Most of us wouldn’t mind losing a couple of pounds as it can be difficult to keep a check on our weight if we have a busy lifestyle. We may have bad eating habits, don’t do enough or any exercise and this can lead to piling on a few unwanted pounds. Well, all is not lost as we have 10 easy ways to burn fat without exercise!
Don’t Eat Too Late
It really isn’t a good idea to eat just before you go to bed because that’s going to up your calories. As a rule of thumb, eat before 9pm and this should help. Apart from the fact that it isn’t a good idea to go to bed on a full stomach, if you’re eating late there’s a chance you’ve already eaten enough for the day and this extra is just excess.
Late night eating can often be as a result of habit, or even boredom rather than hunger. If this is the case, there’s a good chance that doing it will lead to putting on weight. If you set a deadline of 9pm (if you go to bed at an average time), you’ll avoid eating for the sake of it and this will help with keeping your weight in balance.
Reduce Alcohol Intake
There are lots of reasons why alcohol intake should be reduced, even if you’re not a heavy drinker. If you want to lose some weight, it’s a no brainer because we all know alcohol is high in calories and cutting down can make a significant difference to your daily calorie intake.
Cutting it out altogether is best but keeping it in moderation will also help. Another problem often associated with drinking alcohol is that it can encourage us to eat more junk food. Perhaps a packet of crisps/chips or even a sneaky burger and fries. It’s amazing how alcohol can make you feel hungry and then start to put on the pounds.
Drink Lots of Water
Our body is made up of about 60% water, so it’s important to us. It keeps us alive, it makes skin quality better, helps to rid our body of toxins and improves our metabolism. It also helps with weight loss because it can help us to distinguish between real hunger and hunger due to boredom. Yes, boredom hunger is a real thing and can be a major cause of putting on weight.
Drinking a glass of water when you feel hungry will help you to know if your body really needs to eat food. This might sound odd, but it can be easy to mistake dehydration for hunger so if you re-hydrate you’ll know if you’re actually hungry or not. Of course it’s important to keep yourself hydrated because your body needs fluids to survive, but water is also a good way to keep a check on hunger.
Don’t Skip Sleep
The amount of sleep we need varies from person to person, but generally 6 – 8 hours a night is about average. If you don’t get enough it causes stress to your body and this can affect hunger related hormones. Stress causes a particular hormone level to increase and this is related to gaining weight.
On the other hand, a lack of sleep can slow down the metabolism which then causes the body to use less energy for things like breathing and eating. This slows down the rate of calorie burn and so might lead to some weight gain. It’s important to keep your hormones in balance with the right amount of sleep each night, so aim for at least 6 hours to make sure your metabolism and appetite are normal.
Interval Training
Although we’re including this as one of the 10 ways to burn fat without exercise, it does involve some short bursts of it. Interval workouts are a series of low to high intensity exercises with rest periods in between. Whilst this is obviously exercise, it isn’t like doing a full-on training or exercise.
This type of activity will speed up your metabolism and as a result increase your calorie burning process. It’s a simple process with a higher metabolism leading to a higher calorie burn and that means losing some weight. By doing this type of training your body continues to lose weight after you’ve finished the workout, so it does qualify as losing weight without exercising! A 15 – 20 minute daily routine should make a big difference.
Drinking Coffee
There have been many reports over the years which conflict each other with how good or bad coffee is for you. Truth is, it’s both! The caffeine it contains is a stimulant which can cause problems for some people and also make it difficult to sleep. It also stimulates a release of fatty acids into the bloodstream, which gives you energy to be able to train more intensely and for longer. Another factor is that it can suppress your appetite, encouraging you to eat less.
Coffee is also high in antioxidants which help to reduce the risk of developing many diseases. It has very few calories, although adding milk and sugar will increase them. When you’re dieting, drink coffee black with no sugar and it can be a useful part of the process.
Go to Work on an Egg
Eggs are full of protein so are a good start to the day. Having eggs for breakfast will help to stop you thinking about unhealthily snaking during the day. Having them poached, boiled or scrambled can help you to lose up to two thirds more weight. The reason for this is that they make you feel fuller for longer and therefore tend to eat less during the day.
Adding yogurt to your breakfast will help as it is high in proteins and will also keep your hunger at bay. This confirms what’s always been said about breakfast being the most important meal of the day. It obviously means eating the right things, but high protein eggs and yogurt will stop you from getting hungry again too quickly.
Plan for Snacking
Whatever you eat and however strict you are with yourself, you’re bound to get hungry at some point which makes it difficult to resist snaking during the day. But if you plan for these moments, you can keep on top of it. Carry some healthy, low calorie foods with you, things such as an apple or a pack of almonds.
If you’re carrying some little healthy extras with you, you’re less likely to buy unhealthy calorie-loaded foods when you start to feel hungry. Advanced planning can help to improve your health and also help with your weight loss.
Keep a Record of What You Eat
By making a note of everything you eat, you’ll know exactly how you’re doing and you can keep the balance right. Research has shown than writing down what you eat helps with losing more weight than those who don’t make a note of it. One study showed that those who kept a food diary for 6 days a week lost around twice as much as weight than those who recorded it one day a week or less.
It’s a simple fact, making this change to your lifestyle – keeping a food diary, could double your weight loss. If you start it, you’ll probably find it makes a big difference.
Get in the Morning Sun
There’s been a lot of press about how bad the sun’s rays are for us and whilst this is true, they do give us essential Vitamin E and help to reduce our body mass index. The early morning sunlight (before noon) is best for this.
Your BMI can accurately estimate your total body fat, so if you can reduce it, you’re bound to lose weight. There are various ways to reduce your BMI, but if you’re lucky enough to live in a climate where you get some morning sunshine, it’s not a bad way to do it and you might lose a few pounds too. Perhaps this is the most enjoyable of our 10 easy ways to burn fat without exercise!