Okay, let's have a show of hands, how many of us has succumbed, at least once, to the many celebrity diets out there? The Zone Diet? Atkins? The South Beach Diet? Cabbage Soup diet? Weight Watchers? I could go on and on.

Here are the diets I've tried out, and the outcome:

• Atkins - all meat, no vegetables or fruit for the first two weeks, and I was terribly constipated and had foul breath. Wasted my money buying the book.
• South Beach Diet - absolute no carbohydrates for the first couple of weeks. That couple of weeks were hellish; I was always lethargic from lack of energy.
• Weight Watchers - got absolutely fed up with counting points every time I ate something.
• Slim-Fast - gross milkshakes and soups as main meals? You've GOT to be kidding me. I had one can of Slim-Fast milkshake, and I had to give the rest away. Ugh.

I probably lost a couple of pounds the first week of the diets or so, but then gained them all back and then some later. The side effects from the diets were awful; I was tired all the time, and had enormous cravings for food. In the end, I actually ate more than normal to fulfill my hunger pangs!

There are effective ways to losing weight, without starving yourself.

1. Healthier meals

Okay, maybe I shouldn't have used the words "without dieting". In a way, you do need to change your diet to having healthier meals. According to Weight Loss Resources, daily calorie intake for women is about 1940 calories, and 2550 for men. That plate of char koay teow or nasi lemak for a single meal will set you back over 1000 calories. Remember that you'll only lose weight if your "output" is more than your "input". Once you blow your recommended daily calorie intake quota, on average, you'll start putting on about almost 2 pounds a week.

That does NOT mean you should stick to rabbit food, of course. I, for one, CANNOT take rabbit food (e.g salads) for main meals. You might as well NOT give me anything to eat at all. I'd recommend steamed fish, grilled chicken, or stir-fried vegetables in small amounts. If you can, do skip the rice during dinner. It takes longer for the food to digest at night anyway.

2. Eat less, eat often

I know a lot of people who tend to skip breakfast, have lunch, and skip dinner, in hopes of losing weight. My friends, I'm afraid that would NOT work. First of all, no breakfast means that your body will have no fuel to go on. Skipping dinner and breakfast the next day would mean you'll have gone up to 20 hours without food!!

Starving the body of its needed nutrients would make you feel even worse about yourself, much less lose weight. Always remember that when you feel good, you'll look good.

Do not miss any meals. In fact, do not go for 4 hours without eating anything. Have a piece of fruit (no cakes, no biscuits, nothing laced with sugar) in between meals. Have some unsalted nuts. I remembered having a banana at 5pm everyday during work (got teased a lot about it), and a bowl of fruit after dinner every night. That way, I could eat less during lunch and dinner, and I wouldn't go to bed hungry.

3. Exercise

I hate exercising. Yep, you heard me. HATE. IT. I am about the laziest person around. I hate getting all hot and sweaty (unless it's *ahem* horizontal action *ahem* :p) in a room of lot and sweaty people. Still, there'll come a time when the body becomes sluggish due to lack of use. When the body becomes sluggish, so does the mind. I finally made the decision to join a gym. Yep. I PAID to exercise.

What made the ordeal a whole lot easier was that I went with a couple of friends for our twice-weekly aerobics sessions. We would carpool, and after an hour of aerobics, we'd have a good chat. It was great having friends who wanted to exercise together as it motivates YOU to exercise. In time, I started losing weight, and gained a bit of muscle tone on my arms. Yay!

So get your friends together, maybe form some kind of exercise club or something. Once you've hit your target weight, you can all go out and celebrate. Now, is that incentive or what? ;)

4. Bin the bathroom scale

Well, I'm not asking you to chuck your bathroom scale, but stop weighing yourself everyday. You're not making things easier for yourself when you weigh yourself everyday, and moan at the lack of improvement. The first week or so of your new lifestyle will allow you to shed the water retained in your body. You'll only start seeing a loss in weight come the second week or so. Weigh yourself once a week, and NOT after an evening out. Perhaps weigh yourself on a Saturday morning, and you'll see the difference.


Having said all that, let me remind you that I am NO diet expert. Heck, I fall through the gap one too many times to count when it comes to proper diets and exercise. This lifestyle really worked for me (the stupid diets didn't) when I came back from the UK for good, when my dress size bloomed to a UK 14-16. In six months, my dress size fell to a 10. I lost over a stone.

There's no easy way out to losing weight. But there are better and more effective ways to do so, with little compromise on your lifestyle.

Good luck!

This entry was written as part of the Tips & Tricks Project.

Thoughts Aside: Several people on a weight loss diet might face numerous skin problems, like blackheads. And especially, when they use heavy exercise machines like ab machine or curl bar to gain an ideal weight; it increases their blood circulation and cardiovascular movements to an extent that is harmful for health.