It is necessary to look at weight loss in a broader context
and to compose individual pieces of puzzles called lifestyle about the
image of one's dream self. The overall transformation of the character is,
in a way, a work of art that requires vision, purpose, and sufficient
motivation, because staying on the couch with potato chips and a glass of good juice will sometimes be more tempting than fulfilling your training
plan. But the result will bring much better satisfaction than a bottle of
wine on TV.
Michelangelo did not print his statues in a week either, but
he had a clear vision and plan. Over time, the right lifestyle habits will
reward us with a more attractive figure and greater self-confidence.
What will you learn in today's article?
.How to set your diet properly
.How to get more protein and fiber into the body
.How often and how you should play sports
.What role do sleep and patience play in changing lifestyles?
10 tips to make it easier to burn fat and lose weight.
1. Create a customized meal plan.
We will start nicely from the floor and create a meal plan
according to our needs and lifestyle. Nice nut, isn't it? Let's crack
it!
Key questions to answer:
1. Does breakfast and your lifestyle suit you?
2. How many times a day are you used to eating?
3. Is smaller meals a day better or less big?
4. Do you ever feel like having a sweet tooth?
5. Will you ever catch yourself in the evening raid on the
fridge? And how often?
6. Do you have a craving for junk food?
7. Do you eat and "just stick to something"?
After answering the above questions, we should have a little
closer idea of our eating habits. If we answered "YES" very
often in the second half of the questions, we will probably have a
smaller or larger problem in eating. Don't worry, it's quite easy to solve.
Most of the reasons why we have a craving for sweet, fatty, or salty food, or that we happen to fill the fridge, stem from unhealthy eating
habits. And it doesn't matter if we survive all day on coffee and pastries
or we don't eat all day and go crazy twice as much in the evening. Let's
set a better path.
How do you easily create a customized meal plan?
From the answered questions, we found out that we like
breakfast with a smaller meal, after which it suits us to have a smaller snack,
a bigger lunch, a bigger snack, and a lighter dinner. After training,
the protein suits us to supplement protein and regenerate
faster. What's next?
1. We will determine the number of larger meals and snacks as
we think it suits us. In the model case, these are 2 larger meals
supplemented by 4 smaller meals.
2. We will formulate each meal so that it contains all the
nutrients according to a healthy plate from Harvard. This will ensure a
balanced intake of all nutrients and prevent uncontrollable tastes, hunger and,
together with our diet plan, will help us prevent raids on the
refrigerator.
3. We prepare our favorite dishes prepared according to the
principles of a healthy plate at least one day in advance inboxes. Boxing is
the easiest, most reliable, and cheapest way to have control over your
diet. However, this is not a necessity. But it makes life much
easier. For example, we can determine 2 days a week when we will prepare
food, and we are taken care of. For the next few days, we will prepare snacks or
breakfast in just a few minutes.
4. In restaurants and on other occasions, we follow the
principles of a healthy plate.
2. Add more protein to your diet.
Protein is a building material for our muscles and at the same
time, it is the nutrient that has the greatest satiety. After
eating a good portion of protein, we will feel happier and more saturated than
after eating a protein-poor diet.
A bonus is a fact that the proteins on their metabolism to
consume about 20 - 30% of its energy value, so that from 100 calories
from protein realistically utilize 70 - 80 calories. The higher the proportion of protein in the diet will playfully help us to eat fewer
calories spontaneously, and thus help create the caloric deficit necessary
for weight loss.
How to do it?
1. We should enrich our diet with quality
sources of protein, such as lean meat, quality dairy products, eggs,
fish, legumes, and nuts.
2. We can use protein bars for snacks, cookies, puddings or
other goodies along with a piece of fruit.
3. After training, it is nice to supplement protein with
quality whey or a multi-component plant vegan protein.
4. We simply increase the proportion of protein according to a healthy
plate.
3. Eat a lot of fiber.
Fiber is almost indispensable for our health. If we
lighten it up a bit, for us, it is something like burgers for America or
Vladimir Putin for Russia. Not only does it function as a
"brush" on the intestines and keep our digestive system in
shape, but our miniature tenants also enjoy the fiber in the form of hundreds
of billions of microbial cells (about 350 trillion) that feed on the
fiber. We host about 10 times more of these "tenants" than we
have our own cells.
In return for renting our gut to our microbial cells,
they help us lose weight more easily, strengthen the
immune system or improve our mental state.
How does it work?
1. Fiber fights hunger in such a way that after consuming foods
rich in fiber, we feel full for longer.
2. A bonus is the fact that fiber keeps insulin under control
by ensuring a more gradual rise in blood sugar levels. Thanks to
this, there will be no situation where we find ourselves in a
circle of early hunger after eating.
3. We should take about 30 grams of fiber a day. Therefore,
bet on wholemeal bread, cereals, vegetables, fruits, nuts, legumes, and
other foods naturally rich in fiber. They can also be protein bars containing
easily digestible maize or chicory fiber.
4. Thanks to fiber, we end up consuming fewer calories than
from fiber-poor foods, which will help us lose weight.
4. Avoid highly industrialized foods and foods.
Why not only lose weight but ideally exclude the
goodies behind the label for highly industrially processed food?
It is simple. In small quantities, these foods contain
a relatively large amount of energy. Also, such foods
saturate us very little and it is easier for us to eat larger
quantities. An eaten bag of potato chips or two smaller fast-food burgers
represents half the amount of our energy ration per day. Needless to say,
we will be hungry for such a meal in a moment.
Also, these foods are poor in other
valuable micronutrients , but rich in salt and unhealthy fats. By
eliminating these foods from the diet, we will save a lot of unnecessary
calories.
