The biggest problem the dieters face is controlling the HUNGER. No matter how motivated we are to lose weight, all our endeavors are marred by our hunger. As a matter of fact, it is better to eat a bit more than is required to succeed in you weight loss goal.

Often people opine that food is the main culprit in weight gain and if they eat less food, they will be able to lose more weight. This is however a myth. The fact is eating less is not the ladder to lose weight; eating differently is the key to succeed in weight loss.

For instance, eating calorie rich food like cakes, ice creams, cookies etc can be consumed, without any difficulty, even when you are full. The high fat and sugar content in these items make for easy digestion. This results in an instant increase of about 300 calories within a span of few minutes.

Consuming 1 oz (25g) of butter contains more calories than 10 oz (275) of potatoes. But consuming 10 oz of potatoes means having a sumptuous helping but an ounce of butter is hardly realized as any consumption but does sufficient damage to your diet plan.

A whole pound of apples has about the same calories as a couple of candies. The difference is it is easy to consume candies, whereas pound of apples is very filling.

The idea is thus not to go hungry, but curtain on rich calorie foods (usually fatty-sugary food) and consume more of low-calorie stuff with rich dietary fiber.

Our body metabolism determines the rate at which we burn our calories. Though it is vastly genetic, the metabolism rate can be made to increase a bit, allowing for more calories to burn. One of the ways to have an increased metabolic rate is to eat less but quite often. Apparently this sends a signal to the brain that food sources are plentiful thus encouraging you to burn more calories. Conversely, the brain begins to feel that there is shortage of food when you starve and accordingly slow down the pace at which it burns calories. This is primarily the reason why weight loss achieved through starving or fasting are not long-term. In fact they make us feel awful and force us to conclude that dieting is indeed an agonizing effort.

The upshot of the whole matter is that hunger disturbs your diet pattern and should hence be handled with caution. The best way to go about it is to eat less and often. Go low on calorie rich & fat rich food, but include lots of fiber content in your to help you feel full, at the same time not increase your weight. Most importantly, taking care of your hunger will help you remain motivated enough to continue with you weight loss endeavor.

Do we need fat content in our diet and if yes what kind of fat is good for our body is a dietary concern that needs an immediate attention. To understand this clearly we need to know about kinds of fats that are part of our food and how they affect our body positively or negatively.

Today’s eatables have three kinds of fats, which are fatty acids, solid fats, and trans fats.

Fatty acids are molecules of bonded carbon atoms and can be divided in three different types saturated, monounsaturated and polyunsaturated on the basis of the carbon bonding property.

Saturated fats are the fatty acids molecules where in carbon atoms are bonded singly. These fatty acids are harmful for our body and its consumption can lead to an increase in cholesterol and also increases the risk of heart diseases and heart stroke. Usually it is believed since the adipose tissue is made of saturated fats, our body can produce the desired levels of saturated fats and thus there is no need to include saturated fats in our daily intake.

Unsaturated fats are thus the fatty acids where the bonding of the carbon atoms is other than single bonding as is there in the saturated fats. When the fatty acid molecule has only one double or triple carbon bonding atom then it is called monounsaturated fatty acid. Olive oil, chicken, almonds, canola oil, peanut oil, and avocados are all sources of monounsaturated fats. On the other hand if the fatty acid molecule has got more than one double or triple carbon bonding atom then it is known as polyunsaturated fatty acid. Polyunsaturated fat can be found in fish, corn, soybean oil, safflower oil, sesame seeds, and sunflower seeds apart from being present in many other nuts and seeds, and their oils.

Many parts of our body cells are made up of unsaturated fatty acids and thus the consumption of unsaturated fats in our diet is essential. If the supply of unsaturated fats is not adequate then the cells will use saturated fats for body structure formation and would form a weak structure. This weakening of membranes may expose our body to long term heath issues and diseases.

