Losing the fat around your midsection can be a tough challenge. However, we will tell you how to get a flat stomach in this article.
Also, apart from being a risk factor for several diseases, too much abdominal fat can make you feel bloated and discouraged.
Furthermore, if you have been wondering how to get a flat stomach, this article might be just what you need.
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How To Get A Flat Stomach
There are several effective strategies for reducing waist sizes. Here are some ways to get a flat stomach:
#1. Reduce Calories
To begin with, it is a well-known fact that you need to cut calories for weight loss. A popular approach is reducing your daily intake by 500–1,000 calories. This will help you lose between 1–2 pounds (0.5–1 kg) approximately weekly.
With this in mind, it’s important also to know, that cutting your calorie intake too much can yield the opposite of the desired effect.
Furthermore, eating too few calories can lead to a major decrease in your metabolic rate or the number of calories you burn daily.
Also, this decrease in metabolic rate might persist even after you go back to your normal self. This means you might have a lower metabolic rate than you had before you harshly cut your calories.
Hence, do not cut your calorie intake too much or for too long.
#2. Eat More Fiber
Another way to get a flat stomach is to eat more fiber, soluble fiber especially. Soluble fibers absorb large amounts of water. They also slow down the passing of food through the digestive tract.
This process delays stomach emptying, making the stomach expand and you to feel full.
Furthermore, soluble fiber might reduce the number of calories your body is able to absorb from food.
Additionally, by eating soluble fiber, you are less likely to accumulate fat around your organs. This reduces waist circumference and the risk of several diseases.
Good sources of soluble fibers are oats, flaxseeds, avocados, legumes, Brussels sprouts, and blackberries.
#3. Do Resistance Training
Losing muscle mass is a popular side effect of dieting. It can be bad for your metabolic rate. This is because muscle loss reduces the number of calories you burn daily.
Nevertheless, doing resistance exercises often can prevent muscle loss and, thus, helps you maintain or improve your metabolic rate.
Additionally, resistance training can be effective for tightening your midsection and reduce your waist size too.
In fact, a mix of resistance training and aerobic exercise appears to be the most effective strategy for obtaining a flat stomach.
#4. Carry Out Exercises Standing
Carrying out exercises while standing can be beneficial to your health more than performing the same exercises sitting down or using weight machines.
Also, by standing, you trigger more muscles to maintain balance and hold up your weight. Thus, you will use up more energy working out.
Furthermore, a study comparing the effects of standing and sitting exercises says that some standing exercises increased muscle activation by 7–25%, compared to sitting.
Additionally, another study suggests that standing might improve your breathing, compared to sitting.
Even this may seem like a little change, it may strengthen your midsection and is worth trying out.
#5. Add Apple Cider Vinegar To Your Diet
Apple cider vinegar is linked to a lot of impressive health benefits. Most of these benefits are mainly attributed to its content of acetic acid.
A lot of animal studies suggest that acetic acid can reduce body fat accumulation.
Even though human studies are few in this area. A study in obese men showed that taking one tablespoon of apple cider vinegar daily for 12 weeks reduced their waistlines by 0.5 inches (1.4 cm), on average.
#6. Walk At Least Thirty Minutes Daily
A mix of diet and exercise is maybe the most effective way to lose weight and improve your general health.
Amazingly, studies show that you do not a lot of exercises to reap health benefits.
Frequent, quick walks have been shown to effectively reduce total body fat and the fat around the midsection.
Additionally, walking briskly for 30–40 minutes (about 7,500 steps) daily can cause a significant reduction of dangerous tummy fat and yield a slimmer waistline.
#7. Avoid Liquid Calories
Sugary soda, energy drinks, and fruit juices are generally full of sugar and liquid calories.
Also, it is very easy to drink large quantities at a time. This gives rise to an abundance of empty calories.
One fact about liquid calories is that the brain does not register them like it registers the solid calories.
Hence, you get to consume these calories on top of everything else you eat or drink.
A study showed that each daily serving of a sugar-sweetened beverage increased the risk of obesity by a massive 60% in children.
Furthermore, these drinks are also generally filled with fructose, which is directly linked to belly fat gain.
#8. Consume Whole, Single-Ingredient Foods
To start with, the best dietary advice you can give someone is to focus their diet around eating whole, single-ingredient foods.
Whole foods are full of nutrients, fiber, water, vitamins, and minerals. This makes it very difficult to overconsume these foods. Some of them have their own benefits for preventing weight gain.
Furthermore, make an effort to eat lots of dairy, fish, fruits, legumes, nuts, unprocessed meat, vegetables, and whole grains.
#9. Drink Water
In summary, there are at least three ways water can help you get a flat stomach.
To begin with, it can help with weight loss by increasing your metabolic rate temporarily. Drinking water can increase your total energy expenditure by up to 100 calories daily.
Secondly, drinking water before a meal makes you feel fuller. Thus, you end up eating fewer calories.
Lastly, it might help relieve constipation and reduce belly bloating.
With these in mind, try to drink a large glass of water before each meal. It might help you achieve the weight loss goal you have set for yourself.
#10. Avoid Swallowing Air and Gases
The main source of gas in diets are carbonated beverages like soda. Their bubbles contain carbon dioxide, which is released from the liquid in the stomach. Additionally, this might also cause stomach bloating.
