3 Tips on How Not To Over Eat During the Holidays

A lot of you have been asking me:    "How on Earth can you maintain the progress you've made with the upcoming weekend?"     Some of you ask jokingly, others are absolutely terrified!   I've given this some thought and here are a few of the most common tips for you to employ while celebrating this year.   It's not fool proof, but it's a better plan than what you currently have; which is no plan.

#1. Choose Smaller Plates when fixing your food.     If you chose a large dinner plate, you're more likely to fill it up, trying to not see any of the plate.  However, with a small plate you can fill it up.  Obviously the amount of food you have will not be the same.    This is mostly mental perception, not actual hunger.  This will also help you manage your portion sizes.  Not too mention, some of you DO NOT want to look greedy by having stuff fall all off your plate with family and friends watching you, whispering: "I thought she was on some kind of diet plan?" LOL You know how family does.  They can be our biggest haters and enablers.     So, eat off of a small plate.

#2. Drink from Tall Lean Glassware.     Again, perception is the key.  I have so many clients tell me: "I drank this 'big giant thing' of water".  Then we find out, it's only a 12 ounces container.    When your drinking out of a short, wide glass - your perception is 'you aren't getting enough to drink' so you tend to drink more... much more.     If I gave you a short glass, and the person next to you had a tall glass, what would you say? "Why did you give me this little ole' glass?" LOL  Even though, they may hold the same amount of liquid.     So, drink out of a tall lean glass.

#3.

Do NOT Go Back for Seconds! 

 

Fill your "salad plate" with EVERYTHING you want to eat for the entire meal.  Fill that plate with whatever you want.  Get your drink, your dessert (separate plate; but one serving) all in 1 single trip.  If you can't carry, you have no business with it! LOL 

 

You're more likely to over-eat if you can't see everything that your eating.  It's the same thing that happens when you nibble on a box of cookies (or whatever).  How many times have you sat and reached blindly into a dark box, over and over again.  Then eventually you say to yourself: "Holy crap, I ate that whole box!?"  It's because you could not see what you were eating. 

So, no going back for seconds!

I hope some of these tips help you.  But remember, NOTHING WORKS if you don't work it! So, do your part.

Weight Loss Mental Mistakes to Avoid

Mindset is a major factor for successful weight loss. By reprogramming your mental thinking, you can stay motivated and focused on your weight loss goals.  Here are some mental pitfalls that should be addressed when you start your weight loss journey.

Negative Self-Talk

Being overweight can often trigger thoughts of self-loathing. However, disparaging yourself does not help you lose weight. On the contrary, it is actually easier to stay focused and motivated on your weight loss goals when you appreciate yourself. It may seem like a paradox, but when you appreciate your body, healthy eating and exercise habits become easier.

You can help create a new positive mindset by monitoring your self-talk. One way to do this is with a journal and focus on your feelings about your body. By being vigilant about what you're saying to yourself, you can start seeing how negative thoughts are untrue and unhelpful, and start substituting them with beliefs that support your goals. By believing you are capable and worthy of a healthy body, losing weight will be that much easier.

Neglecting Rewards

In addition to negative self talk, one of the other things that many people do to sabotage their weight loss efforts is neglect to reward themselves regularly. By receiving feedback and positive reinforcement, you help yourself stay excited and involved in meeting your weight loss goals.

Start by breaking larger goals into smaller chunks, and reward yourself every time you meet a milestone. Rewards do not need to be expensive, and can include things like time with friends, reading a good book, or spending time on a hobby that you enjoy.

Emotional Eating

One of the major stumbling blocks for losing weight is the problem of emotional eating. Many people use food as medication. By eating, they relieve or soothe their negative thoughts and unpleasant emotions. When you uncover your emotional eating triggers, you can recognize when you grab food in times of emotional upset. By being more aware of when and why you eat, you can stop yourself from emotional eating more often.

 A great way to do this is to have some substitute activities lined up whenever you feel tempted to reach for food. Exercise, for example, is a great way to shift your mood. If you can distract yourself with exercise, you will feel better and remove much of the need for emotional eating. If exercise isn't an option, another effective technique is to distract yourself for 5 minutes, and check your mood again. Set a timer if you need to. In many cases, you will have distracted yourself enough to release the immediate need to eat.

