How to Stop Overeating and Lose Weight Quickly

how to stop overeating and lose weight quicklyThis site is not really about weight loss, but it is about becoming more attractive to the opposite sex. Under the risk of sounding obvious and trivial, I will note that losing and maintaining healthy weight makes you much more attractive. Even though this seems to be more important to women’s looks, being overweight affects men almost as much, and losing that extra weight is just as flattering to men. I have seen quite a few guys who became much more attractive and confident in themselves after losing 10-20 lbs, and first and foremost because their faces became so much flatter, more defined and more masculine looking. When a woman sees a man who is in shape, she inevitable assumes that he probably has his life together in other respects. And being fit is even more flattering to older men. After all, it takes more work and discipline for a guy who is over forty to stay in shape, than for a younger guy, who is still enjoying the benefits of high metabolism, despite not having the best diet and lifestyle.

This is not another article about magic diets, weight loss pills, or some new exercise equipment. It is about something far more simple – it’s about the importance of not eating the amounts of food that are brought to your table by anyone, including your mother, wife, a very kind waiter at your favorite restaurant, just because it’s there in front of you. It is critical that you realize and keep in mind the following: the amount of food that’s placed on your plate by anyone is completely arbitrary. It has nothing to do with how much food you really need, and it certainly has nothing to do with how much food you want at that given moment. In light of this very important fact, here are a few, very simple, practical tips that you can and you should follow to lose weight quicker and without having to invest any special time or effort into it:

1. Cut Your Fast Food Portions by at Least Half

I am not going to ask you to stop eating at fast food restaurants and cafes. I understand that it’s unrealistic for many people, given their lifestyle, schedule, geographic location and the temptation to enjoy eating what they have been eating since early childhood. However, unless you are an athlete who is 6’5 tall or over and over 230 lbs, you should only eat at most half of what you buy in any of those chain restaurants. Generally, a foot-long at Subway is way too big a sandwich for any person, and you should not be eating more than half of it at a time. For many people, even a 6 inch sandwich makes them uncomfortably full. And if you are too full, it means you ate too much. The same applies to burritos which often way as much as a dumbbell and should be split in two or more meals. Togos sandwiches and just about any US diner are no different.

The situation in higher-end restaurants is the same. In an attempt to appear generous, you may be served a giant portion of white rice along with your entree, because rice is so cheap. This does not mean that you have to eat it all, or even any of it, if there are 3 other dishes on your table. Many of the healthier restaurants that serve, for instance, middle eastern food are still way to generous with their portions. Every time I order a crepe,  it comes with a huge “side” of friend potatoes and toast which can be a separate dish in itself, not to mention the fact that the crepe is twice or three times the size it would be in France.

I remember growing up oversees and only having bread on one side of a sandwich – at the bottom. Thinking about it today, I can imagine that removing the top bread from our sandwiches and hamburgers alone will make a significant difference in our diet and will dramatically reduce all those unnecessarily consumed calories.

2. Nutrition is More Important than Exercise   

Read an interview of any fitness model, and you will see that they always say that attractive, lean body starts in the kitchen. They say that diet is 80% of the secret to their fit bodies, while exercise is only 20% of the deal. While exercising is critical to being strong, fit and maintaining healthy metabolism, there are only so many calories you can burn when running, and a 2 mile run or an hour exercise is not going to compensated for poor diet or chronic overeating. This is why you see so many overweight people at a gym, who stay overweight, despite working out so much.

3. Stop Eating When You Don’t Want To

You are at work. It’s lunch time. Everyone goes outside to eat but for some reason you don’t feel hungry. Maybe you ate way too much late last night or that morning, or maybe you are not feeling well, or maybe you are constipated, and you just don’t feel that desire to eat that you normally feel at that hour. But you go to lunch with your friends or coworkers anyway, because you want to be social and you want to spend time with them. You sit down and start eating a full meal, even though you don’t want to, because that’s what everyone is doing. Don’t! Again, in this case, your decision to eat is arbitrary and has nothing to do with the only factor that should lead you to eating – your desire to eat. If you don’t want to draw attention to yourself or offend whoever you are having lunch with by not eating, then have a little bit of food, or have a beverage/coffee, but don’t stuff yourself with food against your will, just because it’s lunchtime and everyone else is doing it.

4. Resist the Social Pressure to Eat a Full Meal Late at Night Whenever Possible

No one wants to miss out on all the parties and other events that take place at night and which involve dining, especially during holidays. However, just because you are at a table, doesn’t mean you have to eat a full heavy meal like everyone else. Eating something healthy at home, right before dinner, will help you avoid overeating during that party you are going to that starts at 9 pm or later. If you are at a party, slow down with eating and focus on socializing with other guests, rather than the food, and this will too likely help you resist the temptation to overeat.

5. The 3-5 Course Dining Expectation is Completely Arbitrary and Unreasonable

I don’t know who came up with the idea that you are supposed to be having a starter, a soup, an entree, and a desert all in one meal, but it certainly has nothing to do with the quantity of food needed in order to lose weight or maintain healthy weight. By cutting a full desert after a full meal alone, you will dramatically reduce the amount of calories you consume and the load you put on your body when you are having a full meal. If you, like many people, need to have something sweet after dinner/lunch, then literally have just one bite of something sweet to make the prior salty/spicy taste go away, but not more.

6. How Not to Overeat If You Are Dining with Just One Other Person

Here is a simple tip to make sure either you or your partner don’t overeat when you go out to dinner. Instead of each of you getting a separate meal, why not split, say, two appetizers, an entree and a desert. In most restaurants this will be enough to make two people full without feeling like you overate.

7. Throwing Food Away is Not The Worst Option

You may feel guilty or ungrateful for throwing away a dish you didn’t finish, because there are so many poor, hungry people out there in the world, who would love to have what you are about to throw away. You also don’t like the very idea of wasting food. So, you force yourself to eat what you don’t want anyway.  You shouldn’t. By eating more than you want, you are neither feeding the hungry out there, nor conserving any resources. You are only harming yourself.

Food should bring you pleasure. Enjoying food necessarily means avoiding overeating and its negative effects – from feeling bloated, drowsy and uncomfortable for hours to gaining weight, which takes years to lose.

 

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Practical, effective dating tips and relationship advice.
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bitchyflower
bitchyflower
12/14/2013 6:04 pm

This is a great article about our relationship with food. The rhythm of life is so fast now that we don't even think about if we really need to eat or what we are putting into our bodies. The timing of the article is perfect and has inspired me to practice mindful eating. Hopefully, this article will inspire people not to binge eat this holiday and gain 10 lbs.

jeremy
jeremy
12/14/2013 4:35 pm

Great advice especially about portions. I just came back from Amsterdam and even there the portions are much smaller than in the US, despite the fact that Dutch people are some of the biggest among human species, as we all know.