Also, this can also happen when you chew gum, drink using a straw or talk while eating.
Eating silently, drinking from a glass and taking water instead of carbonated drinks may help you achieve a flatter stomach.
#11. Reduce Your Stress Levels
Stress and anxiety are very common, and a lot of people at some point in their lives experience them.
Also, stress is can lead to the development of many diseases. It is also a common reason why people tend to eat or binge eat, usually without being hungry in the first place.
Furthermore, stress makes the body produce cortisol. Cortisol is a stress hormone that increases appetite and leads directly to belly fat storage.
Additionally, this might be very harmful in women who already have a large waist. This is because they tend to produce more cortisol due to stress, which further leads to belly fat gain.
Finally, try to add stress-relieving activities like yoga or meditation to your daily routines.
#12. Eat More Protein
When it comes to weight loss, Protein is the most important nutrient. The body burns more calories digesting protein than fat or carbs.
Thus, high-protein diets might be responsible for an extra 80–100 burned calories on a daily basis.
Also, a high-protein diet can reduce your appetite, make you feel full and aid you with retaining your muscle mass during weight loss.
Furthermore, studies have shown that people who eat more protein have slimmer waistlines than those who eat less proteinous foods.
Finally, aim to get 20–30% of your calories from protein every day. To do this easily, add a protein source in all your meals.
#13. Monitor Your Food Intake
When you are trying to shed some weight, it is very helpful to monitor your food intake.
There are a lot of ways to do this. However, the well-known effective ones are counting calories, keeping a food diary and taking pictures of your food.
You do not have to do this all the time. But, it may be good to track what you eat consecutively for a few days every few weeks.
This will make you more aware of your calorie intake and allow you to adjust your weight loss diet if needed.
Furthermore, studies show that people who track their food intake are more likely to achieve their weight loss goals.
#14. Get Enough Sleep
Getting enough sleep is very important for weight loss. Studies have constantly shown that sleeping less than five hours a night for adults and less than 10 hours for children increased the risk of weight gain.
For women, short sleep time is frequently linked to increased waist size, compared to those who get enough night’s sleep.
Furthermore, people who are sleep-deprived are up to 55% more likely to become obese.
However, sleeping for healthier lengths has been shown to help deal with these effects.
#15. Eat Fatty Fish Every Week
It is generally advised to eat fatty fish once or twice per week. You can also take fish oil as a replacement.
Fatty fish are very healthy. It is also very rich in essential long-chain omega-3 fatty acids and good-quality protein.
Furthermore, Protein has been shown to help with weight loss. Also, studies have suggested that omega-3 fatty acids can also help to reduce the accumulation of fat in the liver and abdominal cavity.
If you don’t like eating fatty fish, get long-chain fatty acids from fish oil or fish oil supplements instead.
#16. Use Coconut Oil Sometimes
Replace fat with coconut oil sometimes. Coconut oil contains a unique mix of fatty acids. It is among the few foods rich in medium-chain triglycerides (MCTs).
Also, studies show that replacing a little dietary fat with MCTs might increase energy expenditure and make you feel fuller.
Furthermore, coconut oil has been shown to effectively reduce waist size more than other types of fat.
Remember that coconut oil is still fat and is nine (9) calories per gram. Hence, it is necessary not to just add it to your diet. Rather, replace other sources of fat with it.
#17. Strengthen Your Core
Abdominal exercises can benefit both your overall health and appearance. Doing regular core exercises strengthens and adds mass to the abdominal muscles. This might prevent backaches that result from weak postures.
Strong cores also improve your posture and prop up your spine. This allows you to appear taller and more confident.
In addition, core exercises strengthen the muscles that ultimately hold in your belly. This makes you appear leaner.
Finally, choose to do core exercises that engage all your core muscles, such as planks, Crunches or Pilates roll-ups.
#18. Slip Extra Activity Into Your Day
You can easily slip extra activity into your day. To do this, increase the amount of non-exercise activity you carry out daily.
This includes fidgeting, moving around, standing, walking, and primarily everything except exercise training, sleeping, and eating.
Also, studies show that just fidgeting, standing, or walking around increases the calories you burn by between five- to six-fold, compared to sitting still.
A study suggested that fidgeting, walking, and standing can burn up to 2,000 extra calories daily. However, this depends on your weight and activity level.
Finally, try to walk around while talking on the phone, stand up often, work at a standing desk or take the stairs whenever you can.
#19. Don’t Drink Too Much Alcohol
Alcohol is made up of seven calories for each gram. This partly explains why alcoholic drinks are usually filled with liquid calories.
Ounce for ounce, beer has a similar number of calories like sugary soft drinks. However, red wine contains twice that amount.
Even though a little drinking is unlikely to affect weight gain, heavy drinking does, especially around the midsection.
#20. Do High-Intensity Training
A well-known way to do high-intensity training is to perform intervals of very intense activity like jumping, rowing or sprinting with short breaks in between.
This method of exercise makes your body burn more fat and boosts your metabolic rate, even long after you complete your workout.
Also, high-intensity training has been shown to have significant effects on fat burning, compared to other types of exercises. It is mainly effective for slimming the waistline giving you the flat stomach you desire.
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