You can increase your chances for weight loss success by realizing that your weight loss journey is a mental and emotional one as much as a physical one. Losing weight requires harmony with the mental, emotional, and physical aspects of you. When you remove some of the common stumbling blocks, and focus on creating a positive mindset, your weight loss success will increase dramatically.

The 2 Reasons You are NOT Losing Weight

#1 You Aren't Working "Hard Enough"

Remember: It's Called A 'Work'out! You aren't pushing yourself. People who aren’t used to working out, don’t really know what it feels like to push themselves.  So, when they exercise they simply ‘go through the motions’.   Simply put - you have to exert yourself. For instance; walking or running on a treadmill; or going for a run – while talking on a cell phone or talking with your workout partner is an example of NOT exerting yourself. The rate of oxygen to carbon dioxide exchange should be high enough to the point of you only being able to do one or the other – not do both.

This is why when you see people ‘giving it their all’ they ‘gasp, yell, grunt, or make some kind of exclamation’.  It takes oxygen to talk.  It also takes oxygen to exercise.  To divide your oxygen consumption is to divide your efforts.

Another example would be to imagine yourself trying to carry on a conversation … while holding something heavy above your head, trying not to let it fall on you.  You can’t do it.  You can’t do it, because your muscles need oxygenated blood in order to be useful.   If you were holding a 50lbs to 100lbs brick above your head while someone was asking you 50 questions – sooner or later, you’d stop answering (and probably tell them to shut-up) because you answering is using precious oxygen; oxygen your muscles need to keep that brick in the air.   Most often, people think when they are “out of breath” they are pushing too hard and they ease up.  But that is actually how you break your ‘plateau’.   You have to hit your peak EVERYTIME you work out.  Otherwise, you’re merely wasting your time. The human body adapts to whatever demands you put on in. If the demand you put upon your body in the gym (strolling) is the same as you do during your day to day life (strolling) your body will not change!

#2 You simply refuse to  change your eating habits    Look- Do the Math! Many people believe that since they are working out, they can continue eating the way they always have.  This belief comes from tv, movies, magazines and etc  – catering to ‘what you want to hear’. Simply put.    We don’t get fat due to not working out.  We get fat because we eat more calories than we burn. Ponder that.  Say it out loud. Here it is again. We don’t get fat due to not working out.  We get fat because we eat more calories than we burn.

A calorie is made up of Carbs, Fats, & Protein.  Every calorie is different due to the percentage of each of these items.  You could eat a calorie that is 50% Carb, 25% Fat & 25% Protein.  Or, 10% Carb, 0% Fat, 90% Protein.  You get the idea. When you have bad eating habits and you get big, you’re eating more calories than you’re burning, and you’re putting on body fat.  This is because the majority of the calories you’re eating are high in Carbs and high in Fat. When you have good eating habits and you get big; you’re still eating more calories than your burning, but you’re putting on muscle.  This is because the majority of the calories you’re eating are high in Protein. When you have good eating habits and you’re staying the same size; you’re eating the same amount of calories that you’re burning, so you’re staying the same size.

Conclusion!

Eating ‘healthy’ is not the same as eating for weight loss.  The key is to eat healthy while eating for weight loss.

Your Caloric burn has to be higher than your caloric intake.  When people ‘go through the motions’ in the gym AND they refuse to change their eating habits … they are literally just wasting time, money, and effort because they will NEVER reach their goal of losing weight.

Drinking Water And Weight Loss - Does It Work?

Is there a link between drinking water and weight loss? 

Yes, and one that has been scientifically proven. 

Drinking water with or after food helps to bulk out our food, sending messages to the brain to say that we are full so we will eat less.

Water also helps in aiding the absorption of vitamins and minerals in our food. For example, fat needs water in order to be broken down and used by the body. Water also helps to flush out the waste material in our bodies and thus helps keep us in optimum health.

So how much should you be drinking and when. You should aim to drink at least half you weight in ounces (140lbs person = 70oz water a day) more on hot days, more if you drink dehydrating drinks such as coffee, tea, and/or alcohol.   

You should spread your consumption throughout the day. There is no need to drink bottled water as in most areas tap water is perfectly safe.  If you do prefer the bottled variety, steer clear of the flavored ones. These products contain sweeteners.

