How to Really Lose Weight

Many are struggling with their weight. They try various methods to lose the excess fat, and they may lose a few pounds to begin with, but gain it again soon after. Various companies take advantage of the fact that these people are struggling with their weight by selling them on these weight loss miracle products and diets that ultimately do not work.

The truth is, you can lose the weight you want without buying into all of these obvious, predatory money grabs. In order to lose weight you just have to do one simple thing. It’s pretty obvious, and it’s backed by science. You simply have to burn more calories than you consume every day. If you do this every day, you will see the pounds come off day by day until you reach your target weight.

This is an obvious tactic, and many are aware that it works. So why isn’t everyone doing it to reach their ideal weight? Doing this requires two things. The drive to do it and the resources, and luckily it is not very costly. You likely already own what you need to make it happen. It’s something that’s become a part of our daily lives, and many of us feel lost with out it. It’s your smartphone.

Modern smartphones come equipped with the instruments you need to track how many calories you burn every day. This data can be found in the Health app if you use and iPhone or on Samsung Health if you own an Samsung. There you have it, you’ve already been tracking how many calories you burn daily all this time whether you knew it or not.

Personally, I found my Apple Watch very useful when I was working on losing weight a few years ago. The battery lasts throughout the entire day while I’m awake and I take it off and place it on the charger when I go to bed. A smart device that measures your heart rate gives you a more accurate number on the calories you burn, but if you do not own one, no problem. Your basic pedometer on your phone gives you a good enough estimate.

So, your smart devices will keep track of all the calories you burn throughout the day as long as you have it on you without any input from you, but what about how much you’re consuming? That’s the part that’s going to require a little effort on your part. Fortunately, there are various tools that can help you with this.

My personal favorite is an app called MyFitnessPal. This app offers a lot of features, but the one we’re most concerned with today is the food log. The great thing I like about this app is that it has a bar-code scanner and it has access to nutrition data from many restaurants. Let’s say you go to McDonald’s and order a Cheeseburger, you can simply use the search function and find that item and add it to your food log. It will include the number of calories contained, macro-nutrients, and micro-nutrients if you have the premium subscription.

If you cook a meal at home, you can scan the bar-code on the box of pasta you’re eating, for example. Then, you indicate how much you’re eating, and it will add the data to your food log accordingly. If you’re snacking on some grapes, you can search of grapes, and tell it how many you ate. You can save foods you eaten regularly and even add your own recipes for quick selection.

At the end of the day, once you’ve added everything you’ve eaten on there,  it will display the difference between what you’ve consumed and what you’ve burned in your calorie budget. As long as your budget stay in the positive, you’ll be well on your way to your target weight by doing this every day. MyFitnessPal also allows you to to set your target weight goal and a healthy time period in which to lose weight.