Lose Weight and "Change Your Life" with These 5 "Non-Extreme" Habits

Do you want to lose weight and keep it off? Dr. Nina Ellis Hervey is a health expert and influencer who shares about “healthy lifestyle, weight loss, natural hair care, confidence, self-esteem, education & more.” In a recent viral post, she shares about what she did to drop weight. “Losing over 100 pounds over 17 years ago and keeping it off has been one of the most rewarding experiences of my life,” she says, adding that there were “some real innocent mistakes that I was making that I didn't even realize. So today I wanna share the nine habits that I stopped in order for me to lose over 100 pounds and keep it off for good.”

Choose Which Habits You Want to Give Up

“Now, if you do some of these things, don't feel bad. Instead of giving up altogether, just give up some of these bad habits I'm gonna mention,” she says. “Now, let's get into these practical solutions.”

Understand That You Can’t Change Your Diet Overnight

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“The attempt at changing my diet overnight was a big no-no for me,” she says. “I used to lie to myself, tell myself that all these bad food habits that I had, I was gonna get rid of them by tomorrow, or better yet next year, or that I was gonna clean out my whole kitchen, get rid of all the junk food and change everything about it by the next day and replace it with healthy food. More lies.”

Make Sustainable Changes

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She learned that the point was “to make changes that I could live with in my life for today,” she says. “I wanted to make sure that I was making lasting eating and fitness changes that could last the rest of my life. And so here's a few of those things that I used that were quick fixes.”

Make Healthy Swaps

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“I learned that eating healthy is not all about the foods that you take away. It's about eating the foods that you can have that are healthy, that you're adding into your life abundance,” she says, suggesting “small, steady, and realistic changes,” like swapping out 2% milk for 1% or unsweetened almond milk, or switching out processed bread for a multigrain version. “Once you ease into that, add in a nice serving of fruits and vegetables each day,” she says, noting that “adding small changes that make a big difference over time. Things that you can live with that are not extravagant and overboard that you're more likely to stick with.”

Pair Diet with Exercise

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“Only dieting and not exercising was almost the death of me,” she admits. “You can lose weight through diet alone, but it is super hard.” She learned “a little bit more about exercise and how I could use it to lose a little bit more weight, but also to eat a little bit more,” she says. “Plus, there's a lot of great physical and mental benefits to it, like feeling better in your clothing or looking the best that you would like to look, as well as your muscle tone and body frame.”

Keep It Simple

“Here's my quick fix here: Keep it simple, stupid,” she says. She explains that you don’t need to devote a lot of time to “long workouts and all this strenuous stuff.” Instead, “you need to just figure out how to make fitness work for you. I didn't start off working out all day long. I didn't start off with long, hefty workouts. I had to start off small in just 10 minutes. 10 minutes is all you need in order for you to see some changes in your fitness journey. So get on that elliptical, get you a hula hoop, a little bit of jump rope. Just move a little bit. You're going to see a difference and do it for yourself.”

You Can’t Outrun a Bad Diet

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“I had to also stop putting so much of an emphasis on my exercise as well. Here's the hard truth: What I was eating and how much I was eating had much more of a significant impact on my body, my weight loss, and my weight gain than exercise ever did. In short, you cannot outrun a bad diet. I was ignoring bad food choices because I was working out so much,” she adds.

Working Out Too Much Can Backfire

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“Now let's talk about working out so much. For me, it was bad because it limited my recovery. And when you limit recovery, you end up with more injuries, which kept me out of the gym more, which meant I was in a bad cycle of gaining weight,” she said. She was constantly “sore and tired,” which led to emotional eating. So, she “slowly creeped up in my exercise and changed the way I was eating, which led to good weight loss. This also helped me with pushing through hard plateaus. Whenever you hit those marks, but then you stop, you slow down in your weight loss. And instead of gaining weight or not losing any weight, due to lack of diet care, I was losing more.”

Stop Giving Up On Yourself

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She also had to stop giving up on herself. “Most of us fall short. We skip out on workouts. We're not eating the healthiest, we're not making good decisions. However, you know, we dust ourselves off and we try again.” What she “learned over time is that those pounds kept dropping off because I kept showing up. Even though I didn't always know what to do, I had to forgive myself from my past mistakes. And I also had to figure out ways to use those mistakes as learning lessons to move forward. So here are some of my quick fixes here. I had to learn that perfection has no place here. You deserve it and you are worth it. When you make a mistake or you feel like you're not making significant progress, keep going anyway. Do not give up. Change requires time and old habits, they don't go away easy. Try to reach out for some support and don't wait until next week or next year to jump back on the bandwagon. Do it right now. You can do it.”

