Change How You Think About Food to Change the Results

Successful weight loss is all about how you feel. When you lose weight, you should be more satisfied with your body image and appearance. Moreover, your self-esteem and depressive symptoms can be greatly improved by creating positive changes in your daily food intake. Feeling healthy, alert, energetic, confident and proud comes from getting your mind right, which is a proven key to long-term weight loss success.

Participants who reported lower satisfaction with their environment even though they were losing weight, had daily social activities that involved unhealthy eating and had to pass on social eating due their weight loss plan. If you avoid yo-yo dieting, you can ultimately lower your set-point, so your body is satisfied with a smaller, lighter you. Start by adopting a diet with unrefined, simple, low calorie-dense foods.

• Ditch Fad Dieting - There are numerous online tools and free apps that allow you to set your food schedules with notifications and reminders that can help you stay on track even on those bad days.
• Create Your Meal Plan - If you are what you eat, then think of yourself as a healthy eater. Once you begin to identify with this new role, you will start to take on those traits.
• Exercise Can Be Fun - Adding even a short walk to your daily routine can make a big difference in your efforts to lose weight and keep it off. Moving more supports your health, weight and well-being.
• Dieting Does Not Work - Maintain the same patient, progressive approach to your day as you do with your diet and exercise. Starting out in a whirlwind may look impressive but it can quickly derail your progress.
• Exercise Willpower - If you don't like creating daily menus or have never learned how to eat healthy, seek the advice of a weight loss specialist or dietitian that can set up a program for your unique needs.

One of the most powerful triggers for emotional eating is food restrictions. When you make things off limits, it is easy to obsess over the deprivation. Willpower only goes so far. All too frequently, you end up overeating off limit foods later on. When you eat the wrong foods, you gain weight and your body requires more fuel to burn, so you eat more. By changing how you think about food, you can change how you act and react for the most positive health benefits.

Since insulin only burns carbohydrates, your body starts to crave carbs. In turn, this launches a vicious cycle that must be broken in order for you to lose more weight. Since stable blood sugar levels equate to stable stress hormone production, eating nutrient rich foods may help heal the body rather than simply mask symptoms. Nonetheless, unmanaged stress often causes the body's self-control systems to fail.