I'm a full-time student with four part-time jobs, which means I have no time for anything other than school and work. My hectic schedule has resulted in a fairly unhealthy diet. I usually eat numbered meals from fast food joints, plastic, clam-shelled dishes from grocery stores, and anything microwaveable at home. My diet has taken a toll not only on my overall health (I feel run-down and exhausted all the time), but also on my waistline. Even though I'm just 25, the numbers on the scale have been slowly creeping up.
I did try to go on a diet once. I cut out all of the foods I deemed unhealthy, like carbs, sodas, and meat, but it ended up being a complete disaster. My experiment ended on day four, with me sitting in a parking lot shoving KFC fried chicken nuggets and fries into my face.
If I was serious about losing weight, I knew I had to be smarter this time around. So I talked to some experts and read some studies. I decided to try five simple, time-tested methods to lose weight that actually fit into my insane schedule. Here's what I learned.
1) MEAL PREPPING HAS INCREDIBLE BENEFITS.
The advantages of meal prepping aren't a secret. Bodybuilders have been doing meal prep for decades, and there are entire YouTube channels devoted to the practice. But I quickly discovered firsthand that preparing my meals in advance actually did prompt me to eat more vegetables. While my old diet rarely included anything green, I managed to sneak nearly five servings of vegetables—the minimum daily requirement, according to the USDA—into most of my meals.
2) THE SMALLER PLATE TRICK TOTALLY WORKS.
Most people have probably dismissed the old chestnut that using a smaller plate can help you lose weight. But there's some evidence to suggest that it actually works: Using a salad plate instead of a dinner plate can reduce the amount of food you eat by 30 percent, even when you're allowed to go for seconds, according to a study conducted by the University of Chicago. There's a pretty simple reason for this: the average dinner plate is big—between 10 and 14 inches—and people tend to eat everything on their plates if they cover all the free space in food. A smaller plate means you'll have less food in front of you, which means you'll eat less.
3) USUALLY, YOU'RE NOT AS HUNGRY AS YOU THINK YOU ARE.
4) YOU ALWAYS NEED A PLAN B.
Eating out on a diet is tricky. Restaurants have a financial incentive to make their portions large and calorie-dense, which means that portions at restaurants are large and some meals contain thousands of calories. If you must go out to eat, most nutritionists would recommend that you order a salad. But let's be real — no one wants to order a salad at a dinner out. In fact, in my experience, ordering a salad instead of something I actually want ruins my dining experience.
At the end of the day, I discovered that even some of the simplest weight loss tips and tricks really do make a difference. Within a few weeks, I lost 3kgs. That might not seem like a huge number, but it helped boost my self-esteem and it proved to me that even the smallest changes in diet and lifestyle can make a big impact.