There are habits that you have to ditch to achieve your weight loss goal. Weight gain is as simple as calories in and calories out. You should eat what your body needs and not what you want to eat. Eating right plus regular exercise will help you achieve a long term and true results. Habits are something that are very hard to change, but you can try to make a change slowly. It can start by eating baked sweet potatoes instead of French fires, which is healthier, more nutritious, and good for your eyes. You should serve Greek yogurt with frozen blueberries instead of brownies with ice cream after your dinner. It has lower calories and is a better option for you. You should also know, that to achieve optimal weight loss, it is best to drop some of these habits to see a more effective result. But as we all know, not everyone will be able to fully cut off all these habits which is completely fine. I suggest that you do allow yourself to satisfy your cravings on a ‘cheat day’ or at the least consume them in moderation. After all, a good and healthy lifestyle is all about balance.
[divider title=”1. Night time snacking” style=”style6″ align=”left”/]
Snacking is good to keep you feeling full throughout the day, and make you eat lesser during your meals. However, snacking at night will cause you to gain weight because your metabolism and digestive system will slow down a lot at night time. Everything you eat will stay in your body and not properly digest. Hence, it is bad for your overall health. Nevertheless, if you really cannot change your snacking habit at night, try to eat something with low calories and nutritious for example mushroom chips, kale chips, do-it-yourself frozen strawberries or hot chocolate with maple syrup. This will not only promote a good sleep, but also help you to achieve your weight loss goal.
[divider title=”2. Overeating” style=”style6″ align=”left”/]
Overeating can be bad for your health and will not make you lose weight. Overeating will expand your stomach size which will lead to you eating more. Healthy eating habits should fill your stomach with 30% of water or liquid, 60% of foods, and 10% of air. It is all about controlling this. You should eat to replenish your energy and not to satisfy your emotions.
[divider title=”3. Starving yourself” style=”style6″ align=”left”/]
Starving or depriving yourself from foods makes you carve them even more, and you will eventually eat them more than you should. Regular eating is key to weight loss. You should eat more frequent and fill your body with small meals every 3 to 4 hours. Make yourself some smoothies, fruit juice, yogurt, or do-it-yourself frozen ice cream. If you crave for something like chocolate rolls, cookies or donuts, you can have a bit of them, and not too many. It is healthier this way. Not only that, starving makes your body store more fats and slow down metabolism rate. Hence, it is important to eat regularly. A healthy lifestyle is all about having a good balance in indulging yourself and consuming the right food for your body.
[divider title=”4. Sugar lovers” style=”style6″ align=”left”/]
Refined sugar is your enemy when it comes to weight management. High sugar diet leads to insulin resistance and eventually Type II diabetes in an extreme case. It causes you to feel a ‘fake’ hunger, and makes you want to eat more. Fruit juice from the supermarket for example contains very high sugar and low in dietary fiber, which is not good for your weight loss plan. It is better to eat the real fruits that are full of vitamins, minerals, and fiber. Not only that, high sugar diet also causes leptin resistance. It disturbs your fat storage process and hunger. This is because if your leptin does not work properly, there is nothing to stop you from eating. This causes you to crave for more foods that you do not need. It provides the wrong signal to your brain and thinks that you need more foods. So, you should stick with low sugar diet and replace it some other healthy alternatives.
[divider title=”5. High fat diets” style=”style6″ align=”left”/]
A high fat and cholesterol heavy diet causes you to gain weight. It also increases the amount of fat cells in your body. Not only that, eating high fat diets such as deep fired foods can lead to cardiovascular disease, heart attack, and obesity. It is important to keep the amount of fat cells low. This is because once you add up those fat cells into your body, you will never be able to get rid of them. When you lose weight, your fat cells will shrink, but the amount of fat cells remain the same.
[divider title=”6. Lack of sleep” style=”style6″ align=”left”/]
Getting enough sleep is key to weight management. It allows your body to fully rest and replenish energy. It helps to stabilize your hormone level such as leptin and insulin. It improves your digestive system and metabolism rate. A lack of sleep will stimulate hunger, as well. It makes you feel sleepy during working hours. Some people kill their sleepiness by drinking coffee, which has high amount of caffeine. This habit will make you hungry as well because caffeine adds acidity to your stomach, which stimulates the hunger.
[divider title=”7. Stress” style=”style6″ align=”left”/]
Stress causes your cortisol level to increase. It makes you craving for junk foods and sugary foods like French fires, cookies, chocolate chips, or cakes. It is important to control your stress. You should try chamomile tea to calm your nerves and relax yourself. Go out for a walk and surround yourself in nature. Have a dip in the pool or walk the dog. Do something that helps you to relax after a long and stressful day.
[divider title=”8. Having a too big portion” style=”style6″ align=”left”/]
It is important to know how much food you should be consuming. You should reduce your portion size, if you have experienced weight gains. You should just stick with the right portion size and do not eat more than you need. You can split your meals and eat every 4 hours instead of stuffing every at once. Snacking between meals helps to reduce your hunger, as well.
[divider title=”9. Low in fiber” style=”style6″ align=”left”/]
Low dietary fiber is bad for your digestive system and slows down your metabolism. It also makes you eat more solid foods. High dietary fiber helps to curb your appetite, improves your digestive system, and keeps you full for a longer time.
[divider title=”10. Drink too little water” style=”style6″ align=”left”/]
Our body consists of 70% of water. Drinking too little water will mislead your brain in thinking that thirst is hunger. This makes you eat more foods even if you were just thirsty. So, keep yourself hydrated and drink more water throughout the day. You should drink at least 8 glasses of water daily. This will help you a lot more than you think. Drinking plenty of water is key to weight loss. It also keeps you healthy, flush out toxin in your body, good for your bowel movement, improve digestive system, and important to your overall health.
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