- The Simplest Weight Loss Tips No One Follows

I have a Cheez-It problem. You’re not listening, I really have a Cheez-It problem! I have never met a Cheez-It I didn’t like.* Some people can’t resist chocolate or ice cream, some people it’s pizza or some other food or sweet. While I enjoy all of those foods on occasion, Cheez-It’s are the food equivalent of crack cocaine for me.

It takes all my willpower to pass up the isle where the Cheez-It’s reside on the shelves at my local grocery store. My ever-loving girl friend Kimberly rolls her eyes at me in shear disgust when she sees how weak I am to the power of these little crackers, which draw me in like a cheese flavored black hole. “But you have given advice on nutrition to millions of people Will, how could you of all people be so weak willed about some little cheese flavored cracker?!” she says. I hang my head in shame and avoid eye contact with her for the rest of the day….

The point of this introduction is to point out we all have our weaknesses and we are all human…even me. I find Cheez-It’s to be cheese flavored morphine!

This small problem got me to thinking. If there is one thing I have learned after all these years of doing nutritional research, writing countless articles on the topic of nutrition, and working directly with people on their diets, it’s this: it’s rarely one single thing a person does that is sabotaging their efforts to lose fat and or gain muscle, but a bunch of little things that have an accumulated effect.

There are some amazingly simple behaviors and strategies we can all add to our nutritional goals and workout plans that will have a positive effect. Using my own addiction to Cheez-It’s as the primary example, I am going to cover a few of these surprisingly simple yet effective strategies. A few issues to keep in mind:

1. Taken alone, these simple tactics will have very little effect. Used alone without any other dietary changes and an exercise plan, these strategies wont amount to much. However, as I mentioned, it’s often many minor mistakes adding up to a lack of results for people, and taken in that context, these are some simple mistakes that can be avoided, hopefully resulting in an accumulated effect in a positive direction.
2. I didn’t invent any of these tips. They are some of the oldest and simplest tips you will ever read. I don’t even know who first came up with them, and I bet most people have seen these strategies in other places, such as various diet books, articles, or web sites. I do however think that they may be so old and so simple that most people with the best of intentions about their nutrition and exercise plan, don’t follow these simple concepts.

These tips are more about behavior changes and psychology than nutritional science, study results, or research.

Tip #1: never ever go food shopping hungry

This is one of the most effective strategies I know of to avoid unwanted junk and various snacks from finding their way into your shopping cart, which ends up in your home, which ends up on your butt!

Make sure to eat something before you go food shopping and you will be able to resist the junk that often finds its way into your cart. If I go food shopping without a good meal in my stomach, I often come home with a family sized box of Cheez-It’s and feel like sh*& for days after eating the entire box!

Human hunger and appetite are regulated by a phenomenally complicated set of overlapping feedback networks, involving a long list of hormones, psychological factors, and others way beyond the scope of this article. Suffice to say, we often make snap decisions and impulse purchases with certain foods due to one or more of these feedback loops being activated due to an empty stomach while we shop.

Translated, your “willpower” to resist junk foods will be much greater if you eat something healthy at least 20-30 minutes before you go food shopping. You can either plan your meal schedule so that one meal is eaten before you go shopping, or have a snack (at least 20-30 minutes before shopping) which will have the desired effects.

A yogurt with some flax oil mixed in is a good choice, as is a half cup of cottage cheese and a handful of walnuts or some other nut. A protein shake or MRP will suffice, but solid food tends to be more satiating.

Tip # 2: never keep snack foods in the house

This tip is a logical extension of tip number one. If it does not make it into your cart at the food store, it’s not in your house. However, many people use excuses like “I have snack foods for the kids” or “my spouse keeps a box of Oreo cookies in the kitchen cupboard” as reasons they can’t avoid the snacks that sneak into their diets and sabotage their efforts.

