10 Tiny Changes for Big Weight Loss

Turbo Jam™ trainer Chalene Johnson recommends taking baby steps to eat more healthfully. If you “slip,” get immediately back on track. Never let a vacation or a special holiday be an excuse to overdo it the entire time. Go ahead, enjoy the occasional indulgence, but keep it reasonable. Here are 10 tiny changes you can make for big weight loss.

1. Wait 2 minutes. Cravings will disappear after two minutes if you walk away and turn your attention elsewhere.
2. W.I.W.M. When you really crave something unhealthy, answer this question: “What do I Want More,” that piece of chocolate cake, or a body I feel proud of? And on rare occasions, it’s okay to pick the chocolate cake!
3. No one’s perfect. Don’t allow one bad choice to result in bingeing the rest of the day, or falling back into old habits.
4. Focus. Make eating purposeful, not something mindless to do while watching TV, driving, or sitting in front of the computer. Whenever you put food in your mouth, try to engage all of the senses in the pleasure of nourishing your body.
5. Don’t skip breakfast. Start eating a filling breakfast, but one that’s lower in fat. It will help you eat fewer total calories throughout the day.
6. Veggies. The majority of your plate should have veggies and/or fruit on it at both lunch and dinner.
7. See what you eat. Eat your food off of a plate instead of straight out of a jar, bag, or box.
8. Don’t buy it. Stop buying the food you snack on all day. Just eliminate the temptation.
9. Eat more fruit. A person who gets enough fruit in their diet doesn’t have a raging sweet tooth.
10. Watch what you drink. Cut back on or cut out high-calorie drinks like soda, sweet tea, lemonade, and, especially, alcohol. People have lost weight by making just this one change.

1400 Calories a Day to Lose a Pound a Week

Weight loss season has officially begun. Have you tried to get parking at your local GYM lately?  Everyone has the same New Year’s Resolution it seems.  This year I decided I was going to jump on that bandwagon too. I might as well get rid of those extra pounds rather than get used to them!  I decided if I was going to have a resolution to lose weight I had to have a goal, a plan and a way to measure my progress.  Typically when watching my weight I stick to a formula that I learned ages ago.  Eat 300 calories for breakfast, 400 for lunch and 500 for dinner.  You can also have 3 snacks at 100 calories each.  This is a grand total of 1500 calories per day.  Well, I never realized that this is too many calories for a woman who weighs in at less than 140 pounds.  A 140 pound woman wanting to lose a pound a week should only consume 1400 calories per day!  So to measure and track my dieting progress, I decided to try my iPhone apps tools.  Yes! I found a great program called Lose It.  I’m able to set my weight loss goal and then track the calories of the food that I eat with the handy calorie counter.  This shows me at all times where I am on my daily calorie budget. Want to eat more than 1400 calories a day?  Exercise!  You can track calories burned with the exercise tracker, which includes everything from Snow Shoveling to Broomball, and add this into your budget too.  If you do a spin class for an hour and burn an additional 500 calories, you just bumped your calorie budget up to 1900 for the day.  I carry my phone on me at all times so there is no excuse for not entering those mints I ate at the doctor’s office or the handful of m&m’s I snagged from my kids.  If you don’t have an iPod touch or iPhone you can track yourself on your computer with a similar program called the Daily Plate on the livestrong.com website.  Don’t fall for all the latest fad diets.  What really matters is calories in and calories burned.  You need to count them and stick to your plan.  Good luck.  I know you can do it!