5 Tips On How You Can Safely Lose Weight

As this year closes, you may have realized that, as you look through the mirror, you’ve steadily gained one thing: weight. If you used to move around and engage in more physical activities, this year, as the whole world was forced to a halt, you’re home more than usual. Because of lockdown restrictions, many people have no other choice but to stay at home and unwittingly start a sedentary lifestyle.

Hence, right now, you could be faced with the dilemma of how to lose weight. Apart from looking good, losing weight also has a lot to do with feeling healthier. And with a great state of health also comes self-confidence. 

How to lose weight safely has become a popular subject among many people, since different fad diets and gimmicks seem to arise and dissolve every few months. There are some that even promise almost instant results overnight.

But you should also ask yourself: Are these methods really safe and effective? 

Fortunately, there are a few simple but tried-and-tested weight loss tips that are easy to follow, which can help not only with your health but also your physique. Moreover, since these techniques have been around for quite some time, you’re sure to gradually lose weight by the healthiest means possible.

If you follow these tips, you won’t just find remarkable differences in your weight, but you’re also able to ensure a safe journey towards good health. These pieces of advice can include the following:

Avoid Refined Carbohydrates

The first tip on losing weight safely is to always avoid refined carbohydrates, also referred to as processed carbs. Refined carbohydrates are digested too quickly, causing your body to use sugar as a form of energy. Moreover, these refined carbohydrates are processed extensively, to the point that they already lack essential nutrients.

These refined carbs come in two main types:

• Refined grains: These are grains that no longer have the fibrous and nutritious parts as they’ve been removed. A common example is white flour.
• Refined sugars: This kind of sugar is also highly processed, the common types including agave syrup and table sugar or sucrose.

Here are some other compelling reasons for you to avoid refined sugar, apart from the fact that it adversely hampers your goal to lose weight:

• It can lead to obesity. Refined carbohydrates are mostly made of unsatisfying calories. Because these don’t have the nutrients your body needs, it does nothing to your health but simply make you gain weight. This is counterproductive to your pursuit of losing weight safely.
• It contains much lower micronutrients and fiber. When you’re losing weight, you’ll want to beef yourself up with fiber. However, refined carbohydrates don’t contain any of them. In fact, refined carbohydrates contain only a small amount of micronutrients and fiber. With whole grains, the healthiest parts are the brans and the germs, but these are removed during the refining process, along with any nutrients they might have had.
• It increases the risk of heart diseases. Apart from looking good, living a healthier life should be the other reason why you want to lose weight. You may think that refined carbohydrates are keeping you full, but that’s only temporary. When you’re not careful with your intake, refined carbohydrates can make you hungry again right away, thereby increasing your dependence on them. When taken in exceedingly large quantities and in the long run, these can increase your risk of heart diseases.

Sugar intake should be kept to a minimum during any type of weight-loss program. This includes cutting out all refined sugars, even those naturally found in fruit, as they can have an effect on how your body burns fat. Instead, eat plenty of fresh fruits and vegetables to get your daily nutritional requirements. If you do need refined carbohydrates, get them from whole-grain breads, pastas, and brown rice.

Lose Weight Gradually

There’s no shortcut to losing weight. So, if there’s anything that promises you instant results overnight, be very careful about these claims. Especially when you have to shed a substantial number of pounds, you have to be willing to put in the work and take it slow. The best way to lose weight in the healthiest means possible is to do it gradually.

When you take it easy and gradually, there’s a higher likelihood for whatever weight you’ve lost to stay off. If you’re shedding too fast, the tendency is you could be losing water, muscle, and bone instead of fat. This means that you’re not really losing weight healthily.

Eat-In Smaller Portions

Eating in smaller portions also helps you achieve your weight-loss goals. When you eat smaller amounts of food over a longer period of time, your body doesn’t digest the food as quickly as when you eat a large number of refined carbohydrates. This allows you to burn off the excess sugar rather quickly, building up more muscle and reducing your fat cells.

You can easily find food that is high in protein that can also help with muscle development and weight loss. Protein shakes are a great way to satisfy hunger pangs without adding calories.

Small, frequent meals are better for your metabolism because it brings about the following benefits:

• It gives you more control over your blood sugar. You need to eat so your body has something to take in and turn into glucose. This turns out to be the body’s primary source of energy. However, this also has to be broken down into smaller portions since your glucose levels rise when your body eats in large quantities. The faster this breakdown happens, the more your brain signals your pancreas to produce insulin. Hence, your brain is now tricked into believing it needs more glucose, so you may end up eating more. This puts you in a dangerous cycle of high and low sugar levels. In turn, this results in weight gain rather than weight loss.
• It reduces the calories you’re taking in daily. With smaller portions, you’re actually feeding your body fewer calories. Remember that the main contributor to obesity is the total number of calories you take in daily. So if you want to lose weight, you must be mindful of this.
• It results in increased satiety. Spacing out your meals into more frequent but smaller portions can leave you feeling fuller for a longer time. This is what it means by feeling satiated. When you eat in smaller portions, your body is using the food you eat immediately for the energy you need within the day rather than keeping it stored as fat.