Many of the foods we eat that we know we should not be eating are based on an impulse. Impulse control goes a long way here but no one will deny it’s far harder to resist that impulse if your favorite junk food is under your nose. That’s human nature. When I have an impulse for some Cheez-it’s, I wont resist it well if it’s only a few steps to the kitchen vs. having to get in the car to go get a box.

The former I can’t resist, the latter I can. Remember an impulse is defined as “a sudden desire, urge, inclination.” That means it’s short lived and will go away given sufficient time, so it’s a matter of not having foods in your house that allow you to act on the impulse while it lasts.

As for the excuse of the spouse, kids, etc. That is more an issue between your kids and or your spouse. Should the kids be eating that stuff anyway? No! I had a client tell me one day “I keep eating hot dogs ‘cause I keep them in the house for the kids.” I said “so you’re Ok with feeding your kids foods you know to be unhealthy for you and them?” She stopped feeding her family hot dogs shortly after….

…Bottom line here is, those foods should be occasional treats for both kids and adults, not staple foods that can be found in your kitchen. It’s more an issue of teaching the kids good dietary habits young so they don’t end up overweight unhealthy adults.

As for the spouse, I like to have some chips in the house, which I can resist without a problem. That is, unlike the Cheez-it’s, I can walk past the chips without having to eat them all. I can regulate myself with them. However, Kimberly can’t. Chips are to her what Cheez-it’s are to me, so I make it a rule not to keep chips in the house.

Point being, your spouse needs to support your efforts by making some small sacrifices. If you were an alcoholic trying to avoid alcohol, you would (or at least should!) expect your significant other to not keep booze in the house. If they wont support your efforts here, then relationship counseling is in order or a long talk, and I can’t help you there; sorry!

Tip # 3: eat off of smaller plates

The first two tips are common sense, this one is less so. However, I find it helps, albeit not to a great extent. Again, how much we eat is based on many variables. One of them is the visual cues we get looking at the food we are about to eat. We are extremely visually oriented creatures and part of deciding how large an object is must be compared to other objects, in this case, the food we put on the plate in comparison to the size of the plate we put the food on. Some of you may remember this little visual test from grade school.

Looking at these two horizontal lines below, which one is longer?

Answer: both lines are identical in length. As you can see, the bottom “plate” looks longer then top “plate”, yet they are the same length. It’s a visual illusion that shows how our brains are set up to interpret certain visual cues. It is my experience that people will put less food on their plate if they eat from smaller plates as a smaller plate full of food looks like much more to eat then a large plate with the same amount of food on it. I know for myself I tend to put 2 slices of pizza on a small plate and three on a large plate! Now this is only one minor cue we have to self regulating how much food we eat, and other feedback loops (i.e., hormonal, psychological, etc.) can kick in and easily offset this strategy.

For example, you could simply come back for a second helping using the smaller plates. However, it’s my hunch (and it’s only a hunch as research is lacking here) that over the course of say a month, a person may end up taking in fewer total calories using this strategy as has been my (admittedly anecdotal) experience with both myself and the many people I have given advice to over the years.

Again, as already mentioned, taken alone, this strategy will probably have no effects on your efforts to lose fat if there is not a specific diet and exercise plan involved in the overall equation. It is however one simple small change that may improve compliancy to your efforts. It would be interesting to see a study on this, but whatever effects it may have, would be subtle and fairly small I suspect. Even so, over the course of a year say, it may help.

Tip #4: Know Thy Self

Lesson here is, we are all human and we all have our weaknesses. Trick is to know your weakness and develop strategies for coping with them. How well do you know yourself? That is, do you know what cues/triggers tend to set you off? Have you examined that issue for yourself? It’s essential to recognized the cues that sabotage your efforts. We all have them. Find yours and take steps to avoid them where possible.

For example, try making a list outlining the things you know tend to set you off and how you react to the, then add a column for how you could deal with it. For example you might write “talking to my crazy mother makes me anxious and I eat things I shouldn’t immediately after the phone conversation” which would be followed by a suggestion of steps to change it, such as “always eat a meal right before talking to mom” and “only take calls from mom when I am ready and able to deal with her” and “go for a walk immediately after talking to mom to distress and give me time to get over impulse to eat junk” and so on.

