As per research, 75-80% of your weight loss depends on the right diet and only 20-25% of your weight loss is depended on your exercise. The statement, ‘’burn more calories than you eat to lose your weight’’, is proving to be a myth. The nutrition and weight loss industry is on a big marketing gimmick and marketing to us various odd products. The miracle meal substitute powders, magical herbal teas, astonishing weigh loss multi vitamin pills and what not! The list of products are endless. Here I want to give you all a wakeup call and let’s outsmart ourselves against such products.
One awesome tip to gauge which product is good or healthy and which is not, is that, good/healthy product won’t be marketed or looking the other way round is they don’t need marketing. Yes … In the food and nutrition industry especially, stay away from those products that are advertised, push selling is happening and are over beautifully packed. Nutritional products don’t need marketing. Here I am talking about the final consumable food like the chips, biscuits, cold drinks, ready to eat food packets, etc… We all know that chips, biscuits and cold drinks are doing no good to us except making us obese, lethargic and loading us with tons of sugar. And yes, sugar free option is also a bad idea.
So where to shift our diet !!! Am sure it will take time to shift the habit of packet snacking to healthy snacking, but here are few substitutes that you can follow:
- Juice it up: Rather than sipping those sugar syrups in the foam of cold drinks and ready juices, opt for fresh fruit juice. The packet juices that claim themselves fresh, rather than believing them, ask yourself that for how long a fresh fruit juice stays at your home. Hardly few hours ??!! I even remember my mom and grand mom telling me to drink it right the moment it is squeezed. Juicing salad veggies and fruits can add lots of vitamins, increase your immunity and definitely keep you more healthy.
So have ever seen any such advertisements that tell you to drink home squeezed fresh fruit juice !!! Am sure not …
- Have a fruit snack: We all have faced this situation, that its still sometime more for lunch or dinner and we are already hungry. And in this situation, we go to kitchen, open a packet and munch few handful of that snack. Inter change this packet to a fresh fruit. Indonesia never fails to treat us with those seasonal yummy fresh fruits full of fiber, vitamins and minerals. This fiber will not only add to your nutritional requirements but the fiber in the fruit will help you lose your weight along with various other benefits.
- Go green: Have a cup of green tea after your major meals. It is loaded with anti-oxidants and nutrients that have powerful effect on your body. Green tea helps increase your metabolism and thus creating a multiplying effect on your weight loss. Add lemon for increasing its benefit. Though green tea is a super drink, one should not consume over 5 cups per day due to the caffeine content present in it.
- Don’t skip your meals: Don’t ever punish yourself with a skipped meal in order to lose weight, especially your breakfast. When we sleep our body metabolism lowers down, so starting a day with healthy hot breakfast will boost our metabolism and will make our day energetic. Skipping meals not only will lower our body metabolism but will also make our body store more fat. If possible have all your meals cooked at home and fresh. Make sure, your dinner is 3-4 hours before your bed time.
- Exercise: As I always say, exercise and diet goes hand in hand. The kind of exercise you do, defines your diet. But make sure, you at least do 150 minutes of exercise in a week. Start your day with stretching and throughout the day keep your body moving.
Its high time that we go back to our kitchen rather than malls for our food. Its not difficult to stay healthy, just need our common sense and shift from our food habits. 😉
