How To Cut Calories For Weight Loss Without Starving!

There are two ways for you to lose body fat: you aggressively burn more calories (food) than you consume (by doing cardio exercise and/or lifting weights) or you reduce the amount of calories (food) that you consume. 

However if you want to lose weight in a healthy manner, then you would have to do both - reduce your calorie intake and also burn more calories by exercising.

To get a rough idea about how calories relate to body fat, for you to lose 1 pound (0.45kg) of fat, you body needs to burn off 3500 calories to fuel your body’s metabolism or as energy.

By cutting calories, you are forcing your body to use some of its fat reserves as its source of calories instead of getting all of it from the food you eat.

It sounds simple right?

Well... the problem is a lot men reduce their calorie intake wrongly that it sets their body into starvation mode.

If you want to cut calories for weight loss without running into problems like slow metabolism, then try the following these diet strategies to help you outsmart your body’s natural fat storage system without starving yourself.

1.) Include More Protein Foods In Your Diet

If you want to reduce your caloric intake without feeling starved, then you need to eat more proteins.

Eating more protein foods is the easiest, most efficient and a delicious way to lose body fat with little effort.

There are actual studies that have shown that protein increases your metabolism and assists in reducing your appetite.

When you eat protein, your body needs energy to digest it. By eating protein, your metabolism rises by as much as 20% just to digest it. This is the reason why a high protein diet increases the amount of calories that you body burns by as much as 100 calories a day.

Protein is clearly the most fulfilling of all the nutrients. A 2004 study revealed that individuals that consumed 30% of their daily calories as protein automatically consumed 441 less calories each day.

So, if you want to reduce the amount of calories that you consume each day always make sure that your meals contain at least 30% protein.

Eating protein foods also helps you in fighting food cravings, which is the main reason why so many men just can’t lose weight.

A study done in 2011 discovered that eating 25% of your daily calories in the form of protein helps in reducing obsessive thinking about food by as much as 60% and also reduces your tendency for eating snacks late at night by 50%.

If you are really serious about cutting your daily caloric intake, then you need to increase the amount of protein foods that you eat.

And apart from helping you lose weight, ensuring that at least 30% of your meals are protein would help in preventing or at least in reducing weight regain that could happen if you ditch your fat loss efforts.

2.) Stay Away From Soft Drinks, Fruit Drinks And Other Sugary Beverages

If you are trying to reduce your calorie intake, then it is only common sense that you do NOT drink your calories.

So, remove soft drinks (sodas), fruit juices, chocolate milk and other sugary beverages from your diet.

These beverages are the main reason why some men become overweight in the first place. Most men don’t know how fattening sugary beverages are because they don’t see them as food... drinking 1 liter of Coca Cola means consuming 430 calories.

After consuming 430 calories from a soft drink, you wouldn’t feel like you ate anything thing solid, so it is still easy for you to go ahead and eat your meals as usual.

There are actual studies that point fingers at sugary beverages as being one of the major causes of obesity... one of these studies showed that each daily serving of a sugar-sweetened beverage can increase the risk of obesity by as much as 60%.

A part from the weight gain problem that comes with consuming sugar (in the form of sugary drinks), there is also the negative effect that it has on your body’s metabolism and it increases your risk of different diseases.

If you are getting small quantities of sugar from natural foods like fruits and vegetables, then you are perfectly fine... it is the processed sugars in beverages and the too much sugar that you add to tea or coffee that is the problem.

You don’t need these soft drinks or any sugary beverage in your daily diet if you are serious about losing weight and the health benefit from avoiding them is huge.

3.) Drink More Water

The easiest trick in the book to reduce your calorie intake is to drink more water.

Drinking water really does help you in losing body fat.

By drinking water before your meals, you would end up eating lesser quantity of food which means fewer calories. This is because water takes considerable space in your stomach.

A 2010 study showed that when the test individuals drank 500 mL (17 ounces) of water 30 minutes before meals, they lost 44% more body fat over a period of 12 weeks.

If you combine drinking more water (particularly before your meals) with a healthy diet, it would be a lot easier to lose weight.

