20 Easy Life Hacks for Faster Fat Loss

• Do you feel like you're doing everything to lose weight but nothing's working?
• Working hard may actually be the reason you're stuck.
• After 30 years of struggle, I lost 50 lbs by working smarter, not harder.
• Restaurants often misreport calorie counts, making it harder to lose weight.
• Cycling calories and focusing on protein can help you stay on track.
• Building a sustainable weight loss plan requires daily healthy habits.

[Music]

Do you feel like you're doing everything you can to lose weight but nothing's working? What if I told you working so hard is the reason you're stuck? Because that's exactly what I'm telling you. After 30 years of working way too hard, I started working smarter, which is what helped me lose 50 lbs even when nothing else worked.

So in this video, I'll show you 20 easy life hacks you can use that make it about a billion times easier to lose weight. Well, that billion number isn't really scientific but if it worked for this 40-something who struggled with yo-yoing weight her entire life, that's got to count for something.

If you would have told that girl who struggled to quit this first habit, she would have laughed in your face because in today's world, it's clearly not doable. Except that it's very doable and even necessary if you're serious about your fat loss goals.

Even though most fast food and chain restaurants have nutrition information readily available, which should make it easy to fit these foods into your diet, did you know that restaurants are allowed up to a 20% error when reporting their calorie numbers? Not only that, but not every 16-year-old pimple-faced kid slapping your meal together cares that you're on a diet. So if they add a few hundred extra calories of oil or high fat toppings, no big deal, right? Except that 20% margin of error added to the pimple-faced kid margin of error can easily add up to a weight loss stall.

Because when you're losing fat the right way with a moderate calorie deficit, a few hundred calorie error cancels out the deficit that you thought you were in. Worse yet, if you don't bother to look at the nutrition info because you're making a healthy choice like a salad, you need to understand that many of the healthy options contain more calories in one meal than most dieters plan to eat all day.

I'm not saying you should never eat out, especially if dining out is something you enjoy, but eating out more than once or twice per week is making weight loss about a billion times harder. Since I enjoy meals out, I didn't want to give that up while losing weight, so I use this next hack to save room for one to two meals out every week.

Hopefully by now you understand that fat loss comes down to a calorie deficit. If someone tries to tell you that's wrong, punch them in the face and change the channel. Really. At the same time, no one wants to constantly feel like you're on a diet.

In order to make my diet feel less "diety," I began cycling calories. To do this, I used a macro calculator to figure out a moderate calorie deficit. In my case, I could eat 2,000 calories a day while losing around one pound each week, which is appropriate for sustainable fat loss.

So please quit getting upset when you don't lose 5 lbs every week, especially since that's the fastest way to wind up even fatter than when you started. Since I no longer wanted to end up fatter than when I started, I began tracking everything I ate to make sure I wasn't eating more than 2,000 calories a day.

But this pattern left me sad every weekend when I was eating a plain chicken breast with broccoli while my family feasted on pizza burgers and nachos. Instead of drooling over their meals, I decided to join them, which was easier to do when I instead aimed to eat only 1,800 calories during the week. This helped me save an additional thousand calories to splurge on over the weekend.

So even though I still can't go overboard since restaurant meals contain a boatload of calories, I don't feel quite as restricted on weekends when I cycle calories lower during the week. Of course, you'll never be successful with a calorie cycling plan if you don't establish this next fat loss hack, because how are you supposed to know that a barbecue ranch chicken salad you just devoured has 1,980 calories?

How does a salad have 2,000 calories? It's chicken and lettuce! Well, actually it's chicken, lettuce, veggies, black beans, and avocado, all smothered in high-calorie barbecue ranch dressing topped with even higher-calorie crispy onion strings. Most dieters would never guess that choosing a healthy salad delivers more calories in one meal than you usually eat all day.

