How to Lose Weight Without Dieting

Diets don't work. You can count calories, add up points, buy special dinners and follow all of the rules--and lose it all when that big chocolate cake calls to you in the middle of the night.

I know--I've been there.

It hurts though, to hear the comments. When your loved ones yell "Wide load!" as you walk into a room or your spouse gripes that he's going to have to widen the doorways if you keep spreading out. They think it is funny, and no one has any clue that you hide in the bathroom to cry.

Those diet plans that you've been buying have one goal: keep you happy enough to keep trying and spending your money with them. Have you ever noticed that their plans are "just" hard enough that you can't seem to follow them--so that you feel like you are the failure when the weight doesn't drop?

You don't have to have a special plan or buy special meals to lose weight. You don't even have to diet. In fact, the first thing you need to do is tell yourself that you never need to diet again. This takes the focus off of food and will eliminate one main cause of overeating: stress.

Drink Water:
Purchase a water filter so that you will have pleasant tasting water wherever you go and keep a bottle of this filtered water with you at all times. Whenever you are thirsty grab a drink, making it your goal to drink 1/2 ounce of water per pound of body weight a day--but don't stress if you can't make the goal. Just do your best to make water your primary beverage and to always keep it handy.

Whenever you feel hungry, drink a glass of water and wait a few minutes. Hunger and thirst signs are surprisingly similar and a lot of times you will think that you are hungry when in fact you are just thirsty. By drinking a glass of water and waiting for a time you allow your body to tell you if it just needed the water--or if it actually needs food.

Whenever you do sit down for a meal, drink water instead of any other beverage. This allows your body to focus on the nutrients within the food without distraction from the empty calories in commonly-available commercial beverages. Save the coffee and soft drinks for between meal treats only. Allow yourself as much water as your body desires.

Take Small Bites:
Take small bites and chew each portion thoroughly. Sit there and concentrate on how wonderful the food tastes and wring every last bite of flavor from each and every piece before swallowing. Wallace Wattles recommends chewing until your food slides down your throat without any effort, so chew slowly and thoroughly while savoring each and every bite.

Taking smaller bites and chewing your food thoroughly has a twofold benefit: the thorough mastication of your food will enable it to dissolve better in your stomach so that you system can thoroughly benefit from the nutrients within each bite. This will also reduce the odds of indigestion or stomach upset if you are prone to those symptoms.

Your body takes several minutes from the time it is actually full to communicate that feeling of satiation to your brain, so eating slowly will prevent you from overeating during the several minute time span it takes your body to tell you that it is full.

Leave the Clean Plate Club:
You are not depriving children in third-world nations if you leave some food on your plate. Seriously, how could eating those extra bites possibly help anyone--is it going to magically travel to the body of some starving child somewhere? If you don't want to waste, save your leftovers for the next meal, but never eat when your body says it is full. When your body is full, stop. If you want dessert, eat it before your body is full, but don't take a single bite after your body tells you to stop.

Your body is a wonderful machine and is designed with signs and signals to tell you what and how much to eat--disregarding those signals is the main contributor to weight gain, while listening to those signals will help you to lose weight quickly and easily. If someone complains because there is food left on your plate, tell them that they can finish it, but YOU are full!

Using these three simple tips will allow you to eat what you want, when you want while losing weight in the process. This method works with your body's natural tendencies, so you won't feel hungry or deprived and this will benefit anyone regardless of their current body weight.

Dry your eyes and stop looking at the dinner table with dread. Throw away the calorie counters and cancel the weight loss meetings. As long as you follow these simple tips you will never have to diet again.

Source:
"The Science of Being Well" by Wallace Wattles
"Your Body's Many Cries for Water" by F. Batmanghelidj
"The Weigh Down Diet" by Gwen Shamblin
Personal Experience