Select any magazine or text on obesity and you will be able to access many reasons why people are overweight today. Many magazines will explain the scientific reason for the eating of five small meals rather than two large ones, so I will not discuss that at length in this article. I will focus on how an average to a very overweight person can lose the excess weight and never regain it. Losing weight begins with a decision NOW. Take a look at yourself and say “enough”. Tell yourself that you are tired of huffing and puffing around. Tell yourself that you don’t want to be embarrassed when you’re on the airplane and you’re walking down the aisle towards a seat and everyone is hoping that you would not occupy the middle seat next to him/her. Tell yourself that from this moment on you will enjoy getting on the scale to check your weight. Get sick and tired of making excuses for the way you look. Get tired of all of the bulges in your clothing. Become angry that you are ultra-sensitive about the word “fat”. That is a perfectly normal word. Become tired of being the butt of “fat jokes”. Say to yourself “today is the first day of the rest of my life”.
After you have made your decision that you will change from one state to the other then you are ready to pack up and leave. No one leaves to reside in another country without equipment. You have to clean house after sorting and packing. So, let’s see what we need to sort and pack. Firstly, you have to sort. Go through the house and remove any food or snack that is not in its natural form. For example let’s look at rice. Rice as it came from nature is called brown rice. It is not white. It should be eaten as brown rice. Remove all forms of white rice from the house. Do the same with pasta. Pack the cans of meat, fish, deserts, puddings, and any food with a lot of sugar or salt. Packets of chips and salted nuts, candy and chocolate must go. Cakes, pies and ice-cream need to reside somewhere else, not in your home. Please don’t forget the sodas and cool aid drinks. Now that you have no food in the house you need to go to the supermarket. These are the things to purchase: Begin with breakfast items. Oatmeal, nuts (all kinds), raisins, prunes, dates, all kinds of fruits especially lemons, grapefruits and oranges. Splurge on the different kinds of fruits. Do not purchase them all at one time because they have a limited refrigerator life. Every week eat one or two fruits that you did not eat the previous week, but keep the staples : grapefruits and oranges. Next go on to lunch items. Chicken, fish, lean meat, tofu (ask me about tasty recipes), other meat analogs made with soy, an assortment of vegetables: squash, cabbage, green leafy vegetables, bell peppers, every vegetable that is available. Desert items can be home made from the fruits and whole grain products that are purchased. Oils such as olive oil, sunflower oil, flax oil should be used generously. The list of fruits, nuts and grains is a long list. The guideline is natural.
Use the food in its most natural state. For example when cooking mashed potatoes, leave out butter and add olive oil instead. Use spices like oregano, sage, thyme, celery, cayenne pepper etc. Learn to marinate meats before cooking so that the food is tasty when cooked. (I can tell you how). So, now you have changed states and it is time to learn how to prepare the foods that you have selected. Get a good cook book or go online and type in fat free cooking or just the food that you want to cook and ask for a recipe. There are many. I said earlier that the experts say to eat smaller, more frequent meals so that the body is engaged in digesting which keeps the metabolism or burning mechanism working and thus promoting more weight loss. The breakfast is fairly large and the lunch is fairly large also, but the other meals are small consisting of maybe some celery sticks with peanut butter or cottage cheese or other soft cheese or some yogurt. It may be a slice of whole wheat toast with cheese or a piece of chicken. It could also be fruit with some garbanzos. The idea is protein and carbohydrate. The most important key to eating healthfully is to eat before six p.m in the evening. Try to plan the day so that the last meal which should not be too heavy is finished by that time. After that, water and will power will have to be applied.
Let’s look at a day in the life of a person who is going to live in another state. Rise early and drink 20 ounces of warm water with or without half of a squeezed lemon(depending on whether your stomach can tolerate lemons). Next, spend fifteen to thirty minutes reading a good motivational book and repeating affirmations: for example, I am sitting at my desk, it is one year from now and I am a hundred pounds lighter than I am at this moment. I feel great and I look great. I accept responsibility for my body. I will allow no weakness to pervade my mind. I can do ALL things. What I am, I am now becoming. I have begun with the end in mind. I am getting slimmer and healthier every day. Next is the exercise. Anyone who tries to sell you a diet plan that does not involve an exercise component is lying to you. The human body is designed for movement. Begin small. Walk around the bedroom. Walk to the living room. Walk to the kitchen. If you have a downstairs go down stairs for something. Move around for at least fifteen minutes. The best thing to do is to go outside in the fresh air, the earlier in the morning the better it will be. Walk for at least fifteen minutes. Breathe deeply of the fresh air. Gradually increase this to thirty minutes and then an hour and then you can count it in miles. Get some kind of weight training because you want to build muscle mass as you lose the fat . Get magazines and read up on that. Celebrate every victory.
The first day that you walk for fifteen minutes and you could not do that before, celebrate. Give yourself high fives and drink five ounces of water. Never celebrate with a food item other than water. (During the day try to drink at least sixty four ounces of water or more.)When the exercise routine is over then a good shower with warm water ending with cold water will invigorate the body. Breakfast will then be eaten.
Eat some form of oatmeal everyday. It will clean the arteries and is good for the body in general. Eat three or four servings of fruit. Eat some nuts, some lean protein (cheese, egg-white, meat analog etc). Between meals drink water. Remember to eat a huge salad with nuts, garbanzos, or red beans and olive oil and lemon juice and add salt to taste. Eat the salad first and then eat the carbohydrate with the three ounces of meat followed by a tiny desert (could be yogurt, smoothie, one oatmeal cookie etc.). Again the last meal should be before six p.m or at least four hours before bedtime. Ask me about a natural adaptogen product that will give you a feeling of satisfaction especially for the evening so that there will be no eating after six p.m. You should try to enjoy your food and your life. When the end of the day comes then spend some time repeating affirmations and re-examining your day. Anyone can lose weight if the desire is strong enough. You can do this. You can be as slender as you want to be. Now you can see why you will not regain any lost weight because you have a different life style. I am seeing you thin and healthy and I look forward to hearing about your new state.