And if we're including those other margins of error, the damage is probably even worse, which is why you need to track food before you eat. That way you don't completely blow your calorie goal with a meal that you assumed was healthy. Even if you're not 100% sure of how many calories are in your meal, just take your best guess since staying on track with tracking keeps you on track with fat loss.

Another fat loss hack that makes it easier to enjoy more foods you love comes directly from the carnivore diet trend. While I don't believe eating only meat for every meal is necessary, or really anything short of a desperate weight loss attempt that will fail, after that one time I tried and miserably failed carnivore, I learned a valuable lesson.

The big takeaway I had is that meat by itself is actually pretty filling. So if I have days where I want to keep calories low early in the day so I can save up for bigger meals at night, when it's time for breakfast, I may just have 3 to 4 ounces of meat. Or if I'm hungry in between meals but don't have a lot of calories to spare, then I snack on 3 oz of rotisserie chicken or rolled-up deli meat since this snack keeps me full for hours on very few calories.

But just because I have some days where I just eat meat for breakfast or even as a snack, that doesn't mean I strictly limit myself to only meat every day because I'd get bored of that plan a few days in. Even though my meals consist of way more than just meat, I still plan every meal around protein, especially breakfast and lunch.

Since staying on track with protein all day makes it easier to hit my goal, I make sure breakfast has at least 30 g while aiming for closer to 50 g of protein with lunch. Once I add in one or two high-protein snacks, I never find myself chasing protein at the end of the day. Plus, eating more protein early helps me feel fuller on less calories, which is a requirement of a sustainable fat loss plan.

While something as simple as a protein shake helps me get 30 g of protein first thing, it's not a good idea to rely on too many processed protein foods as the base of your plan. That's where this next easy fat loss hack comes in. Even though a lot of dieters struggle to hit their protein target, they're making their diet way harder than it needs to be.

As long as you plan every lunch and dinner around 5 to 6 ounces of lean meat, this hack makes it easy to stay on track with your protein target since this base starts each meal with 40 to 50 g of protein. If you are sick of hearing about protein, perhaps you haven't learned that high-protein diets lead to two to three times greater fat loss compared to other diets whenever calories are matched.

But I get it; there's more to life than snacking on meat all day, every day. That's what she said! This next life hack also leads to a substantial increase in fat loss even though it has nothing to do with protein, and it's a hack that most dieters would never believe in their wildest dreams could help. But all of that wild dreaming is the exact thing that leads to losing 55% more fat.

There's a 2010 study that showed participants who got 8 and 1/2 hours of sleep lost 55% more fat than those who only slept for 5 and 1/2 hours. Even though this same study shows participants lost similar amounts of weight, the majority of the weight lost by the sleep-restricted group was muscle. Losing muscle on your fat loss diet is nothing worth celebrating since muscle loss slows your metabolism, leading to rapid rebound weight gain.

Plus, a lack of sleep makes it harder to find the energy for this next fat loss hack which is essential to keeping the weight off. Do you ever wonder why what worked for you in your 20s doesn’t even make a dent in your progress in your 30s and beyond? Since women lose between 3 to 8% of their lean muscle mass every decade starting at age 30 if you make no effort to preserve it, that means your metabolism also slows down.

That's because the less muscle you have, the less calories your body needs to sustain this metabolically active tissue. Beyond all of the other reasons, strength training becomes extremely valuable as we age, like not needing someone to lift you off the toilet later in life. Building your metabolism up with habits like strength training instead of continually tearing it down with quick weight loss hacks is the easiest way to keep the weight off long term.

But if you can't find the motivation to stick with your strength training routine after a hard day of moming — or whatever your hard day consists of — this next easy life hack is key. Did you know the most effective way to form any new habit is by getting it done within the first 8 hours of waking up?

That's because anchoring new habits in the first 8 hours of the day aligns with your natural circadian rhythm. Plus, most people have fewer distractions first thing, as well as higher willpower and more energy to accomplish harder tasks early in the day.

