How to Make Dieting Easier: 9 Rules That Simplify Weight Loss

The key to weight loss that lasts isn’t about dropping the weight as much as it is about being able to make dieting easier. After all, if you’re going to be able to keep on top of your weight management over the years, it needs to be simple.

In fact, this is one of the areas in which most people make the largest number of mistakes. It can become very easy to overcomplicate things when losing weight. It is, after all, a vast undertaking. It involves making many changes to your lifestyle. This includes changes on the most basic level of your daily habits.

Therefore, the more you can make dieting easier, the more likely you’ll be to keep yourself motivated and keep going. A simple, healthy and direct approach will be your best friend. You’ll be able to keep it up and avoid becoming frustrated. You’ll also avoid being overwhelmed and confused.

Use the following tips to keep things simple, healthy and achievable both while you lose the weight and while you’re keeping it off.

9 Simple Rules to Make Dieting Easier

Make Dieting Easier Tip 1 – Don’t Diet

Yes, you do need to watch your diet and exercise when you want to lose weight. However, the point is not to think of what you’re doing as a “diet.” Don’t think of what you’re doing as a period of short term suffering to achieve a goal, after which you can go back to old habits. That’s not how you lose weight. That’s how you lose it, then regain it, then lose it, then regain it again.

Instead, make dieting easier by thinking of it as a lifestyle change you’ll be taking on over the longer term. It’s a gradual adjustment of the way you will be living your life from now on. That way, you won’t feel like you’re putting yourself in food jail until you’ve been adequately punished.

Make Dieting Easier Tip 2 – Exercise With Purpose

Workouts are all great for your health, but they don’t all burn fat. Only some exercises boost your metabolism. Understand how to do this properly. If you’re new to workouts, you will likely benefit from speaking with your doctor and/or a personal trainer.

The key is to find a balance where you do cardio workouts most days per week. These workouts are what burn fat while you’re doing them and for a couple of hours afterward. Then, add strength training a couple of times per week. They don’t burn fat while you’re doing them, but they build lean muscle so your metabolism will run higher even when you’re idle.

After you’ve found that balance, make dieting easier by paying attention to how challenging your exercises are. Even if your exercises were challenging at first, as you become more fit, they will become less challenging. At those times, you need to boost their difficulty to make them continue working for you.

Make Dieting Easier Tip 3 – Pay Attention to Hunger Size

All hunger is not created equal. Many of us overreact to our hunger pangs. As soon as we feel hungry, we eat a meal’s worth of food. Hunger isn’t something to be feared. In fact, if you come to terms with your hunger, you’ll find that a lot of it can be ignored or corrected calorie-free.

Once again, when you’re working to make dieting easier, balance is key. Make sure your meals are made to be satisfying. Boost their protein and fiber content to help them fill you up. When you’re hungry between meals, have a snack. That said, a snack and a meal aren’t the same thing. Have something to dull your hunger and drink lots of water. Water is a natural appetite suppressant. In this way, you’ll keep your hunger out of control and avoid binging, but you’ll also stop yourself from overeating at any moment when you might feel the slightest bit peckish.

Make Dieting Easier Tip 4 – Count Calories with Care

Calories can be a fantastic guideline to help you to understand how much you’re eating. That said, they’re not all created equal. Yes, you could eat only jelly beans in a day and count your calories to be sure you remain within the right limit. However, these little treats are high in sugar and pretty much completely empty in terms of nutrients.

As a result, the impact they will have on your body would be different than the equivalent number of calories packed with nutrition. You’ll likely be hungrier, have energy spikes and crashes and find it much more difficult to stay within your limit.

Make Dieting Easier Tip 5 – Plant-Based Foods are Friends

As you work hard to shed the pounds, you’ll find out that a portion of animal based proteins can be great for many reasons, but filling the rest of your plate with plant-based foods can skyrocket your success. By piling on the veggies and adding a fruit here and there, you’ll fill up on nutrients, water and fiber. These are all things we need more of in our foods!

Furthermore, they’re filling, which can make dieting easier because you’ll feel less likely to overeat higher calorie, less nutrient dense foods.

Make Dieting Easier Tip 6 – Quit the Fads

If you’re considering juice fasting, crash dieting, juice cleansing, juice detoxing or skipping meals in any other way, stop now. These techniques always backfire, with no exceptions. They may make you feel like you’ve lost weight at the start, but those pounds will quickly return and they’ll bring friends. Moreover, the weight you’ll lose is more likely to be temporary water loss as opposed to being burned fat.

Make Dieting Easier Tip 7 – Eat Properly

What you’re eating is one thing. How you eat it is something else. Eat your food in a way that will let you get the most nutrient value out of it and that will fill you up with the smallest amount. How? By chewing your food carefully and taking your time while you eat.

The faster you eat and the less you chew, the less benefit you’ll gain from your meals and snacks. Make dieting easier on yourself and take the time to chew up everything you eat. Eat slowly enough to enjoy the textures and flavors and give your brain to realize your stomach has had enough.

Make Dieting Easier Tip 8 – Track Your Weight

As much as you may loathe the bathroom scale, it really does make a big difference to helping you to understand your weight loss progress. The number on the scale isn’t the be-all and end-all of your achievement. It can’t tell the difference among muscle weight, fat and water weight.

However, when used correctly it can help make dieting easier. It is a tool, just like any other. If you start to see trends forming – like you haven’t lost a pound in months – it can indicate a problem. If you gain for several weeks in a row, this may also suggest an issue to be corrected.

Make Dieting Easier Tip 9 – Sleep

Make a priority of getting enough sleep every night and suddenly your weight will seem to magically disappear. Everything from eating less to exercising more will be simpler when you are consistently well rested.

In fact, many experts say that sleep is the best thing you can do to make dieting easier. It speeds up your metabolism, shrinks your hunger and gives you everything you need to be motivated.

With these great tips on your side, you’ll have everything you need to get the most out of your weight loss efforts. You’ll be able to reduce your frustration and boost your results. Even better, you’ll have a better understanding of what you’re doing and what you can expect in terms of results. Simplicity is key. Stop overthinking!