Strategies for losing weight

The claims are everywhere – written in street walls, pasted on telephone posts, printed in newspapers, and advertised on TV and radio: Lose 10 pounds in 10 weeks. Burn away fat without exercise. Achieve the perfect body with these pills. But do any of these fads and gimmicks actually work?

Although many products offer a simple solution to losing weight, the truth is that there’s no easy way to successfully and permanently lose your excess pounds (see table). The best way to lose weight requires making changes in your diet, following exercise routines, and committing to them over the long term.

Although it may sometimes seem impossible to achieve, safe and lasting weight loss doesn’t have to be unattainable. Here are some strategies to get you on your way to a healthier weight.

Identify Your Triggers

In order to lose weight and keep it off, you have to change the behaviors that contributed to making you overweight in the first place. Lifestyle changes start with taking an honest look at your eating habits and daily routine.

Ask yourself if your eating is mood-related. Do you tend to eat when you’re bored, angry, stressed, anxious or depressed? Do social pressures play a role? Does your environment trigger overeating? What about rationalizations, such as, "Well, I deserve to eat whatever I want because I’m traveling." Once you identify what may cause you to overeat, you can begin to create solutions to these triggers.

Try these tips:

• Before eating anything, first ask yourself if you’re really physically hungry.

• Learn to say no gracefully to extra calories when you’re in social eating situations.

• Do something to distract yourself from your desire to eat – telephone a friend, read, complete a household chore, run an errand, or exercise.

• Direct negative emotional energy from stress or anger into a positive activity. This would be a good time to take a brisk walk or do some cleaning.

Keep Records

Keeping a food journal – writing down when, what, why, and how much you eat each day – can help you manage your weight. A detailed food journal can show you how much you’re really eating. It can help make you aware of any unhealthy patterns in your eating behaviors. A food journal can also be motivating. It can remind you of your goals. It can also help you make sure you include items from all the food groups each day.

To start your own food journal, take these steps:

• Decide how detailed your journal is to be. Make entries as simple or as complex as you want. As you go through your day, write them in a notebook or on a calendar.

• Record everything you eat. Be truthful. Omitting foods won’t help you. Don’t forget to count sauces, gravies, ketchup, salad dressings, and mayonnaise. Include the items you grab on the go, such as potato chips, a piece of candy, or a can of soda.

• Include the time, amounts, servings, and food groups.

• Be specific when recording serving sizes. Use measurements such as "1/2 cup of green beans."

• Keep a journal for at least two weeks to get a consistent, comprehensive record, or use a journal as a long-term tool.

• Learn the calorie and nutritional content of the foods you eat.

• Consider keeping a log of your physical activity level. Did you go for a walk, do gardening, play badminton, or go to the gym?

Energy Density

When trying to lose weight, one challenge many people face is finding ways to eat enough to feel full while consuming fewer calories. The answer lies in the concept of energy density.

All foods have a certain number of calories within a given amount (volume). Some, such as desserts and snacks, are high in energy density – meaning that a small volume of that food provides a large number of calories.

Foods with lower energy density are generally higher in water or fiber and low in fat. Thus, they provide a larger portion size with fewer calories. For example, a regular candy bar contains about 270 calories, while a cup of raw vegetables has about 25 calories. The best choices for low-density foods are fresh fruits and vegetables, and to some extent, whole grains. By selecting foods low in energy density, you can eat larger portions of foods – helping to control hunger – yet take in fewer calories.

Get Active

The research is clear – in order to achieve and maintain a healthy weight, you need to participate in at least 30 minutes of physical activity on most days of the week. However, that activity doesn’t have to be a high-intensity exercise. On average, a walk at moderate intensity burns around 250 to 340 calories in one hour.

Start a walking program with slow, short walks and gradually increase your time. To motivate yourself to keep at it, try to make your walk more interesting and enjoyable. Find a pleasant place to walk. Vary your path occasionally. Find a walking partner or use music to energize your walk. Besides walking, there are many other enjoyable ways to stay physically active. Swimming, biking, dancing, and playing golf are just a few options.

Set Reasonable Goals

Goal setting isn’t as simple as it may sound. If you don’t identify goals, your weight may continue to flounder. If you set your goals too high, you’re setting yourself up for a disappointment. The key to successful weight control is to set goals that are SMART – Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Trackable.

• Specific. State exactly what you want to achieve, how you’re going to do it and the time frame in which you want to achieve it. It’s helpful to plan a series of small goals that build on each other instead of one big, all-encompassing goal. A small goal might be "I’ll start having at least one serving of fruit each day," or "I’ll walk each day at 7 a.m. for 15 minutes."

• Measurable. Be sure you can tell whether you’ve achieved a goal. For example, if your goal is to walk for 30 minutes a day, wear a watch so that you’ll know when you’ve walked that long.

• Attainable. Ask yourself whether a goal is reasonable. Are you allowing yourself sufficient time and resources? Start slowly and work your way to larger goals. Remember, success builds success. Better to succeed at one small change this week and increase your goal next week than try for too much, fail and quit.

• Realistic. Set goals that are within your capabilities, and take into account your limitations. Is it realistic to plan to exercise two hours every day when you’ve never exercised that much, even while in high school?

• Trackable. Look for ways to record your progress, such as a food journal or exercise log. Tracking your efforts helps keep you motivated.

Focus on making performance goals rather than outcome goals. Performance goals – such as increasing your vegetable intake or walking a specific number of kilometers each week – help you achieve a healthy weight. That way, success is measured by your mastery of each activity. Outcome goals – such as losing a specific amount of weight each week – can lead to frustration and disappointment.

Right Rewards

Rather than splurging on dessert to reward yourself for meeting your weight-management goals, consider non-food rewards. One possibility is entertainment – taking in a concert, movie or sports event. Other possible rewards can even help you meet further weight-loss goals, such as equipment to help you exercise (treadmill or weights) or to make it more enjoyable (portable music player).

And of course, how about a new wardrobe once you start shedding those pounds?!