Three Principles for Guaranteed Weight Loss

I have battled obesity all my life. I was a plump toddler, a chubby grade schooler, a fat teenager, and a stout adult. I have tried many different diet plans. All worked to a degree, but ultimately, all of them failed. Through trial and error, losses and gains, hope and disappointments, I believe I have discovered three principles which, apply and live them, will guarantee you weight loss.

Principle Number One: Eat only when you are hungry

This is nothing new. You've heard this one said many time and in many different ways It is common sense.

"Push the plate away when you are done"
"Don't snack, it will spoil your dinner"
"Eat to live, not live to eat"

Hackneyed phrase perhaps, but the simple statement, "Eat only when hungry," is the fundamental key to losing weight. Unless you are able to grasp, internalize, and live this simple dictum you will never be successful at losing weight! End of story.

Key to implementing this truth is learning to recognize true hunger. Real hunger is most clearly signaled by a stomach growl. Headaches may or may not mean you are hungry. A growling stomach is an empty one. If you are like me, you may only rarely experience a growling stomach because either you nosh throughout the day or you sometimes eat such large meals that your stomach is never truly empty.

Find for yourself what true hunger is. Skip a meal. Skip two meals. Suffer just one day: what you learn in a few hours of suffering may benefit you for a lifetime. (Now some of you may be diabetics, or pregnant, or suffering from some other condition which requires that you maintain adequate nutrient and caloric intake. Talk with your doctor before doing anything I mention in this article)

Next learn what it means to satisfy your hunger as opposed to filling your belly. Being satisfied and being full may or may not be the same thing. It is possible to eat and have your hunger satisfied without having to loosen your belt, undo the top pant button, or reach for the plop plop fizz fizz. Purchase or prepare a meal that you would love to eat. Make sure that it is a normal serving size. Not too much nor too little. Try to eat this meal as slowly as possible. Chew slowly. Let the food roll over and over in your mouth until you have extracted every bit of flavor from each bite. Make sure each bite is liquefied thoroughly before you swallow. Make your meal last at least a half hour. You should find that over the course of the half hour,

1. your stomach stops growling
   
2. 
   
3. your head no longer hurts
   
4. 
   
5. the food tastes better that you remember it tasting before
   
6. 
   
7. you feel a general sense of contentment
   
8. 
   
9. your hunger is satisfied
   
10. 
    

Now don't skip any more meals. Just wait till you are hungry. You may find that your hunger doesn't always coincide with traditional meal times. That's fine: your eating and your hunger will eventually return to sync. Just don't eat before your stomach growls.

Principle Number Two: Don't Deny yourself any reasonable foods

One reason most diets fail is that the diet book writers ignore a fact programmed deep within our DNA: no one wants to deny him/her self. God told Adam not to eat the fruit. He and Eve ate the fruit. Dr Atkins said cut back on carbohydrates and we dream about biscuits and gravy. Low fat diets have us craving ribs and fried chicken. "Resistance is futile." We must not feel we have to deprive ourselves of anything in order to lose weight. It has been proven time and time again that restrictive diets fail.

Eat the foods you enjoy. Eat healthy foods as often as you can, but eat them because you want to. Do it because you want to eat nutritiously, not because you want to lose weight. Be reasonable though. Don't eat a meal of ice cream and cake or stuff your self on fried clams or barbecue ribs. All things are permissible, but all things are not profitable to me or you, to paraphrase the Apostle Paul.

Principle Number Three: Have Patience

Patience is the key to consistent, lasting weight loss Lack of patience is the root of all weight gain. Lack of patience has caused many to give up and despair of ever successfully losing weight.. Let this fact sink in: It is unreasonable and unhealthy to expect to lose much more than two pounds a week. Work these principles and you will see an average of one lost pound a week.

Don't try to speed up your weight loss by exercising. Exercise for fitness sake - or any other reason you might conceive - but don't exercise to lose weight. This is another source of frustration and failure. When my weight fell under two hundred-thirty pounds, I was very excited and I decided i needed to speed the process up. First I started increasing my walking distance. Next, I increased my walking pace. Finally, I started running. Not only did I not lose weight any faster I actually gained a few pounds. I ate more because I was burning more calories. I began to actually dread getting up early every morning to exercise. I would to use any excuse to skip a morning's run. I wasted two months. Had I been more patient and stuck with what was working, I would have lost about eight pounds. Don't get me wrong. Exercise is good. I recommend it for everybody. It will make you more fit, improve circulation, help relieve stress, tone and strengthen muscles, and much more. Just don't use exercise as a means to lose weight.

Conclusion

Losing weight should not cost anyone anything. All it takes is learning to listen to your body and eat when your body tells you it needs food. Stop when you body and your brain say, "We're satisfied!" There is no need to buy special foods unless you like to eat these special foods. There is no need to avoid eating any foods unless you decide these foods are just not what you need now. There is no need to buy exercise equipment or gym memberships, unless you just want to be more fit and healthy. Realize that it took you some time to put on all those extra pounds: use the time it takes to take off the weight to learn eating discipline. Use the time to learn how to enjoy foods. Exercise your patience instead of your thighs. You will find that the discipline, confidence, and self-esteem you develop will spill over and bring you success in other areas of your life. God bless you as you conquer those pounds.