expend more calories than you eat, you lose weight, and when you eat more calories than you expend, you gain weight.
Of course we all have a different constitution, so diet and exercise affect each of us differently. Every person has a different metabolic rate, gut size, and amount of bacteria in the gut. Bacteria in the gut helps break down foods, using calories to do so. Some bacteria are so efficient, that they don’t require much energy to do their job. In other words, some people use more calories than others, simply digesting food.
Regardless of how your metabolism and digestion compare to someone else, if you want to lose weight, expend more calories than you take in. You can do this by decreasing your calorie intake, increasing your exercise, or both.
My generic suggestion for losing weight is to exercise for a minimum of 30 minutes/day, and eat more organic vegetables than you do currently. Don’t worry about putting small amounts of condiments on them so they taste better. It increases the chance of you eating them. Keep in mind that raw veggies take more calories to digest than cooked ones, but as long as you’re eating them, you’re good.
The diet I’m going with for the next few days is allowing myself to eat all the vegetables and quinoa I want, some fruit to curb my sweet tooth, and a couple of hard boiled eggs to satiate me. Notice I didn’t discuss the things I won’t be eating. As soon as I think about what I can’t have, I crave it. Also notice that I’m allowing myself to eat as much as I want. I don’t like feeling hungry. It makes me uncomfortable and lethargic, it makes it difficult for me to think straight, and I wind up overeating. Of course I’ll also get back to my regular exercise routine.
If you choose to be on a special diet, focus on nutrition and think only about what you can eat. If you eat something that wasn’t on your diet, forgive yourself and simply start again. Remember, the goal of weight loss is to be healthy, so you look and feel your best.
So how do we shed the extra pounds that so easily accumulated through the holidays? Well, I know the secret for how to lose weight. I’ve shared this secret with the students in my weight loss classes, my exercise and yoga classes and personal training students. The secret is..... drum roll, please...
The secret is, there is no secret! It all comes down to diet and exercise. I’m sorry if this disappoints you. When you expend more calories than you eat, you lose weight, and when you eat more calories than you expend, you gain weight.
Of course we all have a different constitution, so diet and exercise affect each of us differently. Every person has a different metabolic rate, gut size, and amount of bacteria in the gut. Bacteria in the gut helps break down foods, using calories to do so. Some bacteria are so efficient, that they don’t require much energy to do their job. In other words, some people use more calories than others, simply digesting food.
Regardless of how your metabolism and digestion compare to someone else, if you want to lose weight, expend more calories than you take in. You can do this by decreasing your calorie intake, increasing your exercise, or both.
My generic suggestion for losing weight is to exercise for a minimum of 30 minutes/day, and eat more organic vegetables than you do currently. Don’t worry about putting small amounts of condiments on them so they taste better. It increases the chance of you eating them. Keep in mind that raw veggies take more calories to digest than cooked ones, but as long as you’re eating them, you’re good.
The diet I’m going with for the next few days is allowing myself to eat all the vegetables and quinoa I want, some fruit to curb my sweet tooth, and a couple of hard boiled eggs to satiate me. Notice I didn’t discuss the things I won’t be eating. As soon as I think about what I can’t have, I crave it. Also notice that I’m allowing myself to eat as much as I want. I don’t like feeling hungry. It makes me uncomfortable and lethargic, it makes it difficult for me to think straight, and I wind up overeating. Of course I’ll also get back to my regular exercise routine.
If you choose to be on a special diet, focus on nutrition and think only about what you can eat. If you eat something that wasn’t on your diet, forgive yourself and simply start again. Remember, the goal of weight loss is to be healthy, so you look and feel your best.