Many people’s New Year’s resolutions involve the goal of bettering their physical health in some way or another. According to statisticbrain.com, the top resolution of 2017 was to eat healthier and/or to lose weight. Out of a desire for instant gratification, it is very common for people to turn to fad diets and other extreme methods of weight loss that can end up harming their physical and mental health.
Anytime someone makes an immediate and dramatic change to their lifestyle, those alterations become nearly impossible to maintain for any extended period of time. The point of a New Year’s resolution is to set a goal(s) for the new year. It doesn’t have to be achieved in the first week, or even the first month. If you choose to partake in yearly goal setting, make sure the goals you set for yourself are achievable and have a realistic time frame. By doing otherwise, you run the risk of setting yourself up for failure and damaging your self-esteem; this is quite the opposite of a New Year’s resolution’s purpose.
If you are one of the millions of Americans hoping to get healthier in 2017, keep these tips in mind to ensure that all your efforts are safe and that they pay off in the end.
1. Think about your life and any bad habits you have that could be preventing you from feeling as healthy as you’d like to. “A successful plan for weight loss is often one that is tailored to an individual’s lifestyle and other personal factors,” says Rachael Rettner, senior writer for livescience.com. Even if your goal doesn’t have anything to do with losing weight, any goal to get healthy always starts with you. Working out and dieting with friends can be a great motivation tool, as long you don’t automatically match your plans with theirs. Personalize your goals, and then hold each other accountable for achieving the targets you set for yourselves.
2. Start small. There are two big reasons why small lifestyle changes are better than drastic ones. Small changes are much more sustainable. While they may not produce instant results, they virtually always create the best results in the long run. “For example, Oprah Winfrey famously lost 67 lbs. (30 kg) on a diet that allowed her to consume just 420 calories a day, only to later regain the weight,” Rettner explains.
Secondly, gradual diets lose/maintain weight by affecting the right parts of the body. “If you lose weight very rapidly, on a diet like a cleanse, then you’re going to lose excess muscle,” says Dr. Louis Aronne, director of the Comprehensive Weight Control Center at Weill-Cornell Medical College in New York. The scale might read a lower number, but what the scale won’t show you is that your health was also compromised.
3. Get enough sleep. If you get home late after a busy day and realize you didn’t have any time to exercise, your best bet may just be to skip the workout and head straight for bed. Studies show that along with the plethora of other health benefits sleep provides, it can also aid in weight loss. You still burn calories while you’re asleep. And if you don’t get enough sleep, there’s a good chance you’ll feel hungrier the next day. “Getting too little sleep, which most experts define as less than seven hours of shut-eye per night, may increase levels of an appetite-stimulating hormone called ghrelin, and decrease levels of the hormone leptin, which makes you feel full, according to the NIH,” Rettner wrote. Don’t feel lazy for maximizing your sleep time; your body is doing more for your health than you think.
Source: http://www.livescience.com/52992-weight-loss-safely-be-healthy.html
