Make three small changes
; Include a fruit
and a vegetable
with your lunch
and dinner.
; Don’t eat white
foods at dinner.
; Use the half-plate rule (fill half
your plate with
salad or veggies).
; Have a sweet or
salty afternoon
snack only if you
first eat a piece of
fresh fruit.
; Drink one glass
of water before every meal or snack.
; Use the Restaurant
Rule of Two: Limit
yourself to two
items other than
your entrée.
; Never eat in
front of the TV.
; Eat a piece of fruit
on the way to work
every day.
; Save desserts
for weekends.
; Freeze half of
what you make, and
serve the other half.
EASY TRICKS
These 10 steps
have helped
people lose at
least 20 pounds
in six months.
ai
e
e
r
T
p
f
Track your progress
Most diets fail because they ask
you to do too much—give up all
carbs, or all sugar, or cut your intake
to 1,000 calories. Instead, keep it simple: change just
three things about your eating habits. David, 55, a
fast-food-loving father of four, resolved to follow this
trio of tactics: ( 1) not eating potato chips unless he’d
exercised that day, ( 2) throwing away half his french
fries before he sat down, and ( 3) having dessert only if
he went back and bought it after he’d eaten his whole
lunch. He didn’t have to give up what he loved, and he
lost 10 to 15 pounds over the winter. It’s not al ways
possible to adhere to all three changes. That’s okay.
If you try for three a day and you only hit two, you’re
still losing weight. (For ideas, see the list at right.) ng i ( r e the i t g
After one of my speeches, Nancy, a
69-year-old office manager, showed
me a baggy sweater she was wearing and said, “Seven months ago this
was skintight; since then I’ve lost 33
pounds.” She was snacking too much
at night, so she and her husband
switched their dinnertime from 6 to
7: 30 p.m. They also saved their desserts for weekends, and moved the
candy dish out of the TV room.
It takes about a month to break an
old habit and replace it with a good
one. But what happens if you don’t
have a partner, as Nancy did, to help
you make these changes?
Many people struggle to follow their
plan unless they write it down, which
is why I suggest a Power of Three
checklist. Take a piece of paper and
write a month’s worth of days across
the top, then write your three daily
goals down the side. At the end of each
day, check off the changes you made
that day. Not every day will be perfect,
but the idea is to track your progress so
you can see what you need to work on. h to
fter one of m
9-year-old o
erts for week
andy dish ou
why I sugge
hecklist. Tak
rite a month
A
6
s
c
is
c
w
Each month,
modify your goals
n
l
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11... 31 TOTAL JANUARY
Not every tip you try will work. Some
sound great, but prove impractical. Others sound crazy yet would be surprisingly effective if you gave them a shot.
Ralph, 65, is a grandfatherly physician
whose problem with meal stuffing led
him to try three changes: ( 1) using the
half-plate rule (fill half the plate with
vegetables or salad), ( 2) slowing down—
be the last to start eating and the last to
finish, and (3 ) “pre-plating” your food
from the counter (as opposed to serving
off the table, where it’s easy to get second helpings).
As you can see from Ralph’s Power
of Three checklist, some of these changes were more successful than others. Af-
Use the half-plate rule.
xxxx xx
x
x 27
Slow down.
x x
13
Pre-plate food. x x x x x
24
ter a month he found that “slowing down”
didn’t work for him: He did it at only 13
dinners during the month. In contrast,
both the half-plate rule and pre-plating
were easy for him. For the next month he
dropped the “slowing down” goal and
substituted it with a serving-spoon tip,
replacing his serving spoons with table-
spoons. So far he’s lost 15 pounds. ;
Brian Wansink is the director of the
Cornell University Food and Brand Lab
and author of Mindless Eating. For more
information go to
mindlesseating.org.
AARP.ORG/MAGAZINE 45
