To figure the number of calories you need we will have to find your Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR). Your BMR is the number of calories you’d burn over 24 hours while laying down, but not sleeping. Your actual metabolic rate is estimated by adding the caloric cost of all the activities you engage in throughout the day to your BMR. There are two steps to determining your BMR and 3 steps for the entire equation. First use equation in Step One. Second, find your “lean factor” in Step 2, and multiply the number you obtain in the equation below by the lean factor multiplier. This is the number of calories you burn at rest each day, or your BMR.

First you need to calculate your body weight in kilograms. To find weight in kilograms, divide the body weight in pounds by 2.2.

*For our 200 pound male that would be 2.2 / 200 = 90.9 kilograms

Step 1:
For Men: 1 x body weight in kilograms x 24 = ______________
For Women: .9 x body weight in kilograms x 24 =_______________

Step 2:
Lean Factor Percent Body Fat Multiplier:
1. Men 10-14%; Women 14-18% 1.0
2. Men 14-20%; Women 18-28% .95
3. Men 20-28%; Women 28-38% .90
4. Men over 28%; Women over 38% .85

*Example: Sex: Male Weight: 200 pounds (90.9 kilograms) Body fat: 15%

Step 1: 1 x 90.9 x 24 = 2182
Step 2: 2182 x .95 = 2073

BMR = 2073 calories per day

Note: To determine your average hourly BMR divide your BMR by 24.
*In our example: 2073 divided by 24 = 86.4 calories/hour.

Step 3:
Now that you know your BMR, the final step in determining your daily caloric expenditure is to factor in your daily activity. Obviously, activity means you are going to burn more calories. Find where you fall in the activity categories below and multiply your daily BMR by the number on the left of your range to find out your daily caloric expenditure.

*Example: Using the same 200 pound male with a daily BMR of 2073 calories per day, we determine that he is mostly sedentary during the day with the exception of some jogging and about 40 minutes of weight training. This would put him in the activity category of 1.65 or 165% of his BMR.

*Total daily caloric expenditure = 2073 calories x 1.65 = 3420 calories

The average couch potato range:
1.30 = Very light: sitting, studying, talking, little walking or other activities through out the day
1.55 = Light: Typing, teaching, lab/shop work, some walking throughout the day

The average fitness buff range:
1.55 =Light: Typing, teaching, lab/shop work, some walking throughout the day
1.65 =Moderate: Walking, jogging, gardening, type job with activities such as cycling, tennis, dancing, skiing, or weight training 1-2 hours per day

The average athlete or hard daily training range:
1.80 =Heavy: heavy manual labor such as digging, climbing, with activities such as football, soccer, or body building 2-4 hours/day.
2.00 =Very heavy: A combination of moderate and heavy activity 8 or more hours per day, plus 2-4 hours of intense training per day

When figuring your total daily caloric expenditure and you do not know your body fat percentage, guess your body fat percentage. The average person’s activity level who exercises at a gym regularly is 1.55 or 1.65.

*Our 200 pound male with 15% body fat should keep his caloric intake below 3420 calories on high level activity days like the days he hits the gym. And keep it below 3213 calories on low level activity days if he wants to lose weight.

The best way to keep track of calorie intake is to write it down. If you have time to eat it you have time to write it down. It has been proven time and time again that keeping a food journal will help you succeed in diet.

Have questions? You can find me and answers to your questions at www.anybodyfitnesstexas.com Watch for upcoming articles about how much protein, carbohydrates and fats you need in your diet. This is related to your caloric expenditure so refer to this article later. You will also need to change this number as you lose weight. This number is not just important for weight loss but also for what types of things you need in your diet daily for general good health.

Have a healthy day! Kathie

Article Source

It all depends on a great deal of factors, and the sum total of those, the ratios, the combinations, are always different for everyone, always individualized.

Your metabolism, your body temperature, the number of years you have spent being fat, the amount of daily stress, the region you live in - all these contribute to how soon your body will start responding to the program and how long it will take you to finally become fit. If you’ve been a “big girl” for over ten years, you should not expect to be ready to audition for American Ballet Company within three weeks of starting a weight management program.

Be reasonable. Weight management can only work if you’re calm, judicious, and patient. Impatience, frustration, panic - all those are recipes for disaster.

