Whether due to stress from eating, boredom or the comfort of old-time favorites, many people gained weight in 2020. Sarah Marion, Ph.D., director of union research at Murphy Research in Seattle, said today in an email that in any given year, 53% of adults in the United States (aged 18 and over) rated themselves as C, D or F for weight control; only 17% gave themselves an A. And she said, 95% of adults think about weight control, at least part of the time, according to company surveys.
If you are concerned about your weight and want to make some healthy changes, there is an impressive amount of advice available on how to lose weight, but in fact, healthy weight loss comes down to just five basic principles. Use them to increase your chances of successful weight loss in 2021.
1. Practice healthy eating habits
Some dietary strategies seem to have more impact than others, so if you’re trying to lose weight in the next year, follow this advice:
- Eat more vegetables.
- Mainly enjoy whole foods.
- Limit the amount of added sugars and processed foods you eat.
Vegetables play their part by allowing you to fill up on more food without overdoing the calories. This principle is called volumetry and produces the calorie deficit needed for weight loss without focusing on calorie restriction or making you feel very hungry. And it is supported by science. Studies support volume intake for weight loss and, more importantly, maintenance of weight loss. This means that, among people who have lost weight, this tactic helps them to maintain it.
Whole foods are also more satisfying and satisfying than the processed foods they replace. Foods made with highly processed grains, like pizza, buzz through your digestive system, leaving you hungry right after eating. Almost 60% of what we eat comes from this category of less healthy foods. A small study suggested that foods like these promote weight gain, probably because they are designed to be incredibly tasty and because they are softer and easier to chew. This makes them easier to devour and therefore easier to overeat.
Processed foods also tend to have more calories per bite, which means they have a higher energy density. Additional research has found that people tend to eat the same amount of food, so foods with a higher energy density can lead to weight gain because you are unlikely to reduce portion sizes when choosing these foods, which can lead to overeating of calories.
Healthy weight loss does not have to be overly complicated, nor does it need to involve a long list of foods to be excluded. The findings of another year-long study revealed that following the three basic principles mentioned above was more important than the type of diet (low fat or low carbohydrate) that participants followed.
2. Pay attention to why you eat
2020 was the year of stress and comfortable eating – two behaviors that can contribute to weight gain. If you are trying to lose weight, it is useful to distinguish between emotional hunger and physical hunger.
Emotional eating need not be avoided at all costs. Sometimes it is comforting to participate in a comforting meal – and it is perfectly healthy to enjoy a festive meal or a traditional recipe that brings a lot of joy. However, if eating becomes an option to deal with your emotions or stress, it can lead to overeating, impair your mental health and make it harder to control your weight.
The first step in breaking this habit is to identify your emotional triggers, be they happiness, sadness, anger, fear, stress, boredom or other feelings. The next step is to find an alternative to eating when these feelings arise. For example, if you are feeling stressed or angry, it can help to burn some of your negative emotions by going for a walk.
3. Adopt an “I get it” attitude
Are you confident that you can make some healthy changes in your eating habits? Studies suggest that an “got it” attitude, known in the world of behavioral sciences as self-efficacy, is correlated with behavioral changes that promote weight loss. In a study of 246 participants, mostly women, having self-efficacy at the start of the study or increasing it while losing weight was strongly related to greater weight loss. People with this skill set were able to recover more quickly when they experienced setbacks, so instead of giving up, they were more likely to commit again, which makes them more likely to lose weight and maintain their results.
To increase your self-efficacy, determine a viable change you can make to support your goal. Let’s say you decide to tackle the snack habit you acquired in quarantine. Instead of saying “I will eat less”, set a specific goal, such as “I will eat fruit with a snack at least three times a week”. Then find out how you’ll do it, starting with adding fruit to your shopping list. By putting your plan into action, you will begin to encounter obstacles (like running out of bananas in the middle of the week), requiring you to resolve the problem. Learning to overcome
The obstacles increase your confidence, which is transferred to other habits in which you are working.
4. Address stress and sleep problems
According to the 2020 Stress in America survey conducted by the American Psychological Association (APA), nearly 80% of Americans said the pandemic was a source of stress in their lives, and more than two-thirds said their stress levels had increased during this period.
When your overload levels are high, your body pumps out cortisol, a hormone that increases appetite and causes cravings for comfort and junk food. Perhaps this is why 86% of those surveyed by Researchscape International, a market research firm in Sarasota, Florida, on behalf of The Monday Campaigns, a public health initiative associated with Johns Hopkins, Columbia and Syracuse, reported having difficulty in resist junk food in 2020.
Stress also takes its toll in other ways. Researchers at Ohio State University conducted a study that suggested that stressed women burned 104 fewer calories after a big meal and had higher levels of insulin, a hormone that promotes fat storage.
Stress also disrupts your sleep, and when you are poorly rested, it can negate your efforts to lose weight. In one study, participants who spent 5.5 hours in bed (compared to 8.5) experienced an increase in the hormone ghrelin, which makes you more hungry, reduces the number of calories you burn and promotes fat retention.
You can solve stress and sleep problems with tips like these from APA:
- Create meaningful opportunities to connect with friends and loved ones.
- Practice naming three good things that happened in your day.
- Before going to bed, write down the thoughts that usually keep you up at night.
- Have a consistent bedtime routine so your body knows it’s time to relax.
5. Exercise, but don’t lose weight
Exercise is great for many things, including stress relief and better sleep, but it is not as good as you think it is for promoting weight loss. The results of a study released in November suggest that in order for exercise to help with weight loss, you’ll have to work out for about an hour six times a week. However, according to the CDC, only half that amount reduces the risk of heart disease, type 2 diabetes and some forms of cancer.
While it makes sense that exercise leads to weight loss, in fact, it makes you more hungry and you eat more to make up for the calories you burned. The study found that you need to burn about 3,000 calories a week with exercise to overcome the extra amount you eat during training.
Since sweating for an hour six times a week is not everyone’s idea of fun, put aside the idea of exercising to lose weight, and instead find ways to work out that make you feel good. This will make your habit of training more subject in the new year.