Weight Loss is a long, exhausting process that demands determination, discipline, and self-love. It requires one to stay committed to their goal and keep on persisting even when results are not shown. Hundreds of individuals look for effective strategies for weight loss and begin their journey, only to give up just a few weeks later because they don’t see the results. What these folks don’t realize is that sustainable weight loss takes months of hard work. It’s not as simple as waking up one day and you have reached your goal weight.
To make things more complicated, there are so many weight loss fad diets, provided by fitness gurus who either want to sell something or are just after fame.
In reality, sustainable weight loss is not that complicated. Here is a list of effective strategies that you can adopt to not only lose weight but also to adapt to a healthy lifestyle as well.
Portion Control:
According to the research, people usually eat more food when they are offered a larger portion. That’s exactly what portion control is. It required you to eat every food group in its specified portion. The word portion refers to how much food you will have on your plate. In order to lose weight through portion control, you need to measure your food. You can either use measuring cups and spoons for accurate measurement, or you can compare your food with everyday objects to understand its portion.
One of the easiest strategies for weight loss is to make your plate accordingly. People also call this method the plate method. Half of your plate should be dedicated to veggies. One-quarter of the remaining half should be any protein of your choice. And in the other half, you fill up with carbohydrates.
A 2012 study proved that making your plate according to portion control can be effective for weight loss. As we discussed earlier, weight loss is not a complicated process. Hence, you don’t need to go the extra mile and buy a certain plate. You can use any 9-inch plate that’s easily available in your home.
Clean Eating:
Clean eating refers to a diet in which you avoid highly processed foods. Individuals focusing on clean eating prefer whole foods that are closer to their natural form and are processed minimally. Adapting the habit of clean eating in your life can give you significant results if you do it correctly and remain consistent. To make sure you buy the right food from the grocery store and avoid processed food, check out the guide about what to buy at the grocery store. Additionally, clean eating can boost your health as well as keep you energized, since you are required to consume more nutritious food.
Another advantage of clean eating is that it saves you a lot of money. Since you eat everything homemade and say no to store-bought and processed goods, you spend less and yet eat more.
Tips for Effective Clean Eating Strategies for Weight Loss:
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- Avoid Added Sugar: Research indicates that frequent consumption of large sugar amounts leads to health complications such as obesity along with heart disease. The adoption of clean eating requires you to discard all shop-bought items and processed sugars available for purchase. Alternative healthy choices replace the options that you need to eliminate from your diet. You can satisfy a craving for sweet taste with Greek yogurt blended with berries or through the consumption of an apple.
- Prefer Green: Here’s a tip for effective weight loss: become friends with veggies, especially leafy greens. This includes vegetables like spinach, arugula, kale, and more. These vegetables are rich in minerals, vitamins, and antioxidants. They are extremely good for keeping your body thriving. You can make spinach smoothies or add them to your omelet for breakfast.
- No need for diet food. When starting their weight loss path many new dieters mistakenly believe they require specific foods to eat. Eating low-fat dressing and diet soda along with meal replacement bars are common among persons who focus on weight loss. These foods contain numerous additives of sugar that result in weight gain. These types of food will not assist anyone in following clean eating concepts.
- Avoid Refined Carbs: The consumption of white bread alongside rice and pasta poses negative effects on your entire body health, although it does not help weight reduction. The inclusion of refined carbohydrates in your daily diet does not prevent weight loss, though better choices exist for health benefits. Alternate healthy choices do exist in the realm of whole grains. The three whole grain options of barley and oats alongside brown rice provide better nutritional value than refined carbohydrates do.
Intermittent Fasting:
Weight loss strategies mentioned above primarily teach what foods to eat and what to eliminate from your diet. Intermittent fasting concentrates its attention on determining the proper eating periods. Your weight loss strategy under this method dictates the designated period of eating. The fasting period takes up the entire time, which is not dedicated to eating. Available research findings demonstrate that designated fasting durations during the day can provide health advantages to people. Your feeding period should be dedicated to balanced meals that include nutritious ingredients while you should exclude junk and processed foods. Take a look at this list of foods to keep you energized.
