Fat Loss Guide for beginners
If you’re looking to shed a few pounds, particularly in losing body fat and you have not intentionally done it before in your life, then these tips will be helpful to you in your journey to losing body fat without compromising your health in general.
Eating lesser than what you’d normally eat. In other words, calorie deficit. While you don’t have to count the exact amount of calories that you’re eating in order to lose body fat, you do need to be aware of the portion and amount of food that you eat regularly. Instead, learn to eyeball your food using your palm, knuckle, and thumb as a guide, i.e. palm size of fish, knuckle of rice, thumb size of dressing, etc. From here you can then adjust your portion down based on the estimation of your hand.
Cleaning up your diet. Estimating your food portion and estimating calories can be difficult especially if it’s ready-made and heavily-processed food such as pastries, desserts, sugary treats, processed meat, hawker food like noodles and rice dishes, which makes the process of losing body fat much more challenging. One of the solutions is to include or replace highly-processed, calorie-dense food with nutrient-dense whole foods such as leaner cuts of meat, leafy greens, legumes, root vegetables, etc. Not to mention whole foods are more filling in general compared to most processed food, thus allowing you to have a greater satiety effect post-meal, helping you to feel full longer.
Drink plenty of water. Keeping your body well-hydrated can help with optimizing your physiological and psychological function which in return aids with fat loss, such as cognitive function (mood and decision making), coping with stress levels, appetite, bowel movement, blood pressure, etc.
Staying active. We know that exercising and working out, in general, helps burn calories and is one of the contributors to losing body fat. While we can’t possibly be working out the whole day 24/7, we can incorporate more physical activity which isn’t as taxing as working out and can contribute to speeding up the fat loss (also known as NEAT, non-exercise activity thermogenesis). The idea is to move more throughout the day in general. The easiest way to start is to aim to get “X” amount of steps by the end of the day and/or get up your work desk and stretch a little every 1 hour. Some other forms of activities that could also contribute to NEAT are doing house chores, groceries, washing your car, walking your pet, etc.
These are just some of the basics you could do at the start of your fat loss journey and most importantly, you have got to BE CONSISTENT with putting up the effort. The journey will become more difficult as you inch closer towards your fat loss goal, that is where you need to be even more persistent and play your strategy cards, which can be for another time. For now, let’s focus on getting the basics right.
Hopefully, you have found this article useful to you, feel free to forward it to your loved ones whom you might think may find it useful. Have a safe and productive week ahead.
