Most of us are already aware that our bodies are mostly made up of water.  So much of it that approximately 65 percent of our bodies is water.  The brain uses it, the organs, the skin, bones and even the way nutrients and waste are passed in and out of the cells.  Drink too little water and you may be at risk for headaches, muscle cramps, dizziness, constipation and other nasty symptoms.  However, if you drink an adequate amount of water you gain some great benefits such as a clearer mind, more energy and even help your body metabolize body fat. 

As a general rule I try to start out at a gallon a day and move up from there.  Yes it is difficult at first but in a short amount of time your body will adapt.  I have also added an extra step to my water consumption by drinking it ice cold.  You not only get the benefit of metabolizing body fat by drinking a gallon of water a day but you also get an extra benefit with cold water by expending more calories trying to warm it up. 

How to prepare – get an empty one-gallon plastic milk carton (or water jug) and fill full of water and put it in the freezer the night before you need it. The next morning a wall of ice will form inside the milk carton.  Take a butter knife and punch a hole through the top layer of ice.  You now have an ice cold water jug that you can carry with you throughout your day.

As stated earlier your body is an amazing machine.  Not only is your body going to do what it can to insure its survival, it will also try to maintain balance by adapting to its environment.  In other words, if you eat the same thing day in and day out your body will eventually adapt to your current caloric intake by adjusting your metabolism.  For example, if you were eating 2000 calories a day and dropped down to 1500 calories a day, your body will eventually adjust your metabolism to efficiently run on 1500 calories a day.   

The key is to trick your body and keep it guessing.  One of the greatest, and most fun I might add, tricks used by bodybuilders is to add a cheat meal to your diet.  For one meal a week you can go hog wild and eat whatever your heart desires, whether it be pizza, ice-cream or a meal full of snickers.  Now I understand there are those that would prefer to eat a cleaner diet so for them I recommend that they just double their carbohydrate intake one to two full days out of the week (this is what I actually did when preparing for bodybuilding contest) 

The real asset of the cheat meal is that it keeps you honest with your diet.  If your cheat meal is on Saturday and Wednesday your getting a really bad pizza craving, you can simply convince yourself to stay on track by reminding yourself that in three more days you can have whatever you want.  Pushing your cravings off to your cheat meal date becomes a little goal for you to achieve while allowing you to maintain your sanity. 

As stated earlier, a successful weight loss routine involves both diet and exercise.  If you are looking for long-term results then one does not go without the other.  If you avoid doing either one or the other, you may experience some short-term success followed by long-term frustration.  A great example of this is to watch people who are always doing the yo-yo diets.  They lose weight one week only to gain it back plus some a few weeks later.  Hey we have all done this so the key to keep in mind that both exercise and diet are the key to long-term success. 

One trick that I have found works is to do your cardio workouts in the morning.  Ideally I would walk on the treadmill or stair stepper at a moderate pace for 45 minutes in the morning (moderate pace meaning that I was breaking a good sweat but could maintain a conversation if necessary (Too fast of a pace and you will burn carbohydrates instead of fat).  The benefits to this are that you not only increase your metabolism for the day you also will feel better too.

Even though I appear to have been stressing the benefits of a good cardio program, it would be irresponsible of me to not also point out the benefits of weight training.  Simply put, the more lean muscle mass you have the more calories your body will burn.  I highly recommend you consider adding a weight resistant workout to your body fat reduction arsenal.  

The key to remember when using any form of diet supplements is that they are a tool to help you reach your goal.  Supplements alone are not a magic pill that will give you instant results.  However, that being said, a good diet supplement added to a solid diet and workout program will help accelerate your results.   

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Tying it all together

I have personally used these six weight losing principles to help me reduce unwanted body fat to win several bodybuilding contest.  For example, I applied these exact principles to reduce my body fat from 28 percent to less than five percent in a six and a half month period.  Although some of the diet practices applied for a bodybuilding show may be extreme, these six principles can be applied and adjusted for everyone looking to reduce body fat.  In conclusion and to recap, the six basic steps to weight loss success is to drink a gallon of ice cold water a day, eat six small meals a day verses the traditional large three, add a cheat meal to your diet program, adjust your carbohydrate intake towards the end of the day, do cardio workouts in the morning and finally add supplements as a tool to your diet and workout program.