Another thing you should remember is that GRADUAL change is healthier and produces more permanent results. If you’ve been a “big girl” for quite some time, chances are your body has grudgingly made some adjustments over the years (against its own better judgment) - and it doesn’t trust you anymore. It might have to take some time to convince it that you are actually serious about weight management this time.

Don’t try to shock it. Don’t scare it. In weight management, slow yet steady usually wins the race.

Article Source

You might think that the last sentence was somewhat controversial. In order to clarify any misunderstanding let’s discover the root of unhealthy weight gain: poor metabolism. NOTE: some of you may have a condition (such as hypothyroidism) that may require more than the methods I will list here, but for the most part, poor metabolism for the rest of us is caused by two factors (no, one of them is NOT genetics): poor activity and poor eating habits.

To correct this type of weight gain you can either embark on a home exercise weight loss program, or change your diet, or both. Now I know this may seem like I am contradicting myself from what I said earlier regarding the exercise component. Of course I never said that exercise is ineffective. I implied that exercise is not the BEST method to lose weight.

The reason is simple, and is based on the amount of calories required for you to lose weight. The exercise that you would have to do in order to accomplish this is VERY intense. Not all folks can handle this. Basically you would have to be in shape in order to be in shape in order to exercises that will in turn help you do some more brutally intense exercises to help you lose weight.

Do some TV shows where overweight people exercise to death freak you out? It should. Why? Because they’re too hard, that’s why! You would need the help of fitness trainer for that. This is not why you visited this page, unless you wanted to hire a fitness to train in your own home, which I doubt is why you come here also.

Now how about changing your eating habits? Well anyone can do that effectively and cheaply. You just have to be informed of the right way to do it and, most importantly, ACT on it.

If you are unsure of the best way to go about this, you can gain access to information on how without a home exercise weight loss program here. You will discover that, thankfully, no fads, no hocus pocus, no unsafe or unhealthy forms of weight loss are needed. Also, no “special” recipes or shakes are needed to lose weight. So what is?

In a nutshell, to effectively lose weight you would have to eliminate the bad foods from your diet and start eating good foods. I know this sounds cliché-ic but it is true. You don’t have to eliminate carbs or fats or proteins from your diet, or resort to certain cleanses (Candida, colon, etc.) to accomplish this. You just have to learn to select, make and eat the right types of foods that are body-friendly.

With that being said, the rest of us have lost weight or can lose weight using this method. Wish you the best of luck doing it - cause you CAN do it!

Article Source

You have the power in your own mind to turn your current situation around so that you are trim and healthy and happy in your own soon to be more shrunken skin. Are you ready to fight the battle of the bulge? You only have to defeat the negative thoughts coming from your mind. You need to break the patterns and habits that you have let yourself slide into.

It’s very simple, it’s just not easy. You have to want it, but it’s worth it, so here we go. 5 surefire ways to win the battle of your bulge.

1. Start your weight loss program now. Today. After you’ve finished reading this, put pen to paper and work out the structure of how you will change your eating and exercise patterns and get into it. Do not wait for some “significant” date or time. There is a pub I know well in a tiny outback Queensland town that advertises “Free Beer Tomorrow”. At first viewing, everyone gets excited, but the sign never changes and tomorrow never comes. Start your diet and exercise program today.
2. Care about yourself. Care enough to put the fork down and back away from the table. “I shouldn’t be eating this, but who cares?” is deadly for your diet and more importantly, for your self esteem. You have to love yourself. Care enough about yourself to take on board a bit of tough self love.
3. Embrace hunger pangs. So what if you are not feeling full, you don’t have to keep eating until you need to undo your top button and let down your zip - honestly, it’s not a good look. Hunger pangs mean that your body is dipping into it’s fat reserves and having a good chew - that’s what you want, so welcome a few complaints from your flabby tummy. Remember it takes around 20 minutes for the food you have in your mouth right now to settle in your stomach so eat slowly and pause before you gorge yourself and regret it (again) later.
4. Forgive yourself when you digress. If you have had a chocky biccy or three at the office morning tea, don’t you be thinking “Woohoo, I really stuffed today up with those biscuits, might as well write the weight control diet off and wolf down a pizza lunch, an afternoon cake and coffee snack, a deep fried dinner and a family block of chocolate for afters”. You need to be thinking something like “Those biscuits were nice, but I can’t do that every day. Best I have a bit longer walk tomorrow to make up for it”. Forgive, but don’t forget and you’ll stay on track.
5. Sever the link between food and reward. So many of us have grown up with sugary, salty, fatty foods waved in front of us as treats or bribes. Food rewards are for Pavlov’s dog. You don’t really want a doggy treat; go for a new novel, a walk on the beach or in the park, a bunch of flowers, some perfume, a trip to the theatre - anything that makes you feel good. Work out (and write down) 4-5 things that are great rewards for you that don’t involve increased cushioning around your hips.

