Fat loss is a relatively straightforward process. Burn more calories than you consume, and your body starts breaking down fat to get the energy it needs to function normally.
Of course, simple doesn’t imply easy. The truth is, many people struggle with fat loss precisely because they don’t know how to make the whole process more manageable.
In this post, we’ll go over four simple and actionable techniques you can use for easier and more superior fat loss.
Let’s dive in.
1. Increase Your NEAT
NEAT stands for non-exercise activity thermogenesis and can account for a significant percentage of the calories we burn each day (1). NEAT encompasses everything we do in a day that isn’t dedicated exercise time - brushing our teeth, walking up to the mailbox, and more.
It’s not uncommon to burn hundreds, even thousands of extra calories by taking good care of our NEAT (2).
Here are some fantastic ways to boost NEAT:
· Walk more each day. For example, if you live in Santa Monica, take a daily walk in beautiful Palisades Park.
· Play sports with friends.
· Leave the car at home and walk or bike to different places - the store, bank, and more.
· Ditch the elevator and take the stairs when possible.
2. Practice Intermittent Fasting
Intermittent fasting is an eating schedule where you get to eat during a specific window and then fast for the day’s remainder.
The most popular fasting schedule is the 16:8 - you eat for eight hours and fast for sixteen. The easiest way to apply this is to skip eating in the morning, break your fast around noon (say, 1 pm), and eat your last meal around 8 or 9 pm.
Fasting is by no means a magic bullet for fat loss (3). But condensing your meals into a smaller window allows you to have fewer but larger and more satisfying meals. In doing so, you can experience greater dietary satisfaction, control your hunger more easily, and achieve better results.
3. Load Up On Satiating Foods
According to research, the physiological state of hunger is initiated by the vagus nerve (a cranial nerve that establishes one of the connections between the brain and GI tract) (4, 5). One of the primary factors is the state of fullness of the stomach. If empty, the vagus nerve sends signals to the brain, and hunger ensues.
Hunger also depends on other factors, but a fuller stomach tends to keep us more satiated between meals.
A great way to reduce hunger throughout the day is to load up on satiating foods, including fruits, veggies, lean meats, eggs, soups, and fish. In doing so, we can keep the stomach full for longer and experience less hunger. This would help us deal with caloric restriction more easily and achieve our fat loss goals.
4. Treat Yourself (Within Control)
Many people equate fat loss with a bland and severely-restrictive diet. Sure, this is one way to go if you want quick results. But if you’re looking for superior fat loss that lasts for months and years, you need to do things at a manageable pace. In other words, you need to have some level of dietary freedom.
The best way to make your fat loss diet more sustainable (and prevent yourself from counting the days until it’s over) is to treat yourself within reason. For example, if you love ice cream, have a serving once or twice a week. Account for its calories and fit it into your nutrition.
This will help keep you sane, prevent you from having intense cravings, and allow you to maintain a healthy relationship with food.