8 Tips for a Healthy Weight and Active Life

Need inspiration for how to achieve a healthy weight and improve your fitness? We’ve put together top tips, based on the latest research.

The effectiveness of HIIT has been confirmed in numerous studies over the past few years, with Science Daily summarizing the results of a 2013 clinical study of HIIT: “Inactive people can achieve major health and fitness gains in a fraction of the time.”

One of the ways HIIT increases fitness levels is by promoting post-exercise oxygen consumption , which means you burn more calories, even after your workout is over.

There are numerous interval workouts online to try out.

2. Don’t forget to strength train.
Too often, we focus on aerobic exercise – think jogging, cycling, and using the elliptical machine at the gym – and neglect strength training (also called resistance training). This is a huge mistake, as strength training has been shown to control belly fat ; ease lower back pain ; improve glucose control ; improve cognitive function , including memory ; and decrease the risk of osteoporosis. Scientists have yet to determine whether it will make your mother-in-law like you, but it probably won’t hurt.

Lifting weights is a method of strength training, as is using the resistance of your own body, such as when you do certain yoga poses.

3. Eat the rainbow.
Include lots of colorful vegetables and fruit in your meals and snacks. Michael Pollan encapsulates this idea in one of the shortest diet plans ever: “ Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.”

The “eat food” part means eating real food, not the stuff we’ve created in the last century (ahem, Twinkies). Highly processed food should be avoided – the longer the list of ingredients, the more processed the food is.

Fill out your diet with lean protein and going easy on the carbohydrates, especially simple (and often highly processed) ones like bread.

4. Go to bed.

In research studies, people who had not had enough sleep ate 260 – 550 extra calories a day! Sleep deprivation may increase your risk for obesity and diabetes. Adults should sleep for 7-8 hours every night.

5. Practice a technique known as precommitment to avoid overtaxing your ability to make good choices.
Impulse control, the skill that keeps you from eating an entire box of Girl Scout cookies in one sitting, requires mental energy. You know what else requires mental energy? Pretty much any decision, from picking out what shoes to wear to whether to ask for a raise at work. (Many highly successful people are noted for wearing similar clothes every day – Steve Jobs’ iconic black mock turtleneck shirt is one example – so they can focus on decisions that are more important.)

Precommitment is planning beforehand (like Steve Jobs) how to minimize energy-tapping decisions and preserve impulse control. Make it easier for yourself to make good choices by practicing precommitment, especially during times like the evening when you are fatigued from a long day. On the weekend, cut up veggies to have on hand for dinners. Tell the waiter not to bring out the bread basket when you go to a restaurant after work.

And a tip you can really enjoy: eat your Girl Scout cookies with breakfast. Seriously. In one study , participants who ate dessert with their high carbohydrate, high protein breakfast lost more weight than those who ate smaller breakfasts and larger dinners. Having a slice of cake in the morning may take away the temptation to eat half a cake at night after a day of eating yogurt and fruit.

Read more here about precommitment.

6. Find an app for that.

It can be difficult to keep track of our wellness progress during the day. Plus, tallying calories uses valuable mental energy (see above!). Let an app do the hard work for you. MyFitness Pal will track both your diet and exercise. Other helpful apps include SparkPeople and Noom.

You can also download apps that monitor your heart rate while you exercise. Instant Heart Rate by Azumio is a good one. Remember that exercise intensity is important. A good goal is to keep your heart rate between 70-85% of your maximum rate. A rule of thumb for determining your maximum heartbeats per minute is subtracting your age from 220. ( Click here to learn more about gauging your target heart rate during exercise.)

7. Identify your goals and make a realistic timeline.

The Mayo Clinic helpfully points out that we need to make two types of goals for successful weight loss: a process goal and an outcome goal. “Lose 30 pounds” is an outcome goal – the result you want. “Exercise every day” is a process goal – what you are going to do to achieve results.

Determine the results you want, then identify changes in your habits that can make them possible.

Here’s an obvious truth that we often ignore: if you consistently fall short of your goals, you need to set a new goal, one you can accomplish! If you’ve spent two weeks trying and failing to exercise every day, make exercising twice a week your new goal. When that becomes a habit, make a new goal of three times a week, and so on until you are able to exercise every day. Your timeline for reaching your goal may become longer, but your results will be sustainable and your overall health better as you work with yourself, not against yourself.

Or maybe you need to change your definition of what counts. Thirty continuous minutes of exercise may not be doable at first, but three 10 minute walks at different times throughout the day might be perfect for your current health level and schedule, and something you can manage every day.

8. Make a chiropractic appointment .
Our providers at Balance Chiropractic and Physical Therapy can support weight loss by providing diet and exercise recommendations and managing any injuries that occur, so you can keep your momentum going.

What tips have you found that help you achieve your health and fitness goals? Please share them in the comments or join us on Facebook to discuss with others interested in lifelong wellness!