Honor Your Hunger… Bon Appetit!

Being more aware when you eat is crucial to losing weight and keeping it off. So, honor your appetite by truly experiencing the pleasure of eating food, which int turn encourages your brain to trigger the ideal metabolic response for optimal digestion and efficient calorie burning. A smart approach to losing weight doesn’t involve starvation and shouldn’t require you to endure feelings of hunger all the time. However, people have trouble distinguishing hunger and thirst, so start by drinking the recommended daily average.

After years of bad information about dieting, many people believe that experiencing uncomfortable feelings of hunger and forcing yourself to ignore your appetite is necessary for you to shed unwanted pounds. In other words, food is the enemy. Funny how often weight loss is short lived. That’s because most people embark on the wrong weight loss journey. Truth is having to live hungry “day in” and “day out” is an unsustainable strategy that’s doomed from the beginning.

Mindful eating is the practice of listening to internal hunger cues and avoiding distractions during the eating process. Savor the taste of food and try these proven tips that promote healthier eating habits:

• Eat Regular Meals – When you are losing weight, you should be eating three balanced meals a day and a high-fiber, high-protein snack at regular intervals every day. But, manage portion sizes to control your calorie intake to shed unwanted pounds.
• Stay Well Hydrated – Staying adequately hydrated can reduce true hunger pangs and help you manage your appetite’s food cravings. Drink a glass when you feel hungry or throughout the day.
• Pick Healthy Snacks – If you feel hungry between meals, have a glass of water. If hunger persists don’t go back to your bad habits of snacking on high-calorie junk foods. Plan for high-fiber protein snacks.
• Be a Smart Shopper – Never keep the foods you can’t resist lying around the house or workplace; these are triggers. In fact to stay on track, prepare healthy snacks ahead of time and take some with you when you are on the go.
• Stop Eating When Full – Although it sounds like a no-brainer, it assumes you weren’t instructed to clean your plate during your growing years and that you are not eating distracted.

After you have reached your target weight, hormones released in your brain will continue to conspire to make you feel hungrier and any emotional appetite will continue to produce very creative food cravings that must be controlled. Since your body wants you to regain lost weight, whatever changes you made to your daily menus or exercise routine have to be kept up permanently or your metabolism will naturally spring back causing unwanted weight regain.

Even though you cut calories to lose weight, it doesn’t necessarily mean you need to eat less food to maintain your new weight. Instead, focus on eating high-fiber foods and proteins that are higher in volume and take longer for your body to digest. If you have been looking for long-term strategies that allow you to eat more while managing your new weight, contact the weight loss specialists at Metabolic Research Center. MRC has thirty years of personalizing successful solutions.