When you think about it, what is the mystery about natural weight loss - if you don't eat too much and have regular physical activity you won't put on weight; nevertheless how many people follow this advice. If it were that simple, which it should be, most slimming companies would be out of business; however, currently 35 percent of Americans are unable to prevent being overweight! However, once you are overweight you can't wait to lose it again whether it is for a wedding, vacation or just for health reasons.

The strange thing is though that it is so much easier to stay trim than it is to lose weight because as soon as you start putting on weight, many things become more difficult. Nevertheless weight maintenance is something that has to be worked on and planned otherwise we will put on extra pounds.

It has been shown that even when overweight people enjoy eating low calorie foods, the majority become bored and end up putting the weight back on because they slip back into previous ways. Despite the momentum towards weight gain, natural weight loss methods can stop this from happening, and there are plenty of good reasons to avoid piling on excess pounds that go beyond vanity or social acceptance.

There is a large number of health conditions associated with weight gain and the greater the increase in body weight the more that problems occur. The annoying part is that natural weight maintenance is not difficult to understand but overweight people choose to ignore this.

By eating a balanced amount of carbohydrates, low fat foods, some protein and those products high in fiber, a natural weight loss regime should be easy to maintain. You have probably had a meal like this in a restaurant; a baked or jacket potato with fresh vegetables and some meat, as lean as possible but it wouldn't have gravy or butter on the potato.

Unfortunately, dietary fat contains higher amounts of calories than ordinary food which when consumed will just be converted to body fat more readily. Don't fall into the fat-free trap where manufacturers keep coming out with low-fat or fat-free versions of their best-selling foods despite the fact that Americans are getting fatter anyway.

Whilst completely false, the perception is that you can basically eat exactly what you want provided it is fat-free but there are still calories in the food which can easily be converted to body fat. The term fat-free can be a trap if you start to believe that you can eat any amount of fat-free food when it is far better to respond to hunger with healthy snacks.

The subject of when to eat and how often can be contentious but the latest thoughts on the subject suggest that keeping to regular meal times and eating small nutritious snacks between meals may be the answer. The secret to natural weight loss is easy if you just obey it; do not eat more than your body requires through normal activities and exercise.