Six successful ways for weight loss
Use these tried-and-true methods to improve your health and weight loss.
By Staff at the Mayo Clinic
Hundreds of fad diets, weight loss programs, and blatant scams promise fast and straightforward weight loss. However, making long-lasting lifestyle adjustments is the most excellent approach to weight loss and keep it off. Eating a balanced diet and increasing daily physical activity are two examples of these healthful adjustments.
Here are six suggestions to get you started on the path to weight loss.
1. Ensure that you are prepared.
It takes time and work to achieve weight loss over the long term. Therefore, make sure you are prepared to eat more healthfully and exercise more. Pose the following queries to yourself:
Discover your inner motivation
You cannot be forced to weight loss by anyone else. To help yourself, you must alter your diet and level of physical exercise. What will motivate you to follow through on your weight-loss plan?
List the reasons you feel that weight loss is vital. You can maintain your motivation and focus by using the list. You may wish to improve your health or prepare for a trip. On days when you do not feel like eating healthily or exercising more, consider your objectives. Look for other strategies to stay on course. For example, you may put a positive message for yourself on the pantry door or refrigerator.
Making the adjustments that result in long-term weight loss is up to you. However, having other people’s support is beneficial. Choose those who will motivate you. They should never embarrass you or impede your advancement.
It is ideal to locate those who will
Pay attention to your sensations and worries.
Talk about your desire to live a healthy lifestyle.
Engage in active pastimes or assist you in creating nutritious meals.
You can maintain your healthy improvements with the support of your support group.
Take some actions to stay on track if you would rather keep your weight-loss attempts confidential. Use a journal or an app to keep track of your workout and nutrition. Keep a weight log as well. Evaluate your progress and adjust as necessary.
Establish attainable goals
Over time, try to shed 1 to 2 pounds (0.5 to 1 kilogram) per week. You will need to burn between 500 and 750 more calories each day than you consume to achieve that.
You should start with a weight loss goal of 5% of your current weight. Nine pounds (4 kilograms) is your weight if you weigh 180 pounds (82 kilograms). Losing even this much weight can reduce your chance of developing some chronic illnesses. These ailments include type 2 diabetes and heart disease.
Setting two different kinds of goals can be beneficial. An action goal is the first kind. You can enumerate a healthy weight-loss strategy. “Walk every day for 30 minutes” is an example of an action objective. An outcome aim is the second kind. You can enumerate a healthy result that you hope to achieve. The outcome objective “Lose 10 pounds (4.5 kilos)” is an example. What you hope to accomplish is known as an outcome goal. It doesn’t, however, explain how to get there. An aim for action does. You create healthy changes by setting action goals.
Savor nutritious meals.
You must consume fewer calories overall from food and beverages if you want to reduce weight. However, you may still cook great and easy dinners.
Eating more fruits, veggies, and healthy grains can help you consume less calories. These are known as plant-based foods. They provide a lot of fiber and a few calories. Fiber promotes feelings of fullness. You can achieve your goals by eating a variety of plant-based foods.
Additionally, adhere to the following dietary guidelines:
Consume three servings of fruits and four servings of veggies each day. In between meals, munch on some fruits and vegetables.
Have whole grains, such as brown rice, barley, and whole-wheat bread and pasta. Reduce your intake of processed carbs like white bread and rice.
Make use of healthy fats like avocados, nuts, nut butter, olive oil, and vegetable oils. However, remember that even good fats contain a lot of calories.
Limit sugar-sweetened foods and beverages. Desserts, jellies, and sodas are among them. Fruit has natural sugar content is acceptable.
Select dairy products that are fat-free or low-fat.
Make fresh food a priority. Compared to processed foods, they are more nutritious. Processed goods are frequently packaged in cans or boxes. They also typically contain higher levels of fat, sugar, or salt.
Get active, stay active. You can achieve weight loss without exercise, but it’s harder to do. Regular physical activity helps burn off extra calories. Exercise has many other benefits. It can lift your mood, lower blood pressure, and help you sleep better. Exercise enables you to keep off the weight that you lose, too. Studies show that people who maintain their weight loss over the long term get regular physical activity.
How many calories you burn depends on how often, how long, and how hard you exercise. One of the best ways to weight loss fat is through steady aerobic exercise, such as brisk walking. Work up to at least 30 minutes of aerobic exercise most days of the week. Some people may need more exercise than this to lose weight and keep it off. Also, aim to do strength training exercises at least twice a week. You could lift weights, use exercise bands, or do pushups.
Change your mindset. It’s not enough to eat healthy foods and exercise for just a few weeks or months. To keep off extra weight, you should make these healthy changes a way of life. Lifestyle changes start with taking an honest look at your eating patterns and daily routine. Think about negative habits or other challenges that have kept you from weight loss in the past. Then, plan for how you’ll deal with them going forward. You’ll likely have some setbacks on your weight-loss journey. But don’t give up after a setback. Start fresh the next day. Remember that you’re planning to change your life. It won’t happen all at once. Stick to your healthy lifestyle. The results will be well worth it.
Strategies for Losing and Maintaining Weight
Preventing unintended weight gain from extra body fat must be the top priority of any successful weight-management program. The military is in a unique position to start talking about prevention as soon as a person enlists. The main objective should be to create an environment that encourages the maintenance of a healthy body weight and body composition throughout an individual’s military career, as the military population is chosen from a pool of people who meet specific requirements for body mass index (BMI) and percent body fat. There is strong evidence that most people struggle to lose excess body fat and that they have a high chance of gaining it again.
A reduction in total body mass through a mean loss of fluid, body fat (adipose tissue), or lean mass (specifically bone mineral deposits, muscle, tendon, and other connective tissue) is referred to as weight loss in the context of medicine, health, or physical fitness. Losing weight can be the result of deliberate attempts to better a real or perceived state of being overweight or obese, or it can happen accidentally due to malnutrition or an underlying illness. Cachexia, which is defined as “unexplained” weight loss that is not brought on by a decrease in caloric intake or an increase in exercise, may indicate a significant medical problem.
The loss of total body mass due to attempts to slim down or enhance one’s health and fitness is known as intentional weight loss. The primary treatment for obesity is weight loss, and there is strong evidence that this helps manage cardiometabolic health for people with diabetes with a 5–15% weight loss and prevents the progression of prediabetes to type 2 diabetes with a 7–10% weight loss.
For those who are overweight or obese, losing weight can lower health risks, improve fitness, and possibly postpone the onset of diabetes. It may help those with osteoarthritis of the knee move more freely and with less pain. Weight loss can lower hypertension (high blood pressure), although it is not clear if this lessens the harm caused by hypertension. [verification failed] By changing one’s lifestyle to consume fewer calories than one expends, one can achieve weight loss. Unwanted weight gain or loss may be caused by depression, stress, or boredom, depending on the individual, and people are encouraged to get medical assistance in these situations.
Dietary and lifestyle modifications must be long-lasting for weight loss to be sustained. There is proof that dieting alone leads to significant, long-term weight loss, but counseling or exercise alone does not, and the best outcomes are obtained when dieting and exercise are combined. Substantial weight loss can also be supported by meal replacements, orlistat, a very low-calorie diet, and primary care intensive medical procedures.