Develop coping strategies to your known triggers. I know for example going food shopping on an empty stomach means I will most probably end up with a large box of Cheez-it’s in my house. I have also found if I go shopping irritated over something I will buy more foods I don’t need as food is one of many ways we self medicate looking for some comfort. Hence the term “comfort foods” which is commonly chocolate, ice cream, and so on.

Bottom line:

• Learn what your hot buttons are that lead to a negative behavior
• Learn to identify when it’s happening
• Develop strategies for coping with it.

How do you go about doing that? As entire books have been written on that topic, my advice will fall short here. That journey is also highly individual. For some it’s working with a therapist or behavioral specialist, for some it’s reading a few good self-help type books, and for some it’s activities such as meditation, joining support groups, and others. It’s also a life long journey.

Conclusion

The purpose of this article is not as much to supply tips for success in your fat loss endeavors but to actually remind people of what is stated in the intro to this article: most people fail in their fat loss/diet goals not due to a single mistake they are making (with exceptions) but many small events that have an accumulated effect that sabotages their efforts. If the tips in this article help, all the better.

Some people are amazed how many extra calories slip into their diet from snack foods that they are not accounting for, or the fact they tend to take the elevator when they could take the stairs, and so on. 99 out of 100 times the person that says “I have tried everything and nothing works” actually translates into “I have not stayed on any one plan long enough for it to have an effect and sabotaged it with small unaccounted for negative habits and behaviors.” Now, if I can just get the funding for that adult Cheez-it rehab center I want to have built….

* Cheez-It’s are a cheese flavored cracker made by Sunshine foods and can be found on the shelves of any major food store in the US.

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QUESTION:
I’ve been going to the gym for the past year now, but I have only lost 2 pounds. I eat about 1800 calories a day and I do 3 cardio and 3 weight training sessions a week. I am 5 feet 5 inches and 128 lbs. I would like to be at 120 lbs. To lose 8 more lbs isn’t a lot to ask, but I’m really frustrated. I’ve been VERY persistent, and I rarely cheat except once each weekend, but at this rate, it will take me another 4 years for me to reach my goal! Please help!

ANSWER:
Don’t worry, it won’t take another 4 years! In fact, you can reach your target wt. within the next month if you start getting feedback, charting results and making some strategic changes to your program.

First, it’s important that you understand how a year could go by with almost no progress.

Have you been doing the same nutrition, same calories, same cardio and same workout for the entire past year with no changes? If so, then you shouldn’t be suprised if you’ve continued to get the SAME results (very little).

If you do more of the same, you usually get more of the same.

Caloric intake, for example is not something you calculate once and then never pay attention to again. Calories have to be calculated and customized for each individual in the beginning and then adjusted continuously in “real time” during the course of a fat loss program, based on actual results.

Just because you start at 1800 doesn’t mean your caloric intake should stay there. Calories may need to be increased or decreased depending on whether your goals, your body weight and your activity levels change and based on your weekly progress (or lack of).

Which brings me to another point. I am a huge fan of using progress charts. There is a saying in business management and sports coaching:

“What gets measured gets done.”

When you start “keeping score” and tracking performance right down to the numbers, it’s almost miraculous how this awareness of how you’re doing translates into improved results.

When you track your body composition results every week, if a week or two goes by with no results, then you don’t continue with more of what got you no results, you change some variable in your program immediately!

An old Turkish proverb that says,

“No matter how far you’ve traveled down the wrong road, always turn back!”

Of course, you don’t have to throw out your entire program, you can simply “tweak” ONE or maybe two variables within the same program.

Also, when you measure, track and analyze muscle versus fat (body composition), instead of just scale weight, you might even discover you’ve gained some lean body mass and this offsets the drop on the scale (which means it’s possible you made more progress than you thought).

