6 Simple & Sustainable Ways To Lose That Stubborn Body Fat

What is that 1 thing that we are all happy losing?

You guessed it right… Unnecessary body fat!

Those nasty, jiggly little pockets of weight that slowly gnaw into your self confidence.

Did you know: In 2016, 25% of world population were overweight. Out of them, 35% were obese!

That´s a big number and we should be worried.

What is Obesity & Why Should It Matter To You?

Obesity in the most basic sense of the word means having too much body fat.

It is measured in BMI or Body Mass Index.

BMI is the ratio of one´s body weight to their height (kg/m2) i.e. how much do you weigh per m2 of your height. Ranges are as mentioned below.

• Healthy range: 18.5 to 24.9
• Overweight: 25 to 29.9
• Obese: Above 30

Checking Your BMI: There are reasonably priced weighing scales that show you a fairly accurate BMI.

Weight Management Basics

Before we dive into obesity, let´s take a look at some basics of weight management.

Calories, Calorific Deficit & Calorific Surplus

The amount of energy in our food or drinks is measured in calories. Our bodies burn calories even when you are in a state of rest. It burns these calories to keep you alive. This amount is called the BMR i.e. Basal Metabolic Rate.

Weight loss boils down to simple mathematics.

To lose weight, you should burn more calories than you consume. This is called Calorific Deficit.

The opposite of this is Calorific Surplus where you consume more calories than you burn. This leads to weight gain.

The major ways to burn/spend/lose calories are:

• Diet Control
• Exercising

Without keeping a check on the above, we will almost always be in calorific surplus. A sustained surplus over a long period of time leads to overweight and obesity.

Why Lose Weight In The First Place?

Effects Of Overweight/Obesity: Being overweight or obese has been shown to have harmful effects.

Physical Effects:

• High Blood Pressure
• High Cholesterol
• Risk of Type-2 Diabetes
• Risk of Heart Diseases
• Bigger tummy causes lower back pain in people with a weak back

… and many others

Mental Effects:

• Depression
• Anxiety
• Lower self-esteem
• Other mental disorders

… low quality of life in general

More than just an aesthetic appeal, losing unwanted weight clearly has its undeniable health benefits.

The Weight-Loss Vicious Cycle

Does the below vicious weight loss cycle seem familiar?

• We secretly want to have a body of a chiselled God/Goddess (well who doesn´t ?)
• We register ourselves in the gym
• We mindlessly pump tons of weight. But after losing a few pounds, we plateau. We wonder why?
• We search for answers on Medium
• Inhouse writing experts say that weight loss is 90% food & 10% exercise
• We Google/Medium diet plans and choose the most rewarding one
• We stick with it for a while
• We cringe each time we take a bite of that tasteless food that someone has prescribed because it worked for them
• We miserably fail when our taste buds get the better of us
• We binge on our cravings
• We gain the weight back — over and above what we lost in the first place

How To Lose Weight Sustainably

I´ve been through this roller-coaster ride. And it has been a bitch to lose the weight I gained from overeating.

Below points worked for me. Hope they help you too.

Prepare Your Own Meal

I loved ordering food.

Technology had made life so easy and me so lazy that all I had to do was click a few buttons on my mobile and within 45m someone would knock on my door.

The aroma of the delicacy would drive me nuts. Then I´d binge.

I did not realize this grave mistake unless it was too late. The result of the mistake was visible on my waistline and my key health parameters.

Issue: I had no clue what macronutrients I was consuming, how healthy were the ingredients, what kinds of oils were being added, what kinds of fatty substances were being used, what quality were those.

If you too find yourself in this situation, what do you do?

You prepare your healthy and clean diet. No worries about who puts what inside your food.

You choose what goes in and what doesn´t.

Switch carbs with protein laden foods. Cutdown on unnecessary fats.

Check out the zillions of healthy cookery videos on YT. Add your own creative zing to it. Experiment till you find the best tasting food.

Eating your own hand cooked meal gives you a satisfaction that a restaurant meal simply cannot. Moreover no regrets after a sumptuous helping of your handmade healthy delicacy.

This is not only easy on your waistline but also on your wallet! Your finances will also thank you later.

Drink Lots Of Water

Many a time, thirst can be mistaken for hunger. When you are craving to binge on something, try drinking a glass or two of water instead.

For a while you´ll feel full. If you really weren´t hungry, your hunger vanishes for a good amount of time.

Eat only when hungry.

10 Minute Rule

I fell prey to this one more times than I can think of. I used to eat until my tummy was about to explode.

Later I read an article about the 10-minute rule. It said that before going for a second/third helping of your meal, just wait for around 10m.

Talk to your family, watch something, do something else to get your mind off eating for the next 10m.

More often than not, you´d find that you are full already. You might easily be able to make do without the next helping.

It takes around 10m for your brain to figure out that you might be actually full. If you are still hungry, by all means go ahead with the next helping.

However, if you don´t give yourself that time, you end up eating much more than your 100% capacity. You´ll regret later.

Follow the 10m rule and watch your waistline decrease.

Eat Slowly & Chew Well

I love eating rice. I´ve switched to quinoa and I love that too. When I mix it with daal, it tastes so nice.

The downside with these kinds of foods (that turn semi-solid upon mixing) is that when you take a bite, you end up swallowing a huge portion of what´s in your mouth. With each bite, a lot of unchewed quantity is swallowed.

So, the work that your mouth has to put in to chew and convert the food to a pasty texture is transferred to your tummy.

Rather than working on a pasty textured food, your stomach has to work on morsels of unchewed food. This keeps you from reducing your weight.

Chew well, eat slowly and your digestive system will thank you for it.

Switch To Healthier Yet Tastier Alternatives

You don´t have to forgo taste. Simply substitute tasty unhealthy food with a healthy, yet tasty version and watch your waistline shrink.

I´m an Indian cuisine addict. I detest Quinoa the bland way it is eaten widely with steamed veggies, without spices, etc.

I don´t like that taste.

My tongue simply won´t accept that bland dish. If I force it down my throat, I would still crave something savoury later to compensate for the missing taste. I´ll end up gaining weight again.

So, do I shy away from Quinoa and not reap its benefits? No.

Trick I follow: I simply substitute rice for quinoa in my Indian meal. I have Quinoa with a helping of Daal (lentils are high in protein) and some protein-rich curries as I would generally do with rice.

This simple tweak doesn´t make me want to kill myself by giving up on my way of eating.

Finally, Don´t Forget Strength Training!

If you leave it just to good eating habits, you will slowly but surely reduce, but then you are missing out on the tons of benefits of exercising.

Not only will it help accelerate the process of your weight loss but it will also help you make you stronger and mentally agile and happy. Benefits abound.

I have seen articles in this website of people losing tons of weight solely through dieting. However, I am not a proponent of that.

Put in your work in the gym. Strength train. After all there needs to be some muscles in your body which the added protein in your new diet can help rebuild!

You could adopt some of the above tips and modify them to suit your needs. Play around with them till you find your version which will help you lose weight sustainably.

Happy losing!