If you want to lose weight and keep it off you have to be smart about it. If a diet promises fast weight loss or says you can eat as much as you want of one type of food as long as you omit others, it may not be the healthiest diet plan. While there is no specific smart people diet, finding a diet that includes foods you like and can follow for life is the smartest diet.
Diet Basics
To lose weight, you need to eat fewer calories than you burn. All diets restrict your calorie intake in one way or another. The trick to losing weight and keeping it off is finding a diet plan that you can follow for the rest of your life that helps you balance your calorie intake. A good diet choice should be easy for you to follow, fit your lifestyle and most importantly include foods you enjoy eating.
Food Choices
Food choices do count when it comes to eating smart. You can lose weight eating just junk food as long as you stay within your calorie weight-loss goals. But to make your body function at its best, you need to feed it right. Good food choices on a smart diet plan include fruits, vegetables, lean sources of protein such as fish, poultry and tofu and low-fat or nonfat dairy products. These foods are also low in calories, allowing you to eat a greater volume of food to help satisfy your appetite while still staying within your calorie range for weight loss.
Activity
A smart people diet should also include activity. Increasing your daily exercise helps you burn more calories to aid in your weight loss efforts. Regular exercise may also allow you to eat a little more and still lose weight. To lose one pound of fat a week you need to reduce your daily calorie intake by 500 calories. Or, you can reduce your daily calorie intake by 250 calories and exercise to burn the additional 250 calories.
Realistic Goals
When it comes to losing weight and keeping it off, you need to keep your weight loss goals realistic. Even losing as little as 5 to 10 percent of your current body weight can help improve blood pressure and reduce your risk of heart disease, says the Harvard School of Public Health. A slow weight loss of 1 to 2 pounds a week is a healthy and realistic goal. Losing more than 2 pounds a week means you are losing water and muscle, not fat.
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