Now, back to the calories. To break a plateau, you can take a reduction in calories, or an increase in activity, either of which will create a deficit if you are currently in energy balance, or increase your existing caloric deficit.

1800 calories may not provide a large enough deficit for some women, and in fact, the majority of women your height, weight and activity level usually are losing fat safely and successfully on 1500-1600 calories per day. (for men about 2200-2500 calories, avg.)

At the end of the day, fat loss boils down to calories in versus calories out, so if you plateau, you may need a simple calorie reduction, provided you don’t restrict too low for too long (which tends to trigger your body’s “starvation response.”)

As for your cardio program, 3 days a week of cardio works for many people, but usually, I would consider three weekly cardio sesssions a maintenenance workout or at best a starting point for beginners,NOT a “maximum fat loss” program.

Example: this week, you could increase your cardio from 3 sessions to 4 sessions. If you combine the decrease in food intake with an increase in calories burned through activity, that will almost certainly get you burning fat again.

If it does, then stay with 4 days a week of cardio. If not, the next week go up to 5 days a week. Repeat this simple “feedback loop” process as many times and for as long as necessary.

Also remember that more (often) is not always better. You can also increase the intensity and get more calories burned in same amount of time. This feedback loop process can be used to make decisions about your training intensity, duration and type, as well as frequency.

Whichever strategy you choose to break the plateau, remember Albert Einstein’s definition of insanity:

“Insanity is to keep doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.”

Although this seems like common sense to some people, what happened to you is really quite common because it does appear that you’re doing everything you’re “supposed to be doing” with perfectly good intentions.

You have have all the key elements there: You’re exercising (weights and cardio). You’re watching your nutrition, and you’ve been disciplined and consistent in following it.

The trouble with many popular programs - even good ones - is that they are too dogmatic. Their entire program may revolve around “X” number of calories, “X” days per week of cardio and “X” days a week of weights….

And you’re not allowed to “tamper” with that “holy grail” formula.

I can understand the rationale for a simple diet and exercise prescription for a beginner in order to not confuse them with too many choices, but what if it doesnt work after a month, three months, six months, A WHOLE YEAR? What if there are no options, what then?

In NLP, there’s a principle, (borrowed from cybernetics), called The Law of Requisite Variety, which says,

“The person with the most choices and the most flexibility is the person with the most power and the greatest chance for success.”

You need to know what to do when you’re not getting results… you need options and choices for breaking plateaus, and that’s important because plateaus happen to everyone - including me.

Some people think that hitting a fat loss plateau means there’s something wrong with them. But plateaus are natural and normal. In fact, you could look at it this way:

Hitting a plateau means your body is healthy and your body is functioning normally, because normal function of the body is to adapt effectively to stress, to protect you and to maintain homeostasis.

Exercise is a stress. Dieting is a stress. It’s natural for your body to adapt to them. When you adapt, you must place a new “positive stress” on the body if you want continued improvement.

There is no reason to allow even a few weeks, let alone an entire year to go by without results. But you can’t expect to get different results if you continue doing more of what’s not working. sure, check it out at this site for more information

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Keep after it! Be persistent - but also be flexible!

this one is for the ladies, the very special people God created. it feels bad when you dont have the body you want. its not you to blame, but what if you can do something about it yet you dont, then you are totally to blame! 

so there is something you can do about that body of yours, yes……….. 

Do you pass by the magazine stands in the store and envy the bodies of the cover models? More and more women today are coveting this body type; strong and muscular while still being feminine.  Gone are the days where strong women are seen as too masculine and unattractive.  The female fitness body is here to stay.

Now, curves are back so long as they are created with muscle mass and have a softer appearance. Hot celebrities such as Jessica Biel and Jessica Alba are now gracing the covers showing off their new curves.  What’s more is that these women are garnering a great deal of male attraction - much more than their thinner counterparts such as Lindsay Lohan or Victoria Beckham.

Luckily, if you make some smart changes to your workout program you can get yourself on the road to looking like the next female fitness model, maybe even covermodel!

