How to win the weight war

Weight control is a problem for too many of us. No one wants to be roly-poly fat or stavation skinny. Yet it can be difficult to eat healthy balanced meals and maintain a comfortable in-between weight. This article on weighty worries offers 30 dieting tips. Dieting is not hard if you alone have decided you are ready to lose weight. The secret is to eat less.
1. Don't eat if you're not hungry.
2. Do stop before you're full, because it takes about twenty minutes for your belly to figure out what your mouth has been up to.
3. Don't eat absent-mindedly.
4. Do keep peeled carrots, celery sticks, tomatoes, green grapes, radishes and other vegetables and fruits ready for snacking or for taking on a trip.
5. Don't go shopping on an empty stomach.
6. Do consider meeting instead of eating.
7. Don't take diet pills or any slimming aids without a doctor's go ahead. Some are dangerous; others make you irritable; others make you lose water, not fat.
8. Do eat well-balanced meals daily that include foods from the four major food groups: grains and cereals; fruits and vegeables; meat, poultry and fish; and dairy products.
9. Don't weight yourself every day. Don't expect to lose more than one or two pounds a week.
10. Do take a walk or call a friend or write a letter when you get a food craving.
11. Don't load your wholemeal bread with butter and jam, or your baked potato with butter, or your pasta with a rich cream sauce.
12. Do eat breakfast. Instead of skipping any meals, eat small meals.
13. Don't talk about your diet all the time. You'll bore everybody silly.
14. Do keep busy and food will become less important.
15. Don't have one potato crisp. It's easier to have none.
16. Do remember that calories count even when it's your birthday, even when you're on a date, even when you have a test that day.
17. Do use a small plate if your dietetic dinner looks pitiful on a big one.
18. Don't start a diet right before the exams or your period or when other concerns are making you tense.
19. Do cut down on salt because it make you retain excess water. Avoid things like salte snacks and crisps. Season your food with pepper and spices.
20. Don't gorge yourself on Sunday in preparation for the diet you might start on Monday.
21. Do drink lots of water between meals. Drinking will make you less hungry.
22. Do brush your teeth when you want to put something in your mouth. The just-brushed feeling will cut down on your desire to munch.
23. Don't fry when you can boil, steam, grill or bake.
24. Don't become a vegetarian unless you research exactly what you'd need to eat each day to get enough protein.
25. Do learn how to use chopsticks. They'll slow you down when you eat Chinese food, and at other meals too.
26. Don't let your menu get boring. Experiment with herbs, and try new vegeables. Learn to adore salad, but go easy on dressings.
27. Do resist. Mere minutes of fudge joy equal flab that could take days of dieting to lose.
28. Don't sit through TV food commercials — change the channel.
29. Do consider making rigid rules for yourself. It may be easier to know you won't allow yourself to snack after 9 p.m. than to have to test your willpower every evening.
30. Do think of getting through one day at a time rather than freaking out over the prospect of survivng three weeks without chips.