1. Do your homework. As you start your weight loss plan, take time to carefully evaluate your situation. What caused weight gain? Pregnancy? Inactivity? Overeating and binging? Emotions? There are many triggers in our lives that will cause us to gain weight. Some can be prevented or eliminated, some can’t. It’s important as you begin your weight loss to understand and come to grips with cause of your weight. Be honest with yourself. Don’t cheat on this one. Obviously, you want to have your weight loss become permanent.

In order to keep off weight in future, you may have to make some lifestyle changes to stay slim. Don’t give up before you start. There’s usually more than one solution to any weight gain reason. Just remain open-minded, and be willing to change to get results you desire. Don’t hesitate to read and learn as much as you can about weight gain. It’s really easy to understand, and you may be surprised at what you learn.

2. Avoid Hidden Calories. Here’s an over simplified version of weight loss and weight maintenance… if you eat more than your body needs, you gain weight. If you eat less (reduce calories) than your body needs, you lose weight! While it sounds simple enough, just eat less ….Right? Basically that’s true. Yet, there are other things that come into play as one is trying to lose weight. One common mistake many people make as they diet is fact they don’t really understand how much is provided by food they are eating. This is especially true with eating out and eating snack foods and beverages.

A serving as defined by scientific communities on weight loss and a serving that your local restaurant provides is most often very different. For example, one serving of bread is typically one slice. Yet, average bun in a fast food restaurant is actually almost three servings. A single serving of French fries is 15 fries. Just take a guess at how many servings are in a “Biggie” French fry container.

Also, don’t be fooled into thinking just because a bag of popcorn is small, that it’s a single serving. The same thing goes for beverages. The bottle may contain16 oz. Yet, serving size may be 4 ounces. Pay attention to actually how many servings of food and beverages you are actually consuming. The amount may surprise you.

I’ll give you an example, my son-in-law who’s 28 was had put on several pounds. His favorite cola is Mountain Dew. Mountain Dew has higher sugar content than most other cola’s. He didn’t have a clue as to how may calories he was consuming by drinking 3 or 4 24 oz bottles a day. When my daughter told him, he was amazed. He replaced cola with water and went from a 38” waist to a 34” waist in about two months. Be careful, you may be consuming more than you think.

Before you spend lots of hard earned cash on weight loss pills and potents, and hours and hours trying to find perfect solution to your needs… Let’s examine some basic facts about why we gain weight and why we lose weight. Don’t despair, there are some truly good products available to help you lose weight. But, before you go out and start buying diet pills, there’s a few basic facts you need to understand.

Usually overeating causes weight gain or being obese, but in rare cases (about 1%) excess weight gain is a symptom of another disease. Three of most common diseases that can cause weight gain are hypothyroidism, Cushing’s syndrome and depression. Certain medications, notably anti-depressants, steroid medications, certain high blood pressure drugs, and seizure medications can also cause increased body weight. A doctor can determine if any of these conditions are responsible for your weight gain. Weight gain and weight loss has basically three components; 1) nutrition (the food you eat) and 2) Stored energy (the amount of fat in your body) and 3) level of activity (what you do each day). Everything we eat is either a) used for energy b) stored as fat for future needs or 3) eliminated from body through wastes. Another factor that has a heavy impact on amount of weight you gain is your metabolism or rate at which your body processes food you eat. Not everyone has same rate of metabolism.

Everyone’s metabolism is just a bit different. I’m sure you know people who can eat whatever they want, whenever they want it and yet still don’t seem to gain weight. Then there’s those who seemingly can just smell food and gain weight. Their rate of metabolism is what makes difference. The person that can eat anything and still maintain a healthy weight has a higher rate of metabolism, than person who gains weight easily.

The amount of energy produced by food is measured by calories. A calorie is defined as amount of heat required to raise temperature of 1 gram of water by 1 degree centigrade at atmospheric pressure. It’s easier to think of in terms of food you eat being converted to energy. For example, something containing 120 calories has more available energy than something containing only 50 calories does.