How To Lose Weight Fast! No Gimmicks, No BS

Here are my no BS Weight Loss Steps... 

• Ditch all forms of sugar from your diet. Table sugar, maple syrup, turbinado, brown sugar, high fructose corn syrup, molasses, honey... and the list goes on. This is the single best piece of advice I can give and for some, it is often the hardest to follow. The average American consumes 120 to 150 pounds of sugar every year and it is part of most manufactured foods. If some form of sugar is within the first five ingredients listed, Do Not Eat It!
• Satisfy your sweet tooth with Stevia. Living without sugar is difficult but Stevia is an outstanding all naturual, non-chemical substitute with 0 calories and 0 glycemic load but is 300 times sweeter than sugar! There are a ton of sites that talk about Stevia (just Google it) but I can tell you from my experience, it is best to get the hightest quality you can find and get two versions:
  1. Pure Stevia Powder
  2. Clear Liquid Stevia Extract
  My favorite is the SweatLeaf Brand.
  You can also make your own clear liquid extract using the powder. The reason you should get both is due to the fact it is sooo sweet. It is much easier to measure out a half dozen drops than a 1/16th teaspoon for single servings. However, it is much easier to measure out the powder in teaspons than a gazillion drops for larger recipes.If you are new to Stevia, it does take some trial and error to get these measurements right but it will be well worth the effort.
• Start reading the ingredient labels on everything you eat. When choosing carbs, only pick slow carbs for your diet. When I say slow carbs, I mean whole grains. Just say no to Wonder Bread and white rice, go for the multigrain breads and whole grain rice. Even with whole grain bread you need to be careful, many grocery store breads include a ton of added sugar - Read the labels! You may have to go to a real baker,a health food store or bake your own for real bread.
• Eat smaller meals but eat every 2, 3 or 4 hours, don't starve yourself. Eat more in the morning than in the evening, you need that food for the day and to boost your metabolism. As an example, cut your daily lunch in half and eat half around 11AM and half around 2PM.
• Hit the Gym at least 5 to 6 days a week and give yourself at least a day or two of rest every week. This one is a no brainer, there is only one way you are going to lose weight and that is to burn more calories than you consume. Forget the diet pills and fad diets, you need to get your body moving. At the very least, by a $5.00 pedometer and wear it from the time you get up to the time you go to sleep. Try to get 15000 steps into one day, your body was not meant to sit in front of a computer all day, it needs to be excercised to run efficiently. Once you start exercising regularly, change up your routine from one day to the next.
• Add weight training to your daily exercise program. Not only do you burn more calories while you exercise, but your muscles will continue to burn while you are sleeping. Better yet, the process of packing on muscle is a serious calorie burner. Always do your cardio before you lift weights, your metabolism will stay high all day (burning more calories) and you will be able to lift longer without feeling fatigued.
• Learn about the Glycemic Index. Stick to foods low on the Glycemic Index scale. The Glycemic Index is a measure of how quickly a food will increase your blood sugar level. The slower the rise in blood sugar, the longer you will feel full. Ditch the morning breakfast cereals, bagels and especially the sugary breakfast cereals and pastries. The glycemic index of a bowl of Cheerios is approximately 74 whereas common table sugar is 64, that means a bowl of Cheerios will spike your blood glucose levels faster than table sugar alone! (Remember, we're talking quality of carbohydrates, not quantity.)
• Ditch the coffee and other caffeinated drinks, they will just make you hungry by increasing the acidity of your stomach.
• Dont be afraid of the good fats. Slap a little coconut oil (Yum) on that whole grain toast, it will make you much more satiated. Make your own salad dressing out of vinegar and olive oil or grapeseed oil. Most store bought dressings are full of really crappy oils, fats, sugars, preservatives, etc, etc
• Always eat a well balanced meal. Duh, how many times have we heard this but the truth is you will feel so much more satisfied that you will eat far less to feel satiated.
• Ditch foods with zero nutritional value such as chips, fries, onion rings, lard laden white flour tortillas, etc. They are pretty easy to identify, just look at any fast food restaurant's menu.
• When you eat out, order a salad with some sort of vinaigrette on the side so that you can choose how much to put on it. Try to get a salad with a chicken or beef in it and ask if they have whole grain bread. This will fill you up and provide a relatively balanced meal. If they don't have whole grain or whole weat bread, plan to eat a bit of complex carb when you get home to round out your meal or you will feel hungry within an hour or twwo.
• Always eat a small meal about an hour before your workout. You will have far more energy and will be able to burn far more calories than if you had eaten nothing at all. By the way, ditch the diet drinks, exercise drinks and meal replacement drinks, they have a ton of sugar and your workout will suffer. I know this probably goes against all the hype but give it a test try, chug a meal replacement and go workout for an hour and see how you feel. The next day, eat a celery stick with peanut butter and a piece of whole grain bread about 45 to 30 minutes before your workout. Then see how you feel an hour into your workout. You will be amazed at the difference.
• Research, research, research. Learn as much as you can about the foods you eat. One wonderful site to learn about healthy diets, eating whole foods and staying healthy through diet is the Weston A. Price Foundation at http://www.westonaprice.org
• Get some Chia seed from your local health food store and put a teaspoon or two on everything you eat. Chia, which used to be known as "Indian running food", forms a gel when wet and this gel displaces fat and calories. Chia gel also slows the conversion of carbohydrates into sugars, thereby regulating and sustaining healthy blood sugar levels in the body.
  
  According to annieappleseedproject.org "Chia" is the Mayan word for strength. According to chia seed lore, Apache warriors would tie a bag of chia seeds to their belts to sustain them on the warpath. Aztec warriors, it is said, were sustained by chia seeds during their conquests."
• This is not the end of the list, there are a million other things you can do and I will add more as I think of them. If you have a great tip, feel free to email it to me and I will add it to this list. Cheers, and good luck.