How to Reduce Weight on Your Belly

Excess weight on your belly can be caused by various factors, including unhealthy eating, uncontrollable food cravings, lack of exercise, and stress. To reduce fat from your stomach, you will have to do more than just stomach exercises. Spot reduction, where you decrease fat in one area of the body, is impossible unless you are willing to undergo liposuction. Naturally reducing belly fat requires that you lose fat from your entire body.

Instructions

• 1

  Makeover your diet by replacing junk food such as french fries, candy, cakes and sugary drinks with healthier options. Avoid foods that are fried. Eat broiled, grilled or cooked foods instead. Stick to a diet that includes lean meat, low fat dairy, egg whites, fruits, vegetables, legumes, nuts and whole-wheat flour products.

• 2

  Stimulate your metabolism to stay active by eating up to six meals per day. Eat smaller portions instead of large ones. Cut your breakfast, lunch and dinner in half to create six small meals.

• 3

  Get moving to increase your metabolism so you burn calories. Perform 45 minutes of cardiovascular exercises per day, three days of the week. Exercise on an elliptical machine or stair-climber or go for a bike ride, brisk walk or jog outside.

• 4

  Engage in strength training exercises, three days of the week. Increase muscle tissue, because muscle stimulates your resting metabolic rate so you burn fat even when you are resting. Take a whole-body approach by doing dumbbell curls and triceps dips for your arms. Hold onto dumbbell weights as you preform lunges and squats for your legs. Target your shoulders with dumbbell presses and do push-ups for your chest.

• 5

  Tone the upper abdominals by doing crunches. Do side bends to target the obliques and practice reverse crunches for the lower abdominals. Do a variety of stomach exercises so that when your belly fat has been reduced, toned muscle will be displayed.

• 6

  Avoid excess sodium, including sodium-rich foods like hot dogs and ketchup, because sodium makes you retain water and causes bloating. The American Heart Association website states that you should not consume more than 1,500 milligrams of salt per day.

• 7

  Learn how to meditate or practice yoga so you can manage stress better. Increased stress levels stimulate the production of the stress hormone cortisol which is linked to excess belly fat.