Engage In High-Intensity Interval Training (HIIT)

Many people think that interval training is boring or too repetitive, but the results are surprising. Once you get used to it, it’ll become an integral part of your healthy lifestyle. You can enjoy a high-intensity workout that stimulates your metabolism for hours on end, while still getting plenty of rest.

This makes high-intensity interval training (HIIT) another effective way for you to lose weight. It’s an exercise method that’s increasing in popularity, and for good reason. HIIT training burns hundreds of calories per hour! It’s also great because it helps you lose weight and build muscle at the same time, without you having to take in large amounts of calories.

HIIT increases your metabolism, which results in your body burning more calories than usual during your workout. In addition, while your workout is intense, you eat fewer calories than you normally would by maintaining a regular diet.

Tabata-style HIIT is also highly effective, although this method is not recommended for women who are planning to become pregnant. 

What’s noteworthy about this type of HIIT is that you should start slowly and ensure that you reach your goals by maintaining your current fitness level and calorie intake.

A HIIT session can result in significant weight loss in just a few weeks of following a recommended program, although you need to make sure that you’re able to maintain your current fitness level throughout it.

Along with safely losing weight, there are many benefits that a HIIT workout can give. It can help burn a lot of calories, build many muscle groups, let you have a healthier heart, and increases your metabolic rate even hours after your exercise. But more than the benefits, it’s important to get familiar with the different types of high-intensity interval training if you want to safely lose weight. These can include:

• Tabata training – This is a type of HIIT workout that only lasts for four minutes. The whole point of this training is that you should complete the repetition of a certain exercise for 20 seconds and rest for 10 seconds. Thereafter, you perform again the 20-seconds intensive exercise until you complete the eight rounds. Typically, by doing Tabata training, you’re able to push yourself as hard as you can within 20 seconds. 
• AMRAP (As many rounds as possible) – This type of HIIT workout allows you to achieve as many rounds as possible of a particular exercise within a specified period of time. Unlike Tabata training, this workout may last for 10 to 40 minutes, which can be an excellent way of tracking your fitness progress. 
• One crazy workout – This type of HIIT workout is intended to take the intensity to the next level using plyometric bodyweight exercises such as power jumps, push-up jacks, and many more. If you’re looking to lose fat and build body-strength quickly, this type of training can be a great option. 
• Take Five – This type of HIIT workout involves a 5, 10, or 15-minutes version of intense exercises such as push-ups and lateral lunges. Generally, the goal of this workout is to make sure you keep on pushing and see how many minutes you can achieve until you get the feeling of burning your fats fast. 

Fill Up Your Diet With Protein, Fat, And Vegetables

To keep fit and healthy, each of your meals should contain a balance of protein, fat, and vegetables. Note, however, that the fat being talked about here is healthy fat. 

• Protein improves your body’s ability to process appetite and body weight. It also leaves you feeling fuller for a longer period, thereby curbing your cravings. The best sources of healthy protein would include beans, beef, eggs, chicken, legume, and salmon.

• Low-carb, green, leafy vegetables are needed by the body to pack up on nutrients without increasing your calorie intake. Good examples of low-calorie vegetables include cucumber, broccoli, lettuce, cauliflower, and cabbage.

• Healthy fats can replace butter and coconut oil with olive or avocado oil. 

If you’re having a hard time choosing healthy food, you can simply consult your physician.

Of course, it’s not easy being on a diet. In addition, eating healthy food will take a lot of effort as you need to prepare them yourself.

However, this doesn’t mean that you have to spend hours in the kitchen preparing your meal, as there are also many supplements or takeaway counters that offer salads and other healthy meals other than the usual fast food.

Just remember that it’s important to lose weight quickly in order to have a healthy lifestyle. When you eat healthy foods your metabolism rate will increase. This means that you’ll burn calories even when you’re not working out. 

Conclusion

Losing weight is a challenging process but if you have the determination and commitment, then you can get your desired results. The tips above may seem simple, but they can help you shed those excess pounds. To sum it up, you must begin by changing your lifestyle and diet.

Changing your lifestyle means changing your eating habits and engaging in a healthy diet program.

This will help you achieve your weight-loss goals faster because you’ll avoid nutritional deficiencies and other diseases that could affect your health. 

A good exercise regimen, on the other hand, is another way to lose weight quickly. You may not have time to go to the gym, but exercising your body twice a week is still enough to achieve your weight-loss goals. The bottom line is that you need to work out to achieve optimum health. With these changes, you can work towards a better-looking and healthier you.

-Terry Asher

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5 Tips On How You Can Safely Lose Weight

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How to lose weight safely has become a popular subject among many people. Read for our 5 Tips On How You Can Safely Lose Weight!

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Terry Asher

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Gym Junkies

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