Lose Weight And Maintain It - 7 Tips To Healthy Weight Loss

1. Don't try to lose weight extremely fast. It always results in a weight gain "backlash". Trying to lose weight at a rapid pace sends a chemical message to your body that basically, it's being starved to death. If you use a fad-type diet (pills, herbs, etc...) you may experience some immediate weight loss. The problem arises when you stop using the medication/herbs/supplements. There's nothing wrong with helping yourself along the way, but don't rely solely on this for a long-term change in your weight. Maintaining a healthy weight is something that you want to do for the rest of your life by developing good habits.

2. Pick a diet plan/strategy that you can live with as a lifestyle. You know yourself better than anyone and how your body operates. It's important to find a diet plan that will work for you, which may not be what works for a lot of other people. For example, vegetarianism is a great way to lose weight, but it's not for everybody.

3. Set reasonable weight loss goals, based on how much weight you need to lose and your body type. Make sure your weight loss goals are not totally unreasonable for YOU. Trying to lose more than 10 pounds a month may lead to that "weight loss back-lash" I mentioned earlier. Remember, this is something you want to be able to maintain for the rest of your life. You are slowly reprogramming your brain to change how you think about and react to food.

4. Reward yourself when you reach your goals. I can't stress how important I believe this is. And I don't mean with food. Take yourself to a day spa for a massage and some other good things. Buy a new pair of shoes you've had your eye on for a while. Buy a beautiful new dress, even if it's just one size smaller than you were previously. I think we humans all react very well to incentives when we've done something good.

5. Avoid eating in restaurants as much as possible. Cook for yourself. If you must, keep it down to a minimum and order the best salad they have on the menu, one of those nice dinner salads that's like an entree, with maybe some grilled chicken or shrimp included. When you eat in restaurants, you have no idea of what ingredients are in a lot of the dishes. If you like grilled fish, like salmon or tuna steak, that's a big plus and it's good for you.

6. Decide on an exercise regimen that actually appeals to you. Walking is one of the absolute best exercises for weight loss. It doesn't build muscle mass, but definitely will take off the pounds. Start slowly if you need to. If you only have time or can manage just fifteen minutes every day, that's a start. You can build up to more time as you lose weight. If you want to add weight training later, you can. But the important thing is to make sure it's something you can enjoy, that doesn't feel like torture. If you like to swim, do that. If you like yoga, do that. But by all means, do some kind of exercise on a regular basis.

7. Learn to enjoy healthy foods and only keep healthy foods in your home. Oh, I can feel the cringing on this one. But it's not that hard. We are creatures of habit and you just have to change your habits. That's all. Yes, I am suggesting that you learn to enjoy raw vegetables, grilled meat instead of fried, stop eating dessert whatsoever and eat fruit instead. But guess what? When you only eat those types of foods, you will eventually learn to like those foods and the bad things you were eating before won't even appeal to you anymore. They won't even be tempting anymore. And if you must have dessert, make sure it's sugar-free.

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