5 Ways to get slim before the holidays

5 WAYS TO GET SLIM BEFORE THE HOLIDAYS

So the holiday season kicks off with Thanksgiving, to be followed by weeks of corporate and friendly Christmas events leading up to the holiday week when most people forget their fat loss goals and indulge in amounts of food that would feed a whole family for a month in any of the developing countries.

Don’t get me wrong, I love to celebrate and find it’s important for people to take a break every now and then, gather together, enjoy ourselves with friends and family, but that doesn’t have to mean to undo all the hard work we’ve done throughout the year to get slim and lean.

There are several ways to enjoy the festivities and maintain the hard-earned results. However, if you’d like to give it a last push before the holiday season kicks in and trim down, here are 5 things you can start doing now. 

1. EAT MORE VEGGIES

Studies show that people on a vegetarian diet lose significantly more weight than those who are on a normal weight loss diet. I am not trying to convince you to go veggie, it would be hard to keep up with protein intake as a start. I am just making a point about how you are more likely to lose more weight when eating high amounts of vegetables.

If your goal is to slim down and see results fast, you need to achieve the highest calorie deficit without starving yourself. Vegetables in general are low in calories, but high in nutrients and fiber. The former will help to manage cravings, the latter will fill you up and help with digestion. 

2. WORK HARDER IN THE GYM

Add 5 minutes to your workouts. Every time, every week till the end of this year. Such a slight increase will not tax your system too much, but if used wisely your body will thank you for it.

Now, the idea is that you work your butt off to aid fat loss with intense burst of exercise. Think full body movements like burpees, squat and press or loaded walking lunges. You’d want to sweat and get out of breath. It’s only five minutes and could be done to finish off your workout before cool down.

3. TAKE YOUR HYDRATION TO THE NEXT LEVEL

How much water do you drink a day? Running around in a dehydrated state can make you constantly tired, contribute to weight gain and cause constipation. All of these side-effects would make your life feel miserable and slash your motivation eventually, not to mention the health risks.

Make sure you drink at least 8 glasses of water (about 2l) every day consistently as a default and drink more when working out. As a result you’ll see your skin glow, you won’t feel hungry as often and overall it will make you feel healthy and aid fat loss, especially if you can cut back on coffee at the same time.

4. LOWER YOUR CARBS FOR DINNER

We’ve already discussed the benefits of including more vegetables in your diet. Now all you need to do is to cut back on carbs after mid-afternoon. Simply make sure your dinner consists of a lean source of protein and salads or steamed vegetables.

If you must have bread, pasta or oats in your diet, eat them for breakfast or lunch, but steer away from indulging. Remember, sugar is also a carbohydrate, if you’re used to having sugary dessert at the end of dinner, either re-structure your meals and have it earlier in the day or replace it with half a serving of Greek yogurt.

5. DON’T TRAIN ALONE

Some people are loners and like to sink into the zone and crack on with training. However, having someone around can push you to work harder than you’d normally do and help with motivation. Don’t underestimate the power of competitiveness on a human instinct level. We all want to do better than the other person next to us.

You can achieve this by finding a buddy in the gym who has similar goals, similar level of fitness and understanding of exercise and challenge each other week by week.

If you don’t like to socialize in the gym but want to have someone to push and motivate you, online coaching can be just the solution. You can still train on your own terms whenever it suits you, but would have me in the corner to program your workouts, support your nutrition habits and check-in with you to keep you on your toes.

Do you have questions on any of the above or would like to schedule a complementary goal assessment call? Get in touch today!