First things first. Pink Weights.

If you want to add sexy curves to your body, you need not be afraid of heavier weights. Don’t worry, you are not going to bulk up and begin bearing resemblance to Vin Diesel, as women simply do not have the testosterone in their bodies to be able to do this.  In fact, in a very good situation, assuming sound training and great nutrition, a woman would be lucky to put on about half a pound of muscle mass per month.  Not quite as scary as you thought right? And that is assuming everything is done right… many will experience a slower rate yet.

The problem with pink weights is that for most of you, they aren’t challenging! You’d be surprised at how strong you already are if you’d just push yourself that little extra bit.  So next time you’re in the gym, pick up a ten pound dumbbell or if you’re really ambitious, go for fifteen.  You’ll start noticing your body changing more in the next few weeks than in the last few years you’ve spent slaying away on the stairmaster.

Weights have the power to completely transform your body. They will make you a smaller, yet curvier version of your body now.

Don’t be alarmed at your scale weight though as upon weight training your body weight may go up. Relax however, because one pound of muscle takes up much less space on your body than one pound of bodyfat does, therefore you may weigh more, but you will look smaller.

Next comes cardio.

Women have this tendency to just gravitate towards the cardio section of the gym. Whether it is the best place to check out the men lifting or it feels safer to them, whatever the reason, they go there and stay there - for hours at a time.

This is something that has to change. Think about how many hours of your life you’ve spent on that treadmill, stairmaster or elliptical machine.  Do you really look that much different because of it? I’m guessing probably not.

Not only that, but how many of you put in your hour while watching TV or reading your favourite magazine? This is probably a good indicator that you aren’t quite working as hard as you could be.

The truth of the matter is that your body will quickly adapt to all that cardio training that you are doing. So while before you might have burned a hundred calories running a mile, now you are only burning 80. Unless you continually add more and more time to get the same calorie burn, it is going to stop being an effective fat loss tool. And when you’re already doing six hours a week, who really wants to spend MORE time doing cardio?

The secret is changing the format of your cardio from that of a comfortable steady-state session to one that’s composed of high intensity intervals that will really kick you out of your comfort zone - and blast away body fat as well.

This is by far a more productive form of cardio to be doing so rather than wasting another hour of your life not really getting anywhere, next time you’re in the gym for cardio, do twenty minutes, alternating thirty seconds going as hard as you possibly can with a minute and a half at a much easier pace to recover. It will be hard - I warn you. Stick with it for one month however and you will be extremely happy you did.

Now. Bring on the carbs.

Have you grown a love-hate relationship with carbohydrates? You love the way they taste but don’t like the number they’re doing to your waist.  Understandable - many women feel this way.

The key thing to remember with carbohydrates is that they are not necessarily ‘evil’, so long as the portion size you eat remains under control and you are timing them properly.  To have carbohydrates working most effectively for you, it is critical that you time them before and after your workouts. This is when your muscles are going to need the energy and will rapidly soak them up!

So if you’re craving a bagel, have at it, but enjoy it right after you’ve finished a hard lifting session, as described above.

Get rid of your fat phobia.

One critical thing that many women do not understand is that in order to lose fat, they must eat fat.  Women in particular actually tend to do better on a higher fat diet than males do. This has to do with their hormonal make-up and the way their body functions and responds to various macronutrient levels.

How many times have you reached for the cookies on the shelves, solely because they were ‘fat-free’ so you thought they’d be a safe dieting food? This was a terrible mistake.

When you remove the fat out of products, often times manufacturers will begin to add in extra sugar to make up for the taste.  Newsflash.  Extra sugar sends insulin levels skyrocketing and guess what insulin is? The fat storage hormone. So, what you need to do is try and minimize the amount of insulin surges you create throughout the day, while staying within your total calorie budget. Do this and you will have your best defence against warding off both hunger and fat gain.

Now, guess which macronutrient has the least effect on insulin levels? That’s right - dietary fat.

