Eight Tips to Lose Weight, Improve Health, and Be All You Can Be

Jan. 20, 2011 - PRLog -- When is less more and more less?  Losing weight means we weigh less, but sometimes in order to lose weight we have to do both less of one thing and more or another.  No matter what we only lose weight if we eat less calories or burn more calories than we consume. Once you decide you can and want to do with less, you need some specific strategies to make that happen.  Here are eight for for weight loss, health and general well-being.

1. When half filled is more than full

   * Eat half the sandwich and save the rest for later.  Try a half glass of water, juice, or any other beverage.  Eat half the food on your plate. If half the people show up to a meeting or conference, the half who showed will be able to dig deeper into the issues and get more out of the session.

2. Spread it out to get more energy with less calories

   * Instead of eating the soup, sandwich, salad and fruit all at once for lunch, try eating the soup and half a sandwich around 11am, the other half sandwich and salad at 1pm and the piece of fruit around 3pm.  Your energy will remain higher, and caloric content lower as you will not need the additional snacks you crave when you eat lunch all at once.
   * Take longer to eat less.  Practice this routine for eating a meal: 1) after every bite set down your fork, take a breath,  and say something to someone or read a few sentences from a book or magazine, 2) pick up the fork, sandwich or finger food and repeat the same process, 3) at the end leave a little food on your plate and do not “clean your plate.”  You will probably take 15 to 20 minutes longer to eat, you will start to feel full before you are finished, and you really won’t mind at all leaving those few crumbs or more on the plate.  To get started, try doing this action for five minutes an expand it as time goes on.

3. Eliminate one thing

   * Ok- go for the fast food restaurant, but skip the French fries! Get a burger or chicken sandwich, toss the bun and eat the main item with a knife and fork; switch to diet pop; eliminate sugar from your coffee or tea.

4. Increase one thing to increase a second thing and decrease another thing

   * Adding olive oil, a good fat, into your diet will increase caloric intake and metabolism.  As metabolism increases, more calories are burned and weight is decreased.  Eating a handful of unsalted nuts once or twice a day results in the same sequence.

5. Say less of NO to get more of YES

   * Telling ourselves "DO NOT EAT THIS" OR "DO NOT DO THAT" often results in an increase in the impulsive urge rather than a decrease.  Instead it is better to find positive activities that replace the forbidden ones and say "YES, DO THAT!"  For example, substitute low fat, unsalted crackers, celery or mini-carrots for potato chips, pretzels and other high carb, high fat, high calorie foods.

6. Give in and toss it

   * Craving a bag of potato chips or candy bar from the vending machine? Go ahead and buy it, but before opening it up, read the ingredients label and check the calories.  Open the bag, eat 1-3 chips, a bite or two of candy, then crunch up the rest with a hard squeeze of the hand and throw the ball of now ruined packaging and junk food in the trash.

7. Out of Site Out of Mind

   * Don’t buy it.  Don’t keep it in the house, office or car.  If it's not there and easily available, there is no chance of giving in and eating or doing more of it, whatever it is.  Watching too much TV. Don’t buy the super sized flat screen and cut back to basic cable.

8. Be Less and Do Less to Be More and Get More Done

   * We are continually told to “Be all we can be,” but sometimes that mindset leads to the “overdo-er” syndrome where we keep taking on more and more until the “To Do’s” become overwhelming.  Better to focus on being “one thing at a time” and another at another time rather than being all things at once.  Do each thing well and become a master of it and soon you will be more than you ever thought you could be.

For more optimism for health and well being check out the "optimism blog:" http://www.drrussbuss.com

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