The first step is to change the diet. Counting calories may be a portion of the diet, but it should not control the amount of food one consumes. Rather one should change to foods that are naturally lower in calories, higher in fiber, and get the bulk of the carbohydrates from whole grains. Ideally, one would have a diet rich in leafy green vegetables and fruits while being low in fat, especially processed fats.

The foods mentioned above are generally so low in calories that a person could eat until he feels stuffed and be getting less than 300 calories. In addition, fruits are naturally high in water, which helps the body to remain properly hydrated.

Not only does one need to change what one eats, but one needs to increase the amount of water consumed. Standard dietary recommendations are that the average adult drink eight 8 ounce glasses of water each day. In order to increase the amount of fat burned, one should strive to drink more than this. Some recommendations even call for twice the amount or 16 8 ounce glasses.

Of course exercise has to come into play. While many trainers push cardio, it is important to do some resistance training. This does not have to be heavy weight lifting or anything like that. One can simply use a resistance band or a couple of small dumbbells as part of the workout. It is important to work the resistance training into the first 20 minutes of any workout. This is because the resistance training will help jump start the metabolism and will burn calories from foods that have been consumed recently preparing the body to burn fat for energy during the cardio exercise.

Following the 20 minute warm up using light resistance methods, one should have a 20 to 30 minute session of cardio exercise where one really pushes oneself to increase heart rate and speed the metabolism. The net result will be that the metabolism speeds up to a point that allows the body to continue burning fat even after the exercises stopped, which will hasten weight-loss.

Proponents of low-carb diets say yes. There are many versions of the low-carb diet, with the most popular probably being the Atkins diet. Most of these recommend eating more fats as long as one sticks with unsaturated and saturated fats while avoiding polyunsaturated fats such as margarine. Of course these diets also eliminate most fruits and vegetables and all refined carbs such as white flour.

It is the belief of those who support the low-carb high-fat diet that carbohydrates are the cause of many modern problems including diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and heart disease. They believed that the average Western diet contains so many carbohydrates that the body builds up a resistance to insulin, becomes unable to use these carbohydrates, and stores them as fat.

The authors of these diets claim that foods high in fats take longer to digest, which allows a person to feel full longer and promote eating less. On the other hand, those who support the low-fat diet claim that the type of food eaten has little bearing on how quickly it is digested, and that if one traced the function of the digestive system one would find that while digestion of carbohydrates actually begins in the mouth, the fats contained in food are digested and made available to the body before the body finishes digesting carbohydrates or proteins.

So, back to the question of can a person and lose weight with a high fat diet.

The answer, despite the majority opinion of the medical community is yes. The reason being, that if a person eats fewer calories than he/she is used to consuming and exercises more, where the calories come from, fats are carbohydrates, becomes irrelevant. It is the fact that the body is taking in fewer calories and burning more that creates weight loss because the body has to burn its own fats to make up the difference.

Dieting can help a person lose weight if it is done in the proper manner. A starvation diet is absolutely the wrong way and can actually result in adding body fat instead of losing it. This is because when the body thinks it is starving, the calories that are consumed are converted to fat and stored against the possibility that it may be a long time before any more food is available.

The proper way to diet is to change the quality of the food one consumes rather than the quantity. This is done by switching to a diet that is high in fruits and vegetables, with moderate amounts of meat, fish, or poultry, and low in fats. It is important to make sure that any carbohydrates consumed are complex and come mostly from whole grains.

Changing what a person eats and following a diet as outlined above will result in a drastic reduction in the number of calories consumed on a daily basis. For some people, this may well be enough to cause them to start losing weight even if they did not increase their exercise.

Exercise is the key portion of the weight-loss regimen that guarantees that the body burns fat rather than destroying its own muscle tissue for energy. This is controlled by the types of exercise one performs. Resistance training uses the muscles so that the body believes they are needed, and therefore not a viable source of energy for maintaining the vital organs. If the body recognizes the muscles as being important, it will turn to its own fat deposits and burned down to make up the difference in the calories between what is consumed and what are used in a day’s time.

One must not focus entirely on resistance training though. The body must have time to recover from resistance training, especially if one uses heavy resistance. However, one does not wish to allow the metabolism to slow back down once it has been kicked into high gear. Therefore cardio exercise following resistance training and on days when no resistance training is performed is key.

In all things one must remember to burn more calories than one takes in and to direct with the exercise is one performs the body to burn fat rather than muscle.

Virtually everywhere you look on the Internet or in magazines pertaining to weight loss you hear the same old cliché, ‘Eat less and exercise more to lose weight.’ While it is true that this approach will lead to the body burning more calories than it takes in, it must be noted that under the wrong conditions the body may attack muscle to convert to energy rather than going after fat. It is therefore important that any weight loss regimen be set up and executed in such a way that the body will burn fat and lose weight.

There many different approaches to dieting, there is a low-carb diets, there are the low-fat diets, and there are starvation diets. The last of these, starvation diets, is the absolute worst way to go. This is because when the body is deprived of food it goes into a survival mode in which all calories consumed are immediately converted to fat and stored against later need. This is generally the opposite effect of what is needed to lose weight.

The keys to burning fat and losing weight lie in the types of food one consumes, not in the quantities of food one consumes. That’s that are high in fiber and protein with a low to moderate amount of complex carbohydrates, not sugars, generally provide a means for the body to become energized and increase the metabolism so that more calories are burned even before exercise comes into play.

The next aspect of burning fat to lose weight is the exercises that one performs. Personal trainers everywhere will tell you that cardio is the best type of exercise because it speeds the metabolism and burns off the calories. However, one thing that they do not all tell you is that light resistance training is an important part of the equation for a couple of different reasons.

One thing that most people do not realize is that for the first 20 to 30 minutes of any exercise program, their body is not burning fat. At the beginning of the exercise, the body is working off of a type of sugar that is a modified version of glucose called glucagon. This sugar comes from the foods that are eaten. Only after the body supply of readily available glucagon is used does the body start to burn fat.

The second reason is that resistance training not only increases the metabolism and burns more calories, but in the process of working the muscles against a resistance, the muscles expand energy in such a way that they form very small tears. Healing the stairs requires extra energy and helps to keep the body burning more fat even at rest while the muscles are healing.

For example, you can lose a LOT of weight in a day if you want to. You would have to know a bit about dehydration and fasting, but it’s easily doable to drop multiple pounds in an afternoon.

The problem with those kinds of methods is that they are not healthy and they are purely short term. You can’t achieve a healthy weight this way, because the moethod you are using is unhealthy. This is because people are judging weight loss purely by the weight scale.

You should judge it by the mirror. The mirror will always tell you how you are looking. The weight scale can deceive you. You may have a full stomach and be disappointed that you’ve gained weight. You might hold some extra water and be disappointed that your diet ‘isn’t working’. Or you may be slightly dehydrated and be ecstatic because of what you see on the scale.

By using a mirror, you will see if you’re improving. The key to weight loss in a healthy way that makes you look better, is losing fat. It’s not losing weight, it’s losing fat. If you’re losing fat, then you are doing a good job. And it will show in the mirror. Your body will look healthier, your muscles will be toned and your skin will look great. Focus on losing fat, not on losing weight.