And asides from helping you eat less food, water can increase the amount of calories that your body burns for as long as 90 minutes after drinking.

By drinking just 2 liters (8 glasses or 68 ounces) of water every day, you can burn an extra 96 calories every day. So, asides from helping you cut calories, drinking water can also help you burn calories.

4.) Reduce Refined Sugars And Processed Carbohydrates

There are good carbs and bad carbs...

Refined sugars and processed carbohydrates are the bad carbs and they are everywhere we go, so it is difficult to stay away from them.

However if you want to reduce your caloric intake and lose weight, you need to cut down on the amount of processed carbs and refined sugars that you consume.

Eating less processed carbs means more space in your belly for lower calorie foods like vegetables and proteins.

There are also actual studies (like this 2007 report) that show that following a low-carb diet can make you lose 2 - 3 times more weight than following a calorie-controlled low-fat diet.

Asides from the fat loss benefit that low-carb diet gives, there are other health benefits that you get when you reduce processed carbs and refined sugar. 

According to the American Diabetes Association, men with type 2 diabetes or metabolic syndrome are better of replacing processed carbohydrates with whole grain and fiber carbohydrates.

You don’t need to go on a low-carb diet to reduce your calorie intake; you just need to make sure that you eat only fiber-rich and whole grain carbohydrates... stay away from the refined and processed stuff.

One last thing, fiber and whole grain carbs are a lot more filling than processed carbs so you can eat lesser amounts meaning lesser calories consumed.

5.) Eat Five Small Meals A Day

Even though we are used to the idea of three square meals, eating five or six small meals would help you reduce your caloric intake better.

Some men have the bad habit of skipping breakfast, and then during the day they get so hungry that they overeat. Eating five meals each day is a better way to control your calorie intake.

Your body takes about 3 hours to digest a meal, so eating 5 meals is enough to drive away hunger pangs during the 16 hours that you are awake (assuming that you sleep for 8 hours each night).

By eating frequently, you would prevent yourself from binge eating, which happens when you go for long hours without eating – you end up so hungry that you consume food in very large quantities.

Asides from reducing your caloric intake, eating smaller meals also helps in speeding up your metabolism since your body always has calories to fuel its metabolism unlike skipping meals which slows your metabolism down.

Eating 5 small meals during the day also helps in stabilizing your blood sugar and insulin levels and this helps in controlling your appetite.

6.) Eat With Your Left Hand If You Are Right Handed And Vice Versa

This sounds very strange... but there is an actual study that proves this works!

Researchers at the University of Southern California (USC) found at that eating with your non-dominant hand really does help you eat less food.

Eating is NOT always the result of being hungry; sometimes it is environmental cues that push you to eat.

In the USC study, the researchers discovered that moviegoers consumed the same quantity of popcorn whether it was fresh or stale. They just ate because they have formed the habit of eating popcorn when watching movies.

Now, when some of these moviegoers were asked to use their non-dominant hands to eat popcorn, they ate less popcorn particularly the stale popcorn.

Why is this so?

Their “watch movies – eat popcorn” habit is based on using their dominant hands, so the moment the pattern was disrupted they became more aware of what was happening... they were no longer on “watch movies – eat popcorn” autopilot!

You can also use this information to help reduce your calorie intake. And there are different ways to do this. For example, if you are used to eating with spoons or forks, then switch to chopsticks or you can eat your dinner in a different part of your house - change your eating pattern so that you can be more mindful during your meals.

7.) Pay No Attention To The Words “Low Fat”

I know this might seem abnormal but there is an actual study that found out that, individuals who saw the low-fat label eat up to 50% more than those who saw labels without the low fat claim.

This is regarded as the “halo effect”!

It makes the product look like a “healthy food” and you get encouraged to eat more... meaning more calories that can sabotage your weight loss efforts.

Then there is also the fact that the lower-fat versions of most foods usually contain a lot more sugar than the regular products in order to improve their bland taste.

If you are going to eat these low-fat processed foods, then only eat the same amount that you would eat of the “normal-fat” version and you would be sure that you have actually cut some calories from your diet.

By following these 7 simple tips you would be able to cut calories for weight loss without having to starve yourself.