Follow these 5 simple steps, but be prepared to struggle a bit, because you are changing long ingrained habits. Know that you will succeed if you focus on winning the battle of your bulge.

Article Source

Low fat foods have been on the market for a long time, and have been used by many yet our society continues to increase its number of overweight and obese people. If low fat diets are so good why don’t we lose weight? The truth is that eating a purely low fat menu on its own is not the answer to losing weight.

Low calorie dieting suffers too because eating low calories slows down the bodies fat burning engine and ruins the chances of losing weight. You may see some temporary weight loss but starving yourself on low calorie diets is not the answer.

More recently low carbohydrate diets have become popular, but they pose other problems for the dieter. Generally low carbohydrate diets tend to be very stringent and difficult to maintain, and the menus tend to rob your body the energy found in carbohydrates. This loss of energy makes it very difficult to keep to the strict routine required and soon give up.

Organized weight loss programs along with the special foods or supplements sold in these courses usually get less dramatic results in the short term and are less likely to be harmful because of the controlled manner in which they work, along with a carefully thought out exercise plan.

You get fat by eating the wrong foods at the wrong times of the day. You can lose weight quickly by eating the right foods at the right times of the day. You don’t have to starve yourself to lose weight. The secret to regular and safe weight loss is by alternating every known calorie type in a programmed sequence. If you maintain your current eating habits you will never lose weight. Your body fat tissue can be and should be burned away regularly. To do this you must learn to eat he correct calorie rich foods in the right sequences and at the right times in order to lose weight and keep it off.

Article Source

Their programs mainly focus upon teaching the victims of obesity the available effective methods for shedding weight. It provides individual attention to their clients by making individual and personal counselling to the customers. The counsellors of these centers will help the client or the person who suffers from obesity to prepare a diet control formula that suits his physique and body nature.

At the centers of LA weight loss control you will get the expert opinions from nutrition experts and persons who have successfully completed the programs to mentally prepare the client for a new healthy life style that demands a lot of sacrifices from the side of the person who wants to get rid of the problems of obesity. A client will be given positive encouragement by providing them with the testimonies of the persons who have successfully undergone weight loss programs .

These centers make it mandatory to subject the clients to a routine medical check up before they start their weight shedding program in order to make sure that the clients are healthy enough to follow the life style going to be prescribed by the center. This medical examination includes blood test and verification of the medical records of the person intending to avail the service of the center.

Once the clients have undergone these medical examinations they will be asked by the center to attend three consecutive counselling sessions organised by the center. It will take three weeks to complete the counselling sessions by the center.

The duration of the LA weight loss program is twelve months. These twelve months will be divided in to three phases consisting of weight loss, stabilise and maintenance. The center offers a money back guarantee if the client fails to achieve to goal. This offer of money back is not applicable to persons who have not purchased the costly dietary supplements available at the centers .

Basically these centers focus more on marketing its costly dietary supplements meant for reducing over weight of the body. They also offer some discounts on these costly products if long term supplies are purchased by the clients.

Article Source

If you’re packing twenty or more pounds of excess weight, here is a short list of potentially deadly conditions you’re at greater risk suffering from:

• diabetes
• high blood pressure
• coronary heart disease
• endometrial cancer
• obstructive sleep apnea
• breast cancer

If you’re one to avoid exercising at any cost, guess what? LAck of exercise only multiplies the risk of suffering from the things in the above list of afflictions. Plainly stated: being overweight is bad, but being overweight and not working out in the least is much, much worse.

Living a inactive lifestyle while being fat only positions you to be in higher jeopardy of cardiovascular disease and other illnesses. And, if you already have a medical condition such as high cholesterol, being overweight positions you at higher risk for complications.

