25 Ways To A Leaner You
Most of us would like to be a little bit leaner than we are. We have compiled a list of 25 ways you can slim down a bit and head more in the direction of the body that you want.
- Eat fewer calories. It is simple math. You have to be at a calorie deficit to lose weight. Burn more calories than you are taking in and you will lose weight.
2. Start walking. Walking is a low impact cardio that anyone can do. A 180 lb man walking 1 mile will burn approximately 100 calories. If you weigh more you will burn slightly more calories. If you weigh less you will burn slightly fewer calories. At a relatively moderate pace you will burn approximately 200 calories in an hour. Walk at a quicker pace and you will burn more.
3. Veggies, Veggies, Veggies. Vegetables are full of nutrients and are extremely low in calories. If you want to lose weight eat more veggies.
4. Eat more protein. Protein has a high thermic effect. This means protein requires more energy from your body to digest. Just by eating more protein you can burn more calories. This alone can lead to weight loss.
5. Eat fewer carbohydrates. Carbs are not all bad, but they turn into glucose. Excess glucose gets stored in the liver as glycogen or, with the help of insulin, converted into fatty acids, circulated to other parts of the body and stored as fat in adipose tissue.
6. Don’t eat anything in a box or a bag. Processed foods are just not good for you. Shop on the outside of the grocery store. Where all the lean protein, fruits and vegetables are located.
7. Cardio. There is no denying cardio helps you burn fat. It is real. If you want to really burn some fat, try fasted cardio. This is doing your cardio after you have fasted (in the morning before breakfast is a great time to do this.) As you are sleeping your body has used up all of the glucose in your muscles. When you do your cardio in a fasted state you are burning up fat almost exclusively as your energy source.
8. Resistance training. Whether it is weights, body weight, or resistance bands. Resistance training helps you build muscle. Muscle burns fat. The more muscle you have the more fat you will be burning.
9. Take up running. Have you ever seen a runner that is not lean? Start with walking and work your way up. I have seen people change their entire body with running.
10. Sprint. Have you seen a sprinters body? Exactly. Want to kick up the fat burning to another level? Find a hill. Hill sprints will kick your butt and burn a ton of calories
11. Stress relieving yoga. Yoga is fantastic. The stretching limbers you up and you burn calories. Stress can add to your belly fat. Stress relief therefore helps hold the fat at bay.
12. Take pictures. Taking pictures will keep you on track and keep you motivated. There is nothing like seeing progress to keep you going, but be patient. It doesn’t happen overnight.
13. Train with a partner. When your partner isn’t feeling it you can motivate them. When you’re not feeling it they can motivate you. Nothing like a little peer pressure to keep you on track.
14. Meal prep. This is huge. If you have all your meals laid out for the week it makes it a lot more difficult to stray. It also makes your life easier. I prep twice a week.
15. Change it up. Changing up your routine keeps you from getting bored. Do calisthenics this week rather than weights. Run at the beach. Next week run in the mountains. Throw in some triathlon training. Try crossfit. Go on a challenging hike instead of the treadmill. Makes it more interesting and more fun.
16. Try a fitness app. Many people find a fitness app helps keep them on track with their diet and their exercise routine.
17. Eat at home. Cooking your own meals lets you know exactly what you are getting. At many restaurants the amount of salt and fat that they are adding adds many additional calories. You will also resist the urge of totally blowing it with your meal choice.
18. Resist alcohol. These are empty calories (no nutritional value). How many beer drinkers do you know with a six pack? Exactly.
19. Eliminate soda. In fact, eliminate all sugary drinks. Juices, soda, fruit punch. These have virtually no nutritional value and are full of sugar.
20. Minimize the sweets. These will ruin any fat loss program. Three cookies are about 400 calories. That is about 2 hours on a treadmill. Doesn’t quite seem worth it does it?
21. Park far away. This is just an example of the many small changes you can make to your routine that can aid your fat loss journey. Take the stairs. Walk at lunch. They all seem insignificant, but at the end of the week you burned a lot more calories and aided your weight loss.
22. Try intermittent fasting. This is where you have a specific eating window. Many people will do a 16-8 routine where you are not eating for 16 hours and then you eat all of your meals in an 8 hour window. If you do your workout while you are in the fasted portion of your day, your body will be primarily using fat as its energy source.
23. Walk more, drive less. Going to the grocery store and it is only a mile away? Walk. You just burned more calories. Walk or bike to run errands. You will spend less on gas, help the environment and burn some calories. Win, win, win!
24. Every little bit helps. The diet, taking the stairs eliminating sweets. What you are really doing is changing your lifestyle. So add that little thing. You haven’t worked out all day and you are about to get in the shower? Do 25 push-ups or 25 sit ups before you jump in the shower. 25 is a lot more than zero.
25. Don’t give up. Just keep going. So you missed a day. Get back at it tomorrow. So you missed a couple of days. Get back at it tomorrow. Don’t beat yourself up, but don’t stop.
Keep going. You deserve it.
You deserve to feel good about your body. You deserve to feel good about yourself.
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