How to Lose Weight Without Hitting the Gym

There are so many diets out there that tell you that the only way to lose weight is to follow a highly regimented schedule that dictates exactly what you do and eat throughout the day. While some of these diets might work in the short term, in the long run, it is likely you will end up putting on all the weight that you managed to lose.

The key to sustained weight loss is patience; healthy weight loss does not happen overnight; it takes time. In order to sustain weight loss over time, you need to find a routine that works for you. There is no point forcing yourself to go to the gym if you don’t enjoy it because it is unlikely you will keep up this habit long term. Finding weight loss  habits that suit you, that you enjoy will help you to both lose weight and keep the weight off.

Drink More Water

It is very easy for people to confuse feelings of dehydration with feelings of hunger. When you are dehydrated, your liver does not receive the amount of water that it requires to properly produce glycogens that provide you with energy. This means that being dehydrated can make you feel fatigued and crave energy sources, like sugary foods.

To prevent eating that is caused by dehydration, you should aim to drink between six to eight glasses of water every day. Drinking enough water will help to keep your body healthy, your mind functioning at its best, and your metabolism running throughout the day.

Grow Your Own Fruits and Vegetables

Growing your own fruits and vegetables is a great way to get your body moving and burning calories without even realizing it. While it might not seem like a big calorie burner, gardening can be very beneficial for weight loss. Planting seeds can burn 162 calories per 30 minutes, mowing the lawn can burn 243 calories per 30 minutes, and just watering the garden with a hose can burn 91 calories per thirty minutes.

Growing your own fruits and vegetables not only helps you to lose weight because it promotes physical activity, but it also encourages you to eat a more healthy and balanced diet. Since you have gone to all the work of growing your own fruit and vegetables, you are much more likely to include them in your meals. Unless you live in a very hot climate, you will probably need a greenhouse to grow fruit and vegetables all year round. To learn more, check it out here.

Practice Mindful Eating

Mindful eating is a practice that involves changing the way that you think about and interact with food. If you have had a difficult relationship with food in the past, mindful eating can be a very useful practice to encourage.

Mindful eating involves:

• Acknowledging responses to food, like fear or excitement, without criticism.
• Being aware of natural body cues like hunger and fullness to guide your food choices and eating habits.
• Becoming more positive and nurturing about your relationships with food and food preparation.
• Learning to respect your senses and inner wisdom regarding food

Practicing mindful eating encourages you to take fear and judgment out of the dieting equation. Instead, you should focus on listening to your body and eating foods that fuel you and make you feel strong and healthy.

Clean the House

Cleaning your house regularly can help you to lose weight as it encourages you to get up and move your body. Cleaning helps you to burn calories without even realizing it. You can burn bout 130 calories per hour while ironing, 128 calories per hour while washing the dishing, and 255 calories per hour of mopping.

Not only does cleaning the home help you to burn more calories, but it can also increase the likelihood of you making healthy choices. Studies have found that living in a messy home makes an individual more likely to make unhealthy choices. The research found that people who live in mess and clutter are 77% more likely to be overweight. Another study found that people who live in disorganized and messy environment eat more snacks and twice as many cookies as the participants that lived in an organized home.

Start Meal Prepping

Sometimes bad eating habits are not caused by the wrong intentions but by a lack of time. If you come home from work hungry, then have to think about cooking a meal, you are much more likely to choose to eat something unhealthy than a balanced and nutritious meal.

By preparing your meals in advance, you are taking the choice out of the equation. This means that even if you come home from work ravenous, you will opt for a healthier meal, as it is easier to warm up pre-made food than start cooking from scratch.

Not only does prepping your meals in advance help you to make healthier choices, but it is also far more budget-friendly. This is because meal-prepping allows you to buy all of your ingredients at once in bulk, which is much cheaper than buying small batches throughout the week. There are a great deal of healthy meal prep recipes online that you can reference when you are starting this new eating routine.

Sleep Well

Getting enough quality sleep can help with weight loss, as it provides you with energy that your body might otherwise be tempted to get from sugary foods. Not only does sleep provide you with the energy you need to maintain an active and healthy lifestyle, but it also plays an important role in regulating hormones.

The human body has two hormones that regulate hunger, ghrelin which increases appetite, and leptin that decreases hunger. When you lack sleep, the levels of ghrelin in your body spike, and the presence of ghrelin falls, making you feel much more hungry. To avoid unnecessary hunger and low energy feelings, you should aim to get between seven to nine hours of quality sleep a night.