Even modest quantities of weight loss can ameliorate your overall wellness. Loss of a meager 10% of body weight can keep down blood pressure, high cholesterol, triglyceride, and high blood sugar levels. E.g., if you weighed 300 pounds, getting down to 270 would make you significantly fitter.

The good thing is that the process of losing weight doesn’t have to be brutal. Nowadays, there are a lot of procedures at your finger tips that can contribute and effectively facilitate your weight loss. One of the noted procedures in losing weight is slimming down through hypnosis.

However, numerous misconceptions have come up with respect to the practical application of hypnosis in slimming down. And because it doesn’t call for drugs or any kind of medicines or surgical operations, a lot of people are inclined to think that losing weight through hypnosis appears to be among the safest weight loss program.

To know more about hypnosis and its effects on slimming down, here are three very important truths that will give you insight on what it can do to your body weight.

1. Hypnosis can be imminently risky if not done the right way and not applied by people who are highly disciplined with the genuine concept of hypnosis.

   More people tend to believe that hypnosis won’t present impending risk to their wellness. It’s crucial for you to realize that the individual who will arrange the process is a highly-skilled professional that knows what factors to look at prior to executing the procedures.

2. Hypnosis cannot exclusively get rid of extra fatty tissue from the body and, consequently, cause somebody to lose weight.

   Most wellness experts argue that hypnosis should only make up a piece of a complete process. It should never be exploited as an exclusive weight loss procedure.

   Furthermore, one session of hypnosis will just have very marginal results on a person’s weight. When slimming down, hypnosis paired with psychotherapy will be more efficient than hypnosis exclusively. This is because hypnosis is just a state of deeply relaxing the mind, in which one can still be in control of his or her own body.

3. Hypnosis is one way of getting into the subliminal state of a person. When you’re in a “hypnotic trance”, your body is more sensitive to suggestibility because of its heightened state of concentration. However, this doesn’t necessarily mean that through hypnosis, you are able to “reprogram” your mind just using hypnosis.

   Actually, hypnosis can only run the range from being an untroubled relaxation condition to a proper initiation when managed by a professional hypnotists. Therefore, it shouldn’t be looked at as being supernormal and witching in its effects. Put differently, it just helps you enter the “weight-losing zone”. Boiled down, you had better be mindful that hypnosis isn’t an effective process in slenderizing when applied alone. It’s more of a facilitator of several treatment techniques.

Consequently, it should be blended with your other weight loss management programs to be more efficient in making you drop off excess weight. In that way, you are able to drop off more weight with a more mellow and rested frame of mind.

Article Source

As a waitress I walked countless miles to and from the customer’s table and the kitchen. In my youth I spent many hours burning them in the sun. Over the past 20 something years I’ve cut them with dull razorblades repeatedly and either slathered them with chemicals to fry off the hair or allowed someone else to cover them with hot wax to rip it off. Never once did I look at them and say, “thanks for being there for me, I love you.” This week was different.

I’ve been talking a lot about the importance of being grateful for your body lately and I took my own lesson to heart. I was laying in a hot tub with epsom salt after 2 grueling hours of roller derby practice. Everything ached. I had just eaten a meal so my stomach was a little fuller and rounder than usual. My most common reaction to seeing my protruding belly is to suck it in, worry about it, obsess on it, vow to do sit-ups or allow any number of thoughts to race through my mind that signify and reinforce my unhappiness with it. I decided right then to switch up the pace and to focus on a part of my body that I loved. It was my legs.

You see, despite the aches and pains I was nursing in the tub that night, I experience great joy from roller skating and pushing my physical limits. The 2-hours of skating I just completed was 120 minutes of exhilaration, challenge and fun all of which I could not have experienced were it not for my wonderful legs. Oh sure, I have cellulite, stretch marks and even some spider veins and you know what else? I have thighs of steel! These legs of mine can skate. These legs can take me some fun and amazing places.

Just when I was beginning to flood with positive feelings about my legs and all they had done for me in just a couple of hours, I began to think of the years of dancing, gymnastics, swimming, hiking, walking and numerous other activities that all bring me joy and that would not be possible without my wonderful legs. Not only that, I’ve never had a serious injury in my legs, knees, feet or toes. Even some of my younger teammates battle with things like knee problems, ankle problems and serious blisters on their feet. I am fortunate enough to say those issues don’t plague me today and thank goodness for that!