Solid fats are the fats have a solid form at room temperature. These are usually loaded with saturated fats and thus are not at all good for intake. The most common sources of solid fats are animal products like meat, milk, butter, beef fat, chicken fat, pork fat etc. Plant oils like coconut oil and palm kernel oil are also high in saturated fats and are nutritionally considered to be examples of Solid fats.

Trans fats usually results in because of the hydrogenation of fats and can be found in eatables that are made in or fried in partially hydrogenated oils. Trans fats are also available naturally in very minor amounts in diary products and some meats and other animal products. Like solid fats these are also full of saturated fats and thus are not good for us. 

Always choose eatable that have polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fat contents instead of saturated fat content to lead a healthy and long life. 

An enzyme associated with production and management of fat in our bodies has been found playing an important role in keeping our skin and hair healthy and beautiful. This was established in one of the latest researches the findings of which were published in “The Journal of Biological Chemistry”, and was undertaken at Gladstone Institutes of Cardiovascular Disease (GICD) by Robert V. Farese, Jr. and other fellow researchers.

The enzyme that is known as acyl CoA:diacylglycerol acyltransferase 1 or DGAT1 found to be regulating retinoic acid levels within the body which in turn directly impacts the health of skin and hair.

The study on mice reveled that the lack of DGAT1 in them caused them to be lean, diet-induced obesity resistant, and leptin and insulin resistant along with another typical characteristic, which is abnormal skin and mammary glands development. The researchers used genetic engineering techniques and caused the reduction in the DGAT1 enzyme levels in a group of mice. This resulted in high increase in retinoic acid (RA) levels causing quick aging of their skin and loss of hair.

"For some time, we have been studying the enzymes that make triglycerides," said Robert V. Farese, Jr. and added, "We found that one of these enzymes is a major regulator of retinoic acid actions in the skin."

Retinoic acid (RA) is a highly toxic acid and in a controlled way it is being used to treat a variety of skin disorders like acne, psoriasis, certain cancers etc. The research on the mice proved that due to lack of DGAT1 the skin’s sensitivity towards retinol resulted in skin problems. The loss of the enzyme also caused a condition known as alopecia, or loss of hair. The research also proved that it was possible to prevent both these effects on the body by restricting retinol in the diet. DGAT1 enzyme renders retinol ineffective and lack of DGAT1 on the other hand makes the excessive retinol in the skin to be converted and affect in a negative way.

"Our results show that DGAT1 is an important component for controlling retinoic acid levels in the skin of mice," said Michelle Shih, the lead author on the study. "These findings may have implications for the treatment of human skin or hair disorders."

If you think that an intense workout with a proper diet can lead you to your weight loss mission, think again. Though these two aspects form an integral part of your weight loss initiative, having further knowledge on the other key aspects is equally vital for you to see quick success. Be aware of the following 3 key factors:

Stick to Smaller meals: It is a usual practice that 3 meals a day are considered vital for our existence. But having 3 big meals applies a tremendous pressure on the body metabolism and the body metabolism becomes sluggish in burning all of the fat, which leads the food to get converted and stored as fat leading to obesity. On the other hand, if the meals are split into smaller quantities and consumed say 5 -8 times a day, then the body metabolism remains stable, allowing you to lose weight more than you deemed possible. 

Keep away from stress: Do you have the faintest idea how stress can influence you body weight? When you are stressed, the body releases ‘cortisol’ hormone that precipitates hunger and causes you to eat more. Thus it is very important to control your mood swings in order to keep your body stable and healthy.

Remain motivated: Last but not the least, you need to keep yourself motivated enough to stick to you plan and work towards it consistently and diligently. You need to identify a strong driving force so that you are able to keep to that goal even when you are tempted to give up for reasons whatsoever. A strong driving force will ensure that you are not allowed to give up at any point of time, no matter how strongly you feel about giving up.

Interestingly, when we eat our bodies release two types of hormone into our blood stream. These hormones together control our function of fat burning and fat storage. The solution then is to incorporate in your diet such foods that help in fat burning rather than fat storage. In other words, calorie shift is the key to losing weight more than diet, exercise or positive thinking.