According to Johns Hopkins, the human body has evolved to be able to survive without food for several hours. Back in the prehistoric era, before humans discovered farming, they were hunters. They evolved to survive without eating, even for days. Hence, to this day, intermittent fasting is considered healthy and beneficial for weight loss.
Types of Intermittent Fasting:
Before you get into it, make sure to visit your doctor and discuss whether this is a suitable strategy for you. There are several types of intermittent fasting, including:
- The 16/8 method: This approach includes an eating period of 8 hours and a fasting period of 16 hours. While some individuals implement this strategy by skipping breakfast, others prefer to skip dinner. The right time for an eating window is up to you.
- The 5:2 diet: This method requires you to consume only 500-600 calories on any two non-consecutive days and eat normally for the rest of the days every week.
- One Meal a Day (OMAD) Diet: In the OMAD diet, you consume all your required calories for a day by eating one meal, after which you fast for 23 hours. Although it has been proven to be an effective strategy for weight loss, the OMAD diet is not suitable for everyone. It may also lead to health problems for some people, so it’s always a good idea to ask your doctor before starting any diet, especially something like OMAD.
Calorie Counting – A Foundation of All Strategies for Weight Loss:
The only element that unifies successful weight loss approaches is the creation of an energy shortage through daily caloric consumption lower than calorie burn. Body functions derive energy from food through calories. Human body operation requires these units of energy to function normally. Your body absorbs only some of the consumed energy at the initial moment. The majority of stored energy exists as fat within the body. Activities requiring high energy levels cause our body to consume stored calories. The relationship between calorie consumption and body calorie burning determines whether weight loss occurs. A calorie deficit describes this exact process.
Your body burns through all the fat it has stored.
How to Find Out Your Calorie Deficit?
As a general rule of thumb, you have a deficit of 500 calories every day. Following this strategy should help you lose 1 pound every week. All you need is to eat 500 fewer calories than your required calorie count. How will you find out your required calories for a day? This depends on several factors, including your gender, age, height, and current weight.
First, you need to find out your Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR), followed by determining the Total Daily Energy Expenditure (TDEE) through multiplication of BMR by an activity factor. After that, subtract the TDEE from your daily calories required to achieve a deficit.
Furthermore, you can try the calorie deficit calculator online, where you just need to enter the required data (age, weight, height, etc), and it will tell you the number of calories you need to take to lose a certain amount of weight every week.
The Role of Physical Activities in Weight Loss:
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Add your preferred type of exercise with one of the strategies for weight loss that you want to implement, and you have the best plan for losing weight in a couple of months. Just make sure to consult your doctor for the right exercise. As per the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), an average adult needs to engage in moderate-intensity exercise for at least 150 minutes every week. In addition, we also need at least 2 days of muscle-strengthening activity.
Final Thoughts:
We hope that our guide to different strategies for weight loss was helpful to you. You can choose any strategy that suits you the best. However, weight loss is a long process that requires sacrifice and commitment each day. Whatever you decide to go with, know that it will seem very difficult, sometimes impossible, to carry on. However, with each passing day, you will get used to the new and healthy lifestyle.
Frequently Asked Questions Regarding The Strategies For Weight Loss:
What is the most successful weight loss strategy?
Eat a balanced diet, count your calories, and engage regularly in physical activity. Additionally, get enough sleep and learn to manage stress.
What is the 3-3-3 rule?
Eat 3 meals per day, by 3 o’clock, drink 3 bottles of water, and spend 3 hours exercising every week.
What are 10 tips for successful weight loss?
- Avoid fast food
- Learn stress management
- Prefer whole foods
- Eat breakfast
- Exercise regularly
- Eat fruits and vegetables
- Cut down on sugar
- Drink plenty of water
- Have enough sleep
- Stay consistent
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