By the time I thought of all these reasons to love my legs I was downright teary eyed and filled with joy. I forgot completely about my round belly and in some ways, I felt like a kid again…only with a few more aches and pains.

I plan to love my legs a lot more often from now on and I’m looking forward to the many years of adventure we will experience together from here on out.

Article Source

According to the Law of Attraction, you’re a giant magnet constantly attracting into your life whatever you think about. If you apply this understanding to weight loss, it follows that your thoughts and beliefs determine whether the food you eat adds pounds or subtracts them. Therefore, if you continue to THINK of yourself as overweight, you will continue to BE overweight even if you work out at the gym every day and eat like a bird. As you deliberately direct your thoughts toward being thin and sleek, you will become thin and sleek. To BE thin, THINK thin.

Here’s Deanna’s story: “My sister is as skinny as a stick and always complains that she can’t gain weight. She takes supplements to gain weight and eats cheesecake for breakfast, but she can’t gain weight. Then I thought of the overweight people I know who complain that they just look at food and gain weight. Many of these overweight people claim to eat very little and I believe them. It became so clear to me that it’s our thoughts that keep us skinny or make us heavy - not the food. We don’t need to change what we eat. We need to change what we think.”

“Change your thoughts and you change your world.” - Norman Vincent Peale

Thoughts are the building blocks of our lives. Thoughts transmute themselves into their physical equivalent. It is estimated that we think 50,000 thoughts per day. That’s about one thought per waking second. Since you become what you think about, rather than giving up your favorite foods, how about giving up your heavy, negative thoughts!

Lila is a nutritionist. She knows the acid-alkaline balance story. She knows that acidic foods bind to fat to balance pH. She knows that an acidic body attempts to neutralize the acidity by holding on to fat. She had an Aha! Moment when she realized that negative thoughts - like worry, guilt, and fear - create acid in the body. It became clear to Lila that it’s toxic thoughts that cause acidity and weight gain - not food. When she released her habit of dwelling on toxic, anxious thoughts, she naturally desired fresh healthy foods and lost 12 pounds almost overnight.

A slender body is not just for the lucky few. Everything physical starts as non-physical. Everything physical is created in the non-physical workshop called the mind. You can think your way to whatever you desire. You can use your thoughts to design and create the body you’ve always wanted. You can literally THINK YOURSELF THIN!

Article Source

A healthy weight loss diet means eating sensibly and losing no more than 1 or 2 pounds at the most every week over a period of time. Counting the calories that you eat throughout the day and the types of food you eat all go a long way to not only losing weight but also being successful in keeping the weight off. The amount of calories that your body will need and still allow you to lose weight will depend on factors such as your height, sex and current weight.

When going into any weight loss diet it is imperative that you go into it gradually. While it can be tempting to cut down on all the foods you eat, as mentioned earlier this will lead to your body accumulating fat stores when you do eat. Almost all calories counting diets allow you to ease yourself into the diet, including some of the most popular types. There are many ways that you can gradually ease yourself into your new diet and lifestyle. A little thought is all that is needed, for example instead of drinking soft drinks which contain a lot of sugar and additives start drinking water instead. When you put out your food on the plate tell yourself you are going to leave a little and increase the amount you leave every other day.

Learning about portion sizes goes a long way to any successful weight loss diet. It can be surprising how many calories are in a portion. For example if you eat in a fast food restaurant then most people are offered “super size” burgers and meals and these are often one and a half or more portions and contain almost half of your recommended daily calorie intake.

One of the biggest mistakes that the majority of people make when going on it telling themselves they cannot have a certain type of food. By doing this they are doomed to failure from the outset. If you tell yourself you cannot have it then you will almost certainly want it more than ever. A far better way around it is to have your favourite foods but in smaller quantities or reward yourself with a favourite treat for sticking within your daily allowance.

While you should have a goal in mind for the weight you wish to achieve when starting a weight loss diet, being too strict and setting impossible goals means trouble. If you give yourself a tight time span to reach your goals then you are putting yourself under a great deal of pressure which can have an adverse effect.

Article Source