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7 Unusual Tips to Help You Lose Weight

You might have heard of some of them before: chew your food longer; use smaller plates; put your knife and fork down between bites. They are the somewhat “unconventional” – meaning they don’t have anything to do with forcing yourself to eat less or exercise more – tactics and tips for helping you to manage your weight.

And they work. Chewing your food longer helps to slow down fast eating. When you gobble down dinner too quickly, your body doesn’t have time to register that it’s full, so you tend to overeat. You also extend your eating time by putting down your knife and fork between bites. And, whether they are bigger or smaller, we tend to fill up our plates with food. Smaller plates mean less food in a single plate full.

While these sorts of tips and tricks might seem somewhat out-of-the-ordinary, they are part of a weight loss direction that many dieters haven’t grasped. There is no one single magical way to lose weight. Instead, living at a healthier weight comes from a variety of different factors, the combination of which is unique to you. The more tactics you know about, the better your chance of finding those that work for you.

Without further ado, try some of the following tips:

1. Put a Mirror in the Dining Room

University of Chicago research found that when people ate junk food in front of mirror, they tended to eat less. But when they ate healthy food in front of a mirror, they felt better about themselves and enjoyed their vegetables more.

2. Wash the Dishes

We told you before about a study that proved a cluttered kitchen with a sink full of dirty dishes leads to overeating. Participants ate twice as much of the snack food set out in the dirty kitchen versus when the snack food was set out in a clean kitchen.

3. Pay Cash

Whether it’s junk food or healthy food, or anything else for that matter, you tend to consider the purchase more when you see the cold, hard cash actually leaving your pocket. In the case of junk food, you’ll buy less when paying for it with cash.

4. Turn the Lights Down Low

A study presented in Psychological Reports found that those who ate in darker lighting enjoyed their meals more, spent longer eating their meals and ate 18% fewer calories than those who ate in brighter conditions.

5. Choose Your Movies Carefully

Many of us eat as an emotional response to both positive and negative moods and thoughts. So it only makes sense that one study found that its participants ate 25% to 55% more buttered popcorn during tear-jerkers and action movies, versus comedies and TV talk shows.

6. Use Colourful Dishes

Who would have thought that the dishes you eat from could influence how much you eat in so many different ways? The Journal of Consumer Research discovered that people exercise more control over the portion sizes on their plates when the colour of the food on the plate contrasted with the colour of the plate. And if you don’t want to keep a whole lot of different dish sets to (not) go with whatever you are eating, another study found that we perceive the portions to be larger on blue-rimmed plates.

7. Get Your Food Freak on Sundays

“Cheat days” can be beneficial for weight loss as they take the edge off of changing your diet by letting you eat anything you like for one day a week. But many people choose Saturdays as cheat day; a day on which they do more socializing, stay up later and tend to be less vigilant about what they eat. All of which adds up to more eating. If you move your cheat day to Sunday, you’ll probably eat less, even though you can eat whatever you want.

The nutrition consultants at Herbal One know lots of healthy, creative ways to help you lose weight and keep it off. Call or visit us today.

 

If you have any questions or concerns, stop by, call, or email your Herbal One centre and our qualified counsellors will be happy to give you tips and some great ideas that will help reach your weight loss goals.

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