Don’t Eliminate Food Groups. Instead Practice Moderation

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She also reveals that she tried to give up on certain foods altogether, explaining that she would “get around certain foods” and had zero willpower. She tried eliminating food groups, but “I was even eliminating the things I actually enjoyed,” she says. “And what I learned is you have to have a diet that includes things you enjoy for you to sustain it for the rest of your life. So I would go around cutting out bread, sugar, pasta, everything, and I would lose weight for a little minute and I would lose it sharp. But then as soon as I would add that thing in, let it rip, and I would gain that weight back real fast. So here are my quick fixes with that: Everything in moderation. And I try to eat more of what I know is good for me. And I also try to get proportioned items that allow me to eat what I want, but within a certain controlled portion,” she says. And this also stopped my all out binges and being weak around foods that I needed more willpower around because I had more of the treat that I desired.

Don’t Overindulge on Cheat Days

“Overindulging on those cheat days had to stop for me,” she says. “What would happen is I was literally just binging out on food. And so then this would lead to me feeling bad about myself. I would be in a bad mood, which would lead to more bad eating. That made me feel even worse. So here are some of the things that I use as quick fixes. Keep in mind that for some people, especially at first, and when you're struggling with self-control, which is not a horrible thing, it takes time. Maybe it's just an excuse to binge on food instead of actually having a nice reward day. If you can have a cheat day and be reasonable with it, then you're fine. But if it leads to you just eating foods over and over that make you feel bad about yourself leading to less restraint on your eating, then this ain't for you.”

Portion Control Treats

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She recommends portion controlling your treats. “This way you feel more good about your choice and your decision, and you also feel a bit more satisfied. So it leaves you with both feelings of not feeling bad about yourself, but also getting what you want out of the deal,” she says.

Stop Confusing Healthy with Low Calorie

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“I had to stop confusing healthy with low calorie,” she continues, explaining that she used to buy

“healthy buzzworthy” food. “Research even shows that people who grocery shop are more likely to buy the stuff that says stuff like gluten free, organic, low fat, without even thinking about whether it really means that it's low calorie. And a lot of the stuff on these packages is a whole lie.” She claims that most of it isn’t actually low calorie. “Read the front of the package very carefully and flip it over. And look at the nutrition facts. Look at all the things from the calories to the fat, to the cholesterol, the carbohydrates, all of that. That's gonna give you a rundown of what you want inside your diet or what you're having. It's not that you're calorie counting per se, but it's good to know the ingredients that's in your food so you actually know what you're consuming.”

Read Restaurant Menus Carefully

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“Restaurant menus are super suspect as well. They love to put in that section that says healthy options and healthy choices. And when you look at the calorie count, sometimes it's just as high as the other food that's on the menu,” she continues. She recommends looking things up on MyFitnessPal.

Eliminate Unrealistic Expectations

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“I've had to stop it in the past with unrealistic expectations. And what I mean is, reality stars and TV and infomercials make weight loss look like a breeze. So when I actually lost my weight, I had to realize how hard, definitely hard it is. And that's why I share with y'all the struggles and the triumphs. It's not all cute peaches and cream. Sometimes you're gonna have downs. Sometimes you're gonna have ups, and sometimes you're gonna have wins and losses.”

There’s No Quick Fix

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She also says that fads are too good to be true. “When I would try to lose the weight super quick, it would come off quick for a while, but then you can't sustain that. It's not consistent. So I had to find something to stand in to make me more stable,” she says.

Make Small Goals

“Changing my mindset was the major tweak when it comes to expectations. Instead of me expecting that I would lose 10 pounds in a week, expecting that I could lose one pound and reaching that goal helped me to be more likely to stay on track and feel good about myself because I was reaching the goals I set out to do and they weren't too hard for me. Losing one or two pounds per week, or even half a pound is something to be celebrated. It's very much healthy and realistic, and it also leads to a lifetime of watching your health,” she says.

Here Are 5 Problem Solving Methods

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“I had to stop forgetting to use problem solving methods in order to stop bad habits. A lot of times we think it's easy for us to stop things and pick up new habits, but actually it's very difficult. And when it comes to weight loss, there are some specific things I try to stick with,” she says. “Number one is replacing bad habits with good habits. Two, finding your bad habit triggers. Three, managing those triggers. Four, enlisting a friend or family member to help with the positive changes. Five, making avoiding bad habits easier by removing those things out of your way and out of your life.”

Create Good Habits

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If you change your behavior, you have more of a chance of sustainable weight loss. “Create good habits so that you can last longer. Give yourself some room,” she says toward the end of the video. “Things that you can add to your life that will be even better for you on this journey.”

Follow Her on Social Media

You can follow Dr. Nina Ellis Hervey on social media. Here is her YouTube, Instagram, and X. And if you enjoyed this article, take advantage of these 15 Quick Ways to Lose Body Fat Percentage in a Week.