When you combine that with scoring a big win at the beginning of the day, that's the best way to set yourself up for a full day of success. Since establishing a strength training routine is so important for sustainable fat loss, if this isn't a habit that you already follow, prioritizing a morning workout could be the best way to establish this habit.

Even if you're short on time, you can get a lot accomplished in only 15 minutes a day as long as you focus on the right exercises while following a full-body routine each week. That's the perfect amount of time and effort for most people to build more fat-burning muscle.

A good way to guarantee you don't cozy up with your phone and a cup of coffee in the morning instead of hitting the gym is to lay your exercise clothes out the night before. That way you have a reminder of your morning routine staring you directly in the face right after rolling out of bed.

Dressing in your workout clothes first thing is usually motivation enough to lift that first dumbbell. But if you still have trouble getting into the mood, sometimes you just have to take the first step—literally. Since I prefer three longer full-body workouts each week instead of daily 15-minute sessions, I still take advantage of my early morning energy on days that I don't lift by getting in a big chunk of my daily steps out of the way.

But just because I plan to walk in the morning doesn't mean that I always have the motivation. There are some mornings that I'd really rather cuddle up on the couch with my dog. On these days, I make a deal with myself to commit to a 10-minute walk. If that's all I end up doing, then that's great; at least I did something.

But once I get started, I'm reminded of how good a brisk walk makes me feel, and I usually have to force myself to stop since I have other things to get done. Even though I start every morning with habits that push me closer to my health and fitness goals, it hasn't always been that way.

Recently, my husband asked me how I get it all done because achieving your weight loss goals doesn't just happen. You have to find time to work out, but you also got to move more in general. Then you spend like half the day planning high-protein meals while spending the other half chewing all of that protein, adding time to de-stress, enough time for sleep, plus all of your other daily responsibilities. That adds up to way more than 24 hours!

Right after thinking about it, I realized the secret to my success comes down to my morning routine. When I wake up an hour earlier than everyone else so I can get a big chunk of daily movement out of the way, I don't have to spend the rest of the day trying to figure out how to fit everything in once the daily chaos takes over.

Plus, I'm working on the task that takes the most amount of effort when I have the most energy, which means I make faster progress than I would with some half-baked effort I'd give to a workout that I put off until later that day. But getting a solid start to my day would never happen if I didn't also follow this next life hack.

A few years back, I had zero energy most days, leading me to constantly count down the hours until bedtime. But once it was time for bed, I always had trouble falling asleep. Even after I finally got there, my restful slumber never lasted since I found myself tossing and turning most nights around 2:00 or 3:00 in the morning.

This exhausting cycle lasted for years before I learned that getting active early in the day could help in more ways. One morning, while getting in some steps, I popped on an episode of The Huberman Lab Podcast. In one of his sleep episodes, I learned that getting early morning sunlight directly into my eyes can reset my circadian rhythm.

This daily habit made falling asleep and staying asleep so much easier. Not only that but getting early morning light into your eyes and directly onto your skin increases the MSH hormone. Increasing MSH levels helps regulate appetite, boost energy expenditure, improve insulin sensitivity, support fat loss over muscle loss, and reduce inflammation.

Listening to this episode was another hack that we'll get to in a minute, but it was life-changing because I picked up a few other tips to help me sleep through the night. I've since developed a nighttime routine where I stop staring at screens close to bedtime. I take magnesium 3 and 8 right before bed. I practice diaphragm breathing to put me into a more relaxed state and go to bed at the same time every night, even on weekends.

Getting to sleep on time and staying asleep all night makes sticking to these other fat loss habits way easier. Hopefully, you can see how impactful a solid nighttime routine is for weight loss. Just as helpful as not staring at screens before bed since this makes it easier to fall asleep.

Another hack I use is to avoid all screens for at least the first hour of the day. This means no email, no social media, and none of those Debbie Downer news programs that literally program our brains to be on high alert right after rolling out of bed.

One huge lesson losing 50 lbs taught me is that morning time is me time. It's a time that I have come to treasure since I use this time to focus on habits that help me live a healthier life.

