5 Calorie-Counting Strategies

We all know that the best ways to shed those unwanted pounds are to ensure that you don’t take in more calories than you burn. Now, one of the biggest issues I see all the time is people not properly tracking their calories. This leads to not properly tracking calories and therefore, weight gain! Follow these strategies for properly tracking your calories in and calories out so you can get closer to reaching your weight loss goals.

1. Determine Your Caloric Needs
Use this Caloric Needs Calculator http://www.freedieting.com/tools/calorie_calculator.htm from Free Dieting to determine how many calories you should be eating per day. Always remember NOT to starve yourself of foods to lose weight. This causes binge eating, eating disorders, and in most cases it actually causes weight gain because it slows your metabolism.

2. Use a Calorie Tracking Program
I personally use My Fitness Pal on my iPhone (I’ve never used it online before, I just use the application), and I LOVE it! You can use all sorts of different programs though such as My Fitness Pal, Calorie Counter, Lose It!, My Net Diary, or Daily Burn. These allow you not only to track what you eat, but your activity as well.

3. Watch Your Portion Sizes
My family thinks I’m “obsessed” with measuring my food, but that’s not it at all. I know myself, and I have to watch my portion sizes or I’ll overeat and feel horrible. So I measure all my sizes when I can and then I’m able to successfully track my meals and avoid over-eating, which is not only bad for weight loss, but hard on our digestive system as well.

4. Always Read Labels
Although you should be doing most of your grocery shopping in the produce, dairy, and meat aisles, there are going to be times where you need to purchase from the “processed” aisles. When you do this, ENSURE you read the label of everything. Just because a product says “Low Calorie”, “Low Fat”, or “Zero Trans Fat”, doesn’t mean anything. Look at the amount of sugar is has, the number of calories per serving, as well as the fat and saturated fat content. Sugar is something you need to be careful of when you are trying to lose weight and keep the weight off, so ensure the product doesn’t contain a high amount of sugar.

5. Don’t Waste Calories on Drinks
I see so many people who easily blow 300-500 calories of their available daily calories on a drink from McDonalds, Starbucks, or Dunkin Donuts. Try not to do this! It’s SUCH a waste of calories! You can have an orange, an apple, grapes, and some yogurt for that amount of calories!

For more great articles and tips on fitness, nutrition and Weight Loss check out http://www.Calorie-Smart.com. Here you’ll find healthy yet simple recipes, effective workouts, and supportive information on how to achieve your target weight.