Weight Loss Cheat Meals – Why These Are Important
If you're looking to lose weight, it's vital that you are including cheat meals in the program. Cheat meals? That may be what you're thinking – why would you include a cheat meal which would only take you further away from your goals?
There are a number of reasons a cheat meal will help with weight loss and it's a proven fact that those who include them in their weight loss diet plan do better than those who don't.
Here are a few things that you should know about cheat meals and weight loss.
Cheat Meals and Metabolic Rate The very first reason why you must include a cheat meal, and possibly the most important from a weight loss standpoint, is because cheat meals will rev the metabolic rate. When you go for so long eating very little calories at all the metabolism begins to slow down because of this.
Then when you add a cheat meal to the day, the body senses that it no longer needs to conserve fuel, and as such starts burning calories at an elevated pace again.
If you fail to ever have any cheat meals in the diet, it's quite likely that the metabolism will slow to a crawl and weight loss will stop. When they are included though, that's when you'll find you continue on your pathway of continually losing weight.
Cheat Meals and Food Cravings The second reason cheat meals are important should be obvious – to help beat cravings. Just like all the dieters before you, you likely realize that when a strong craving strikes, that's when it's most difficult to stay the course on your plan.
If you have a cheat meal around the corner though, you all of a sudden know that you will get to give into that craving shortly, so it loses its power over you.
Giving up favourite foods is the single most difficult thing most people have with diets so this makes it a great deal easier.
Cheat Meals and Energy Levels Moving on, another reason to add cheat meals to your plan is to help maintain energy levels. If you're never bringing the calories up, it's only going to be a matter of time before your energy level plummets. In order to prevent this, you should aim to have one cheat each week.
This will be especially important if you're participating in vigorous exercise, which will quickly use up calories for energy.
Cheat Meals and Your Relationship With Food Finally, the last reason to include cheat meals in your plan is because they will help out with your relationship with food. If you permanently ban any type of food from your diet you will get stuck in the 'good food, bad food' mindset.
For some people this could be a terrible place to be and they may eventually start viewing far too many foods as 'bad'. When you eat the cheat meal and see that you don't gain 10 pounds of fat back, you'll realize that all foods can be eaten in moderation.
So be sure that you're giving yourself permission to include the odd cheat meal in your weight loss diet plan. The benefits really do outweigh the cons, so when done correctly these will actually help, not hinder overall weight loss progress.
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Our Expert
Shannon Clark, BPE, AFLCA Certified, is a personal trainer and writer out of Edmonton, Alberta. She's been in the health and fitness business for over 8 years and is passionate in helping others achieve their goals
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