Like starting my day with activity, either working on mobility, strength, or movement while taking the extreme actions that many diets require for quick weight loss never works. Establishing habits that promote better health is a more sustainable way to achieve the body you want.

I find maintaining a solid morning routine makes it easier to stick to better habits all day long, but that would never happen if I was still wasting my morning staring at screens. But that doesn't mean I love lock my phone away until I'm done with my workout, especially since another life hack I use is to learn while I earn.

Okay, so that sounds like a mantra straight out of the 80s. What I'm trying to say is I listen to my favorite health podcast during whichever activity I start the day with. This helps me reinforce all of the healthy habits I'm using to build the body I want. So while stretching or walking, I pop in the latest episode of Mind Pump. When I'm lifting, I use my phone to throw on my favorite soundtrack.

Don't get it twisted; this rap is mine, mother! I do have one caveat when it comes to this hack. Back in the day, I was a health podcast junkie, but listening to anyone with a mic really confused me because this week they said eating fruit was the Devil Himself while the next week you'd see them recording while eating an apple.

It wasn't until I narrowed down the influencers who I was willing to take advice from that I started getting my best results without all of the confusing diet noise. Which reminds me: never work out on an empty stomach.

Back in the day, when I was taking advice from anyone with a mic who was preaching about intermittent fasting, I thought working out in a fasted state would help me get better results because autophagy. Even though that's a big word that most people don't understand, there's more than one way to take advantage of autophagy, and lifting heavy weights is an even better way than intermittent fasting.

But for me, combining intermittent fasting with lifting weights wasn't leading to the results that I wanted because I always found myself daydreaming about food halfway through my workout. I soon realized that I never had the energy to lift as heavy as I needed to for results when all I could do was think about food.

So while it's probably not a good idea to work out on a full stomach, make sure you go into your workout with enough energy to come out of it stronger than when you went in. Since I work out within 30 minutes of rolling out of bed, a protein shake with added nutrients like frozen fruit and MCT oil is enough to keep me energized through an entire 80-minute full-body routine.

But just because all of those health podcasters led me astray, that doesn't mean I gave up and binged on junk all week while vowing to start brand new come Monday. With decades of failed diet attempts behind me, I finally realized that constantly starting from scratch was the exact reason I never made progress. Instead of completely starting over with an even stricter plan every time I screwed up, I just made the next right decision anytime I fell off track.

Since my body hardly notices one mistake, even if it's a big one, getting right back on track by making the next right decision makes it easier to make progress every week. So instead of throwing in the towel on your strict diet every time you screw up, just do the next right thing.

And also quit following strict diets! Even though it seems like you're making faster progress whenever you follow extreme plans, the faster a diet promises that you'll lose weight, the longer it takes. That's because quick weight loss diets are never sustainable past a few weeks. In fact, following extreme diets is the reason you eventually end up binging on everything you made off-limits.

Even though progress isn't as fast when you follow a moderate plan that's actually sustainable, you have to realize that even slow progress is progress. Even if you only lose half a pound each week, those are the kinds of results that eventually snowball into the body you've been chasing for years.

This brings us to our last easy life hack to lose weight faster, which seems a little counterintuitive, but I promise this one works: you have to quit rushing the weight loss process.

Since fast weight loss only leads to a never-ending diet, instead of thinking about the results you want 5 weeks from now, start thinking in terms of where you want to be 5 years from now. Because someone who looks like this didn't build that body with some five-week program.

Even giving yourself 5 months to get there will only result in another diet failure because fat loss, which is way different from weight loss, takes time—like a lot of time. This means you've got to understand that health and fitness is a lifelong journey, not some program you can finish in 75 days. Especially since maintaining what you lose is actually the hard part.

If you're ready to start a sustainable program that will help you get the results you want for years to come, then watch this video next. You'll learn the two habits that are essential to any fat loss plan that not only helps you lose weight, but this time you will actually keep it off.