If you do not drink sufficient water, you will feel lethargic, tried and confused. Your body may misinterpret your feelings of thirst as hunger and thus you can over eat. In fact by the time you feel thirsty your body is already starting to dehydrate hence why should drink regularly. You may find that initially you have to go to the bathroom more often but your body will soon adapt to the increased volume.

Drinking water on its own won’t win your weight loss battle. You need to make changes in other areas as well including your diet and the level of exercise you undertake. You should aim to be doing at least twenty minutes of exercise per day.  Remember, exercise isn’t exercise if you are not pushing yourself.  If you aren’t maximizing your exercise – then you’re just participating in an activity and your body will not respond as if you’re working out. 

There is no point in drinking loads of water and taking exercise if you are still eating junk food every day. You need to retrain your palate and make your diet healthier. Do it gradually. Replace your favorite bad food with something healthy.  Swap your chicken nuggets for a salad.  Increase your fruit and vegetable consumption while decreasing the amount of cakes, candy and bad fats you eat. Not only will you lose weight but your skin will love you too.

The link between drinking water and weight loss will also help to give you glowing skin and you will soon become the envy of your friends when you show off your new slimmer figure at the next social occasion.

Free List Of Negative Calorie Foods

You will find a free list of “negative” calorie foods below, but first let's consider what this means. 

There is no such thing as a “negative” calorie - a calorie is a unit of heat and it cannot be negative. 

However, when people talk about “negative” calorie foods, they're referring to foods whose calorie level is low enough that it takes more energy to eat and digest it than the food contains.

For example, if you consider water to be a food, then cold water is certainly a negative calorie food. It contains no calories at all and the body has to expend energy to bring it up to blood temperature. So every time we drink a glass of cold water we burn up a couple of calories. But there are very few foods like this. 

Most foods that are on the list do not really use more calories than they add, or if they do the effect is negligible. Celery for example, does not give us enough calories to cover. So that is why people call it a negative calorie food.

 

Negative calorie foods are most attractive to anorexics. A negative calorie diet would obviously result in starvation in the long term and nutritional deficiencies can occur over time.  Once the body has lost excess fat, the calories burnt then come from muscle mass.  With this, the result is debility and wasting.

A more healthy way to use a negative calorie diet is as a form of fasting or detox.

It is something you can do for one to three days right after the Christmas season or another time when you have been eating an over-rich diet. Provided you are otherwise healthy it can be a great way to clean out the system. However it is still best to take medical advice before attempting this.

If you decide to use a negative calorie detox, keep the following points in mind:

1. It is never a good idea to eat huge quantities of one type of food, especially fruits. A lot of foods contain substances that can be damaging if consumed to excess. For example, the acid in grapefruit and pineapple can damage your stomach lining. Other foods put an excessive burden on the liver or may cause diarrhea. So try to use all the different foods in small quantities.

2. Do not spend all day just eating to be eating. You will become bloated and ‘heavy’.  You’d probably make yourself feel sick. If you are only doing this for a couple days, you should not feel too hungry. Plan four or five salad meals each day, and let your digestion rest at other times.

3. You will feel more satisfied if you eat slowly and chew your food thoroughly. You will also use more calories that way. So if the foods can be eaten raw, that will be more effective than cooking them. Foods like carrots and beets will also be more satisfying if you eat them grated.

4. Schedule time when you do not have any important commitments. As with fasting or any kind of detox, you may suffer some uncomfortable symptoms including headaches, tiredness, depression and irritability. If these become severe, stop the diet and see a doctor; otherwise, tough it out.

5. When you end the detox, plan a gradual return to normal eating.

If all the above points are checked and passed, let's move on to the list of foods.

    * Apples

    * Asparagus

    * Beets

    * Blueberries

    * Broccoli

    * Cantaloupes

    * Carrot

    * Cauliflower

    * Celery stalk

    * Celery root

    * Cranberries

    * Cucumbers

    * Eggplant

    * Endives

    * Garden cress

    * Garlic

    * Grapefruit

    * Green beans

    * Green cabbage

    * Lamb's lettuce

    * Lemons

    * Lettuce

    * Onions

    * Papayas

    * Pineapples

    * Prunes

    * Radishes

    * Raspberries

    * Spinach

    * Strawberries

    * Tangerines

    * Tomatoes

    * Turnips

    * Zucchini

Please use this free list of negative calorie foods wisely.