So do not be so scared of consuming fat in your diet. It will help you deal with hunger and help your food taste better.  Ideally you should be aiming to get no less than 25-30% of your calories coming from a combination of healthy fats (fish oil is particularly important).

Work Those Glutes

Finally, the one body part that most women usually will say they want to improve upon is their glutes.  That curvy, sexy backside appearance tops the list of many gymgoers and in order to achieve this you are going to have to be doing the right exercises.

Concentrate on adding heavy-weight lunges, one legged squats, hamstring curls and ass-to-the-ground squats into your program.  These are your fast track to a great behind. You can do all the cardio you want to try and get it, but unfortunately, all that might do is make you a smaller version of your exact same self. If you want to change the way you look, then you need to change the way you train.

So next time you pass by one of those covermodels and start dreaming about what it would be like to have that body - make it a reality for you.  Many women are capable of making great improvements to their bodies if they would just stop with the training methods they are currently using and get on ones that are much more in tune with their goals.

LUCK!!!!!! SUCCESS

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been away for a while,  but am now ok. hope you are doing great.

i was with a couple of friends and they were all in awe of my good shape. am qite shaped anyway. so they wanted to and still want to get lean mass on their bodies.

i thought that maybe out there you want to do the same, to look good. to be you, to be a guy.

checking on the net, this guy, coach, had something marvellous. the best muscle building resource ever!

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was held in a deep conversation with a friend of mine, dont bother yourself with the person’s gender! anyway it was a deep one, a long one, a good one. you know am in this science and art of bodybuilding, so, it was the topic. i hate talking about it because most of my friends dont like it. am just mad about it!

some how, the talk drifted to succees. you know, not everyone who sets out to have big muscles, to lose weight, lose fat, tighten up his or her flabby tummy, really achieves it. no! on and on we discussed, deeper into the ‘factors’ that define and spell success for some one and yet at the same time, failure to the other. we came across many of them, very many that i cant exhaust them.

however in our discussion, we discovered three types, or kinds of people; those are the ones i am going to tell you about:

the first category includes that person who wants to get something done, who wants to achieve something in life. however he never walks to talk, he doesnt try out anything, everything of his theoretical. he thus doesnt achieve because he spends his time wishing but not acting.

the second category includes the good person who actually talks the talk and walks it. he sets his goals, knows that he can achieve them and actually sets out to achieve them. however he falls on the way and doesnt get up! he therefore fails to make it to the end. i can credit him for daring to start, but discredit him for failing to stand up!

the third and most important category, is of those with a strong will. those who are ready to beat the odds, who can stand inspite of anything. the person in this group has his dreams which he wants to turn into reality. he therefore sets goals as to when he will achieve them. also, he sets out how he will achieve them. he draws the blue print and being time bound, he sets out to work. this guy works hard but mostly, he works smart, sticking to his blue print and only changing where necessary. he faces challenges but is not discouraged. all of those cold shoulders, he just presses on. ‘pressing on towards the goal to win the prize’ . he in the end realises his treasure. he catches up with it and is happy.

credit to him, he delights in his achievements and is one to be respected everywhere. you cant despise him, or dare!

so who are you?

well check up here!

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well i have brought a new thing to the world of blogging. yeah, still think what i ve brought? its something unique, something everything soul needs. yes, everyone, including the pontif! it does not matter whether you are boy or girl, man or woman, employed or unemployed, rich or poor. everyone craves for it.

you have got it, i hope so, its , well, health and whats more, to look like you really what to look.  tired of looking forty yet you are thirty, tired of that extra fat, that lugging tummy, want to put on that killer figure for the ladies? look no further, i ve got it all here!

i can hear the guys grunting, gnash not your teeth, please, because yours is also great, the greates, cause am a guy too.  do you want to put on mass, lean mass, cut the fat, or you are really thin that you want more muscle. worry not, brother, its all here! those who are crazy for building lean maximum myscle, and to do that naturally, i am here for you.