Putting on weight is very easy unless you have your habits tightly in check-especially during winter. The biggest predicament we face is our body's ability to cope with massive excesses and our relatively ‘new' habits (evolutionarily speaking) have not evolved at the same rate. And mostly we are unaware of the tremendously negative impact weight gain has on our hormonal balance, reproductive health and even fertility.

Our fast paced lives, convenience foods, super sized portions, cornucopia of video games and other sedentary activities including endless hours in front of the television and way too little exercise has dangerously caught up with us. And now we face an almost epidemic need for re-education on how to eat and a healthy lifestyle.

Balance your life and get organise
You already know what you need to eat to lose weight. It's simple. The problem most people face is not lack of education on what to eat. It is lack of organisation to actually have a healthy, home prepared meal. That's the truth and unless you actually put some planning and organisation into your week and day to day you will not achieve your goal.

The best suggestion I can give you (because it works a treat if you work it!) is to plan out your weekly meals-school timetable style. Yes you can still have flexibility if you do this but what will actually happened is that you will have the ingredients at home to cook the meals you have planned ahead of time. Mostly because you will have based that week's shopping list on it.

All you need for this exercise is a half an hour per month to have all your meals sorted! You will save money, time, aggravation and your health in this one simple step. Great return on investment, if you ask me!

Chew you food!
I am forever astounded by how people don't CHEW their food. I am also guilty of this at times but let me share with you that this is the one thing that will make the BIGGEST different to your waistline. Why?

Simple.

When you actually chew each mouthful at least 30 times you will take longer to eat. In turn you actually give your brain time to register you have food in your stomach. Thus feeling FULL sooner, eating less and maintaining a healthy weight super easily!

I urge you to try it for yourself.

Eat with your stomach not your eyes
Your entire stomach is only as big as your closed fist, but have you noticed that some people train themselves over time to ‘stuff' half a football amount of food in there? Essentially if you are eating any more than about a tennis ball amount of food at any given meal-you are overeating!

Newsflash! Most people overeat at EVERY meal!

The key to change this? Start training yourself in the reverse. Essentially halve (or quarter) your portion sizes-and when you eat regularly throughout the day this is really easy because you will be having just what you need to keep your metabolism nice and high in anticipation for your next small meal. Eat small!

Eat regularly
This is a crucial step on your journey to maintaining a svelte figure. When you eat smaller meals regularly your body keeps ‘burning' fat, it speeds up your metabolism, keeps your energy levels high and your moods stable.

The key here is to make sure you finish your last meal at least 3 hours before going to bed. And this way, if you have not overeaten, you will be hungry again-just in time for the most important meal of the day: Breakfast!

Another great tip here especially in winter is to have really light, low calorie, tasty meals like soup or casseroles. Just keep in mind that for the average woman, the portion size is about 1 cup and for the average man 1.5-2 cups is what you are looking at as far as amounts go. Just because it may be light and low calorie it does not give you an excuse to overeat.

Drink at least 2 litres of filtered water daily
Did you know that the body's thirst signal is the same as its hunger signal? If you want to maintain a healthy weight this is a crucial aspect to which you must pay close attention. Essentially what it means is that most of the time if your body is dehydrated and you are actually thirsty-the first instinct is that you will feel it as hunger.

What does this mean? You will often eat on impulse when really all your body needs is water! To avoid this be sure to drink at least 2L of filtered water daily (do not drink tap water!!!) and pronto! Problem solved. It's that simple!

Put these tips into practice and add some physical activity like gentle walking or dancing to the mix and you will soon be seeing a slimmer you without even trying.