5. Check your food portions. Shrink your plates.
When we load a good portion of food on a plate, it is quite
easy to eat more food than is enough for us. That's why it's nice to have
a lot of food in your eye, which will be enough for breakfast,
lunch, or dinner. But how to achieve easier weight loss?
Let's start using smaller plates! This will reduce the
area on which we put food, we will eat less energy and it will help us with
weight loss. We don't necessarily have to start eating all the food from
the smaller plates right away. All you have to do is eat only one meal a day
from a smaller plate and add another over time.
6. Stay hydrated enough and don't drink your calories.
We cannot live without water. All vital reactions in
our body take place in water. Therefore, it is important to pay attention
to an adequate drinking regime. Not only that! A sufficient drinking
regime can help us lose more fat thanks to a small increase in resting
metabolism. When we drink enough before a meal, this strategy will
help us absorb less energy in the next meal (Davy et al., 2008; Dennis et al.,
2010; Stookey et al., 2008).
Thus, on average, we should take about 30-45 ml of
water per kilogram of body weight in drinks and food per day.
Don't drink lemonade, you consume hundreds of calories
unnecessarily.
Lemonades and sugary drinks are a source of empty energy in
the form of sugar. With a liter of Coca Cola, we drink the energy
equivalent of a decently nutritious meal and unnecessarily ingest over 100
grams of sugar. In the case of sweetened mineral waters, the situation is
often a little better, when, for example, such orange Mattoni contains about 40 grams of sugar, which is energetically equal to a
smaller snack.
Unsweetened coffee and tea, on the other hand, help speed up
metabolism
Coffee without sugar and cream is almost a calorie-free drink
just like tea. Their bonus is the fact that thanks to caffeine they
help speed up metabolism and act as such natural fat burners. You
shouldn't overdo it with caffeine. Ideally, stick to about 400 mg of
caffeine per day (3-4 espresso or 6-7 teas).
7. Do sports at least three times a week. Give strength
training and cardio a chance.
Every move counts. When we find a place in our
lifestyle for regular sports, we have almost won. During sports
activities, we give our body a lot to make it stronger, more persistent, and healthier. Also, we burn a decent amount of calories
through sports. This will make it easier for us to maintain a healthy
weight, fitness, or lose weight.
It is ideal to do strength training 2-3 times a week, supplemented
by endurance sports about 2 times a week, and of course, any movement
during the week that makes us happy. However, this is not a
necessity. Any sport we enjoy is a great choice.
How much energy and kilograms of fat do we theoretically
burn per year if we exercise regularly?
If we take an hour of strength training three times a week
and go jogging for half an hour twice a week, we will create a positive
relationship with sports, support our health and lose weight more easily.
. With these activities alone, an average 65-kilogram a woman can burn 1,625 kcal per week
. With these activities alone, an average of 80
kilogram man can burn an average of 2,000 kcal
If they played sports like this all year, they would
theoretically burn:
. A woman would burn an average of 86,125 kcal per year, which
is theoretically 11.1 kilograms of fat burned
. A man would burn an average of 106,000 kcal per year, which
is theoretically 13.6 kilograms of fat burned
And I'm not talking about the next 24-48 hours after
training, when the RMR (resting metabolism) is so high that we burn about 5-10%
more calories in the case of strength training than if we didn't go to
training. With regular sports, weight loss will simply be easier
for us.
8. Move as much as possible during the day and take short
breaks at work.
Let's look for any excuse to move. To work either on
foot or by bike. The same from work. Escalators? Let's leave it
at a different pace and run up the stairs. Lift? We'd better
bet on the stairs again.
Do we work on the computer for several hours a day? Let's take regular
stretching breaks or a short walk to the coffee machine.
Once again, we will be more active and the calories burned
will only jump in.
You can read more ways to move more during the day in the
article entitled 5 ways to move more during the day and promote
weight loss
9. Don't forget to get good quality and enough sleep.
Little sleep is anything under 6 hours a day. The ideal sleep period for most adults is between 7-9 hours per day. It will
be difficult without sleep. We will lose hormones by not getting enough
sleep, we will have a greater appetite and we will not feel so satisfied after
eating. The level of the stress hormone cortisol increases and the level
of testosterone decreases.
It all adds up to gaining weight. Thanks to a good
night's sleep, we will be more active, more efficient, and healthier
overall.
10. Be patient.
Changes are not happening from day to day and even a small
improvement in lifestyle is counting, this is necessary to
realize. Everything takes time. Let's take an example. When we
walk up the stairs wherever possible, we come to the conclusion that we walk up
the stairs for 15 minutes a day.
. A 15-minute walk up the stairs for a 65-kilogram
woman means an average of 113 kcal burned.
. A 15-minute walk up the stairs for an 80-kilogram
man means an average of 140 kcal burned.
. They walked up the stairs for 15 minutes every day of
the year, they would theoretically burn for a year:
. A woman would burn an average of 41,610 kcal per year, which
is theoretically 5.4 kilograms of fat burned.
. A man would burn an average of 51,100 kcal per year, which
is theoretically 6.5 kilograms of fat burned.
And that's worth such a small lifestyle change.
. You can read more tips in the article called 10
simple tips on how to start eating and exercising healthily
What to take from it?
By mastering simple lifestyle changes, we can tilt the bowls
of weight loss scales to our side. It all starts with creating at
least some plan or system in food and knowing what suits us. Blindly
copying foreign diets really doesn't make sense.
More protein, fiber, and fresh foods in the diet means
not only a healthier self but also a richer self with a better potential to
lose weight. Water and unsweetened mineral water with occasional
enjoyment of a few cups of your favorite coffee or tea should be the basis
of an optimal drinking regime.
Natural movement, any sport, enough sleep, and patience are
the keys to success.