It does not matter if the summer time is around the corner or it's getting towards the end of the year, if you are like many other people, you are starting to think about slimming down. And shedding pounds fast. There is something you can do to shed some weight in a short amount of time and do it properly.



None of those crazy soup or celery or lemon juice diets. Those do work, but what a cost you need to pay for releasing a couple of lbs. And the most awful part is that when you go back to regular eating after lemon juice for 10 days, the weight seems to amazingly reappear all by itself.



But if you want to do some small modifications in how you eat; changes that you can live with and carry on with after your initial weight loss results, then pay attention because here a few good tips for you.



Tip #1 - Pay Attention



There's a reason why many well-known dieting programs have you keep a food journal of everything you take in. When you take notice and note down every single thing you eat, whether it's a goody or a breakfast bar or even a stalk of celery, you tend to consume less food.



Could be because the thought of needing to keep track of each bite makes people want to eat less because it's a pain to write it all down. But much more likely it's because your mind begins to think to itself "Hmm, am I really hungry enough to eat this and then write in my food diary"? Often, the answer to that is a "No" and you find yourself eating a lot less food.



This writing idea works in a lot of self-improvement areas, not just for dieting, but when it comes to food, it really helps you focus on what you are doing. And being mindful about precisely how you are taking care of your body and your health is a very good step in the direction of feeling better and losing weight.



Another great tip has to do with the notion that less is more.



Cut it down.



One of the largest amounts of calorie consumption comes from the consumption of fats. Of course, this is not the case 100 % of the time for 100 % of the people. But if you live in a location that has a diet similar to the Standard American Diet, which is quite high in animal fats and saturated and hydrogenated fats, you're eating a lot of calories from fats.



The fats on their own contain a high amount of calories per unit measurement. Basically if you took a teaspoon of a carbohydrate and a teaspoon of fat, the fat would have more than two times as many calories in it.



Fats contribute to the taste and the mouth feel of food and this is a major reason why they are very popular. Problem is along with twice as many calories, they don't metabolize as cleanly as many carbohydrates and you are left with the results hanging around your waist.



If you like butter on your toast in the morning, put only half the amount on that you typically do. Use only half the amount of oil when you are cooking on the stove. Try something like one of those cooking sprays. Your food will still cook nicely and will slide out of the pan, but the amount of oil you will have added is almost non-existent.



Bake your potatoes in place of frying them. Boil your eggs instead of scambling them with a tablespoon of butter. Do just a couple things like this and you will surprisingly find that you are ingesting nowhere near the amount of calories that you did previously.



The fact remains, it doesn't take a lot of doing to vary some dietary habits. And when you make those changes in your lifestyle you will be on the right track to losing some weight quickly in a safe, simple to sustain way.