What are your best weight loss tips
 

Hi everyone, What are everyone's best weight loss tips. I mean the tips that have actually led you to see progress in yourself.

No eating before bed.
I know some think it's a bit of a myth, but I've eaten before bed and my weight loss was sluggish at best...for a couple of weeks i stopped eatting before bed and the weight fell off. at least .5 to.2 a pound every morning.
the problem with me is that working the night shift, I come home starving and willing to eat anything bad or good and then a hour later it's time for bed. It sucks going to bed full. The sleep sucks, the food turns right into fat and i wake up never wanting breakfast.
So by skipping the after work meal, I wake up hungry and ready for breakfast (which should be the biggest meal of the day anyway.) and I just make sure I get a bit of a snack in on my last break so that I'm not as starving when i get home.

What I call power snacks help alot. High power snacks that kill hunger and give my body what it wants without stuffing myself. Such as nuts, avacado, and beans. if I do eat before bed, I try to aim under 200 calories.

This by far has been what's giving me the best results as far as weight loss goes.

My best tip is to stop eating sugar. I cut it out and my body has really changed. I haven't lost all my weight but the bloating, miserable moody days and sugar fixes are gone. Honestly, eating a cupcake isn't worth it anymore.

This is a great post for perfectly demonstrating that calories in/out and getting a good nights sleep are what matters but we assign all kinds of voodoo magic to what has happened in our bodies and myths are perpetuated.***

This is also a perfect post for demonstrating that you need to experiment a little to find out what is going to work best for you based around your lifestyle. Congrats on finding a diet you can successfully maintain and live with!

*** I hope this doesn't come across as me trying to pick on you or being argumentative. I can totally relate. I used to work a crazy schedule and would get home around 10:00PM or later and then consume a giant high calorie meal so I can totally relate to what you're saying.

My best tip - educate yourself on the fundamentals of how fat loss and gain happens. Unfortunately it is so simple that it will never be a best selling book. Fundamentals are at least 95% of the battle.

NOTE: I didn't say it was easy.

Teeny, tiny spoons (and plates, and bowls, and cups and forks...)


It's a little silly, but I'm finding that I eat a lot less when I use miniature implements and dishes.


My obsession with miniature dishes and utensils started with using salad plates as dinner plates, after I read that antique dinner plates were the size of modern salad plates (the article was actually in a collectibles magazine, noting that in some china patterns, people were seeking out the serving platters to use as dinner plates).

I started with using salad plates and saucers for my meals.

Then on a whim, I bought a set of plastic infant spoons. They were just so cute and had very tiny bowls, and I thought that using a very tiny spoon, might help me eat slower and eat less.

At first I used them only for creamy desserts like puddings and my "imitation cheesecake" (sugar free pudding mix stirred into plain greek yogurt. 1 small package to 2 cups of yogurt).

Then I started looking for even more ways to miniaturize my meals, including smaller dishes and cups.

It's worked so well, that I've begun collecting miniature dishes and utensils.

Several weeks ago, I saw a very pretty, small teaspoon set in a thrift store, and I'm kicking myself for not buying the set. They were gone when I went back.

This may a tip that helps you keeps calories in control. But claiming as fact that food turns into fat if you eat it right before bedtime, and breakfast needs to be the biggest meal of the day are both weight loss myths :) :)

Our bodies do not move in 24-hour cycles like we do. What you eat one day does not show up on the scale the next. If you consume a large meal right before bed and weigh in the next morning then YES will have a larger number on the scale. There's more food (weight) in your system.

That doesn't mean you aren't losing fat overall.

Some people like eating huge bfasts and small dinners. It helps them keep their calories in check.

I like to skip bfast, work out on an empty stomach, eat a large lunch, and medium-sized dinner.

to each his/her own :)

Track every single thing I eat. No matter the amount. No matter what it is.

If you bite it, you must write it. If you snack it, you must track it. If you nibble, you must scribble. ... I could go on. I won't. <3

I agree with Sakai -not eating before bed is amazing for sleep and feeling rejuvenated.

Also, I'd add meditating after each meal. Here, I'm not talking about a full-on meditation session.... really, just finding a quiet corner somewhere in the house or outside for 5 - 10 minutes. I reassure myself, on a rational level, that I HAVE ate enough. I do not need seconds or any more bites. I also reassure myself that there will be more food later, at my next meal. Meditation is sort of like a calorie-free dessert.

This helps if you are like me and you want to never end a meal because eating is such a pleasant feeling!

Weigh or measure everything. I found out that I was a terrible estimator.

Larry,

this isn't really my best weight loss tip, but it did help...

i work for a chemical company and one of our product ranges is superabsorbants - the sort of thing they use in diapers and sanitary towels etc.

Anyway this stuff comes in crystal form and when you chuck water on to it it absorbs and becomes a fat-like mass.

From there you just add a bit of yellow food colouring and 'voila!' the perfect substance to measure out into a bucket to correspond to your weight loss. It looks like a mass of fat! A visual reminder of what is not in your body any more! (no-ones trying to eat their dinner and read this are they?!)

Anyway it was pretty good to add the appropriate amount of this stuff to my bucket each week. Quite a few of us in the office were all trying to lose weight together, and we all had our buckets in the corner of our rooms, and it used to be quite the thing to wander round peoples offices and admire the contents of their bucket!!

Not sure what 'normal people' could use. Maybe just buy a bag of sugar to stick in the corner for every 2lb lost or something, although not quite the same visual impact as my lard-bucket!!!

Never give up, no matter how crappy (or even good) the day is. Stay on plan even if your dog dies, if your BF cheats on you, you get a bad grade, you break a nail or get a zit. PMS/TOM, "it was calling my name", I didn't have time, I didn't make time, I was running late, I am late.

Stopping the multitude of excuses and making it happen is the ONLY way I have successfully lost weight and kept it off. :)

Make your plan reasonable, and be consistent with it.

This means, for example, if you are not normally an early riser, don't plan workouts at 4 a.m. If you don't enjoy cooking, don't start a plan that requires you to follow elaborate recipes. If you have special occasions, figure out how to fit them into your plan--don't just toss your plan completely out the window because it's your birthday, your cousin's wedding, the weekend, a football game, etc.

And don't expect that you'll be all done by next week. ;)

Jay

I agree with this completely.

My best tip is is boring: Strive for moderation. It is simple, but it has taken me YEARS for that message to finally sink in. Because it finally has sunk it, this time my weight loss journey has been so much easier. The dread factor and inner tantrums are gone (you know the ones: "Why does that thin person over there get to eat whatever she wants while still being thin but I can't!! :cry: Boo hoo for me!). If I screw up on my plan, it's just a blip, not a reason to throw in the towel altogether.

So true, Jay!! I always think of that quote from Clint Eastwood in one of the Dirty Harry movies: "A man's gotta know his limitations"---and we all do. Trying to be something we're not---whether on a diet plan or just in life---is rarely successful. It's important to find a good balance between establishing good habits without forcing ourselves to do things that we know we'll never stick to.