Limit Your Calorie Intake to Lose Weight

If you're overweight and looking for a solution, one of the important steps you can take is to limit your calorie intake to lose weight and make a habit of eating less each day.

Here is another one of those blatantly obvious statements that have everything to do with losing weight and maintaining it once you have lost it.

But even though it is so glaringly in your face and stands out like a sore thumb, you'd be surprised at just how many people choose to ignore it and go right on happily stuffing the high calorie foods into their faces without a second thought.

So what is this all about and why should you take any notice of it?

Restrict Calories Consumed

Well, you should certainly take notice if you really want to keep your weight in check, or lose some if you have already gotten overweight.

By limiting the amount of calories you consume each day, you can restrict the amount of fat your body stores if there's an excess or even start to reduce that fat store if there is a shortfall of calories that your body needs to function for the day.

Some people can do that by reducing the size of their meals, with a popular option to be to start a diet food delivery program by one of the popular meal replacement diet companies like Jenny Craig, Nutrisystem or Medifast, for example.

Others can do it by initiating portion control with meals or outright banning snacks between meals.

So as to what this is all about, let's take a look at some of the ways in which the calorie limits are most often exceeded and how to stem the flow of foolishness.

Carb Overload

One of the biggest causes of excess calorie intake is snacking on high calorie snacks that are high in refined carbohydrates and sugar during the day in between meals.

You may be a champion at eating your three or even five low calorie, healthy meals at the right times, but then ruin it all by reaching for a packet of cookies or diving into the donut box.

Sweet or Savory?

It's not just the obviously sweet treats that are bad choices to eat between meals, either. Potato chips, pretzels, corn chips or similar savory snacks are just as bad!

Snacks are often eaten with the excuse they are needed to either stave off a nagging feeling of hunger, or more likely to ease boredom, or even to help you concentrate while you are working at your desk on a computer or similar job that requires a lot of concentration.

Often, you can repeat the snack bag opening ritual and eating the contents several times throughout the day without even realizing you are doing it.

How to Avoid Eating Snacks

The way around giving into temptation to eat these evil snacks is to not have any of them available to you.

Don't store any in your desk drawers, or by the TV or wherever it is that you allow your mind to get itself into another place while your hands are reaching for the rustling packets of high calorie weight gain delight.

In fact, when you are out shopping, do not buy any, period. Seriously, if you don't have the snacks to hand, you can't eat them!

The Craving for Sugar

Any food that the body quickly converts into glucose, namely refined carbs being the number one offender, comes with a sinister payload. A short time after you eat some, you want more!

This is a real food craving that can be tough to ignore.

At first, you may get a nagging feeling that something is missing. Soon you start thinking about how nice that last snack tasted.

Before you know it, you may even find yourself getting up to go searching around the house for some stashed away snacks that you might have forgotten about. Maybe your kids have stowed away some goodies in their rooms.

If you're at the office, it is not unknown for someone in a carb craving moment to go scrounging around other office co-workers desks to see what they have on offer!

Do not do it!

Avoiding the Craving

If you feel you need a little something to stave off the boredom while you're at work, go to the water machine and get a cup of cold water.

If you're at home, grab a glass of water from the fridge or just from the tap if yours is certified fit to drink.

Drinking water can have a dampening effect on the craving to eat a snack. Often we mistake hunger for thirst, opting for a snack of some kind when a drink will often do the trick.

Quench Your Thirst First

To make sure you were really just thirsty, drink something to quench that thirst. You could grab a coffee but you better be sure it is black with no sugar or sweeteners, because a creamy latte can throw you a high calorie curve ball you are not expecting!

How about trying a herbal tea, such as mint, camomile, rose hip, or one of the tangy fruit teas. There is no added sugar or additives in most of them (check the labels first to be sure) so no calories hidden in them and they actually taste good!

However you do it, you can lose weight by knowing your calorie intake limits and by being sure that you do not add unwanted calories during the day to your carefully crafted low calorie meals. It goes without saying that you should also make sure you keep to your diet and you will be more successful with your weight loss strategy that you thought possible.

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Posted on Fri, 19 Mar 2021 in Diet | 0 Comments