One easy tip to help you lose belly fat fast has to do with one of the healthiest spices in the world. You might even call it a "fat burning spice” because it actually can help you win the battle against abdominal fat if you use it daily— good old tasty Cinnamon! Although cinnamon does not directly increase fat burning (such as by increasing metabolic rate), it CAN actually help you to burn off abdominal fat and get leaner indirectly because the spice:

• controls blood sugar levels
• helps maintain insulin sensitivity
• is a very powerful antioxidant
• may have antibacterial and antifungal properties

Although cinnamon has dozens of health benefits, the main benefit that will help you to get leaner and be able to lose belly fat fast is through it's strong effect on controlling blood sugar levels in your body. In a study published in 2003 in the medical journal Diabetes Care, groups were split into people taking 1, 3, or 6 grams of cinnamon per day in capsule form (the equivalent of approx 1/4th to 1 teaspoon of cinnamon). The results of the study showed that all 3 amounts of cinnamon reduced fasting blood glucose levels by 18-29% after 40 days. 0 0 0 Cinnamon can also increase insulin sensitivity, which essentially means that it is helping your body to control blood sugar while simultaneously allowing your body to produce less insulin. As you know, chronically high insulin levels can make your body pack on the blubber. So try to use cinnamon every day in yogurt or cottage cheese, in smoothies, oatmeal, or anything else you can think of where it would go well.

In multiple interviews, Mike Geary, Certified Nutrition Specialist, Certified Personal Trainer, and author of The Truth about Six Pack Abs, says he is repeatedly asked, "With so many different types of diets and exercise programs out there, and so many people trying so hard to lose body fat and get six pack abs, why do 95% of people fail to ever achieve this goal?" Mike's answer:

• The #1 reason for failure in most people is the general procrastination, laziness, and poor mental attitude about what they BELIEVE they can actually achieve.
• The #2 reason for failure at fat loss & achieving their dream body is ineffective training routines and poor dietary habits.

The reason mental attitude and beliefs is #1 in front of the actual details of training/nutrition for weight loss is because your mental status is the true starting point for success in anything. It involves:

• DECIDING exactly what you want (how you want your body to look, how much confidence you want to feel, how much energy you want, internal health, etc)
• Making sure you actually have a BURNING DESIRE for what you want to achieve
• Setting/documenting EXACT GOALS for what you want to achieve
• VISUALIZING and "feeling" what you want to achieve
• BELIEVING that you CAN actually achieve it
• Taking massive action NOW to start achieving (no procrastination)

In order to ever be successful at anything, all excuses need to go out the window... there is no such thing as poor genetics, no such thing as "not enough time", no such thing as "it's just too hard"... no excuses at all for not achieving what you set out to achieve! This is the stuff nobody ever wants to talk about, but this is more important to get right first before ever dealing with the "details" about workouts and how to eat for fat loss or any goal. If you want to get your mindset straight, and also set yourself on the right path with the "details" of your workouts and dietary strategies, check out the Truth about Abs system to help you lose belly fat fast.

As if a fondness for sweets and lounging on the couch isn't bad enough, did you know that a natural chemical could be FORCING your body to hold onto stubborn body fat?!  It's called Neuropeptide Y (NPY) and a 1995 study found that 1 of the 4 major underlying factors causing obesity was high levels of NPY. It also found that NPY can stimulate your body to increase cravings and appetite, hence further contributing to weight gain. NPY can even stimulate your body to increase the size AND number of fat cells. Now that's scary! So what triggers your body to produce NPY, hence making you fatter?  STRESS!  Of course we've heard a gazillion times about the nasty effects of stress, and now here's one more. What to do?  Well, perhaps just knowing this tidbit of information will increase our motivation to really work on reducing stress levels, which can lead to losing weight, especially belly fat that is so dangerous to our health. If you need help getting started down the right path, Mike Geary, Certified Nutrition Specialist and Certified Personal Trainer knows what to do.

One of the main problems people face when trying to control their eating in order to lose belly fat is having grown used to processed foods and additives that are excessively AGGRESSIVE TASTES. So many foods have excessive added sugars, corn syrups, artificial sweeteners, added trans fats, refined vegetable oils, and flavor enhancers such as MSG and processed commercial salt. All of this massive onslaught of overly aggressive tastes have rendered most people's taste buds senseless when it comes to the natural taste of real unprocessed foods! The first step is to wean yourself off these aggressive tastes. It can be successfully done! Try this first step... begin to slightly reduce the amount of sweetener you add to coffee, tea, and other beverages. Eventually you'll find that you PREFER the natural taste of coffee or tea instead of just tasting the sweetness. Same with chocolate. If you now like milk chocolate, try substituting that for dark chocolate. Another easy substitution is to eat grass-fed beef, fish, chicken breasts, or pork tenderloin instead of the aggressive tastes of the additives in sausages, hot dogs, deli meats, and other processed meats. Slowly but surely you will begin to enjoy the REAL taste of food instead of the ADDITIVES in food! Click here for  tips on losing belly fat fast.

Soda (aka "pop" in some areas) is one of the most evil things you can put in your body... the nasty chemicals, the gut-fattening high fructose corn syrup, and a myriad of health problems caused by this carbonated cocktail. But what about DIET drinks? Are they safe? Let's set the record straight... there is NOTHING even remotely healthy about drinking diet soda. In fact, several studies have shown that dedicated diet soda drinkers got even FATTER than their regular soda drinking counterparts. One reason is that the artificial sweeteners in diet sodas create a negative hormonal response in the body that increases fat storing hormone production and increases cravings for more sweets and refined carbohydrates in the time period after consuming the diet drink. Another reason is that people may subconsciously think that because they are drinking a diet soda, that gives them more leeway to eat more of everything else, hence consuming more calories overall. If you're serious about your health and body, soda of any kind (and artificial sweeteners in anything for that matter!) should be avoided at all times. The best alternatives to diet pop or soda are good old water with lemon or unsweetened iced teas. To sweeten them up, add a little of the natural non-caloric sweetener Stevia. Read more about artificial sweeters on the Lose Belly Fat Articles page of this website. This information courtesy of Mike Geary, Certified Nutrition Specialist and  Personal Trainer and founder of Truth About Abs.

We hear so much about how we should avoid foods containing trans fats, yet when you read labels it seems like you can't get away from them. What to do?  It turns out, that there IS a type of trans fat that is not "bad" for you. The Good Trans Fats are natural and are created in the stomachs of ruminant animals such as cattle, sheep, goats, etc. and make their way into the fat stores of the animals. Therefore, the milk fat and the fat within the meat of these animals can provide natural healthy trans fats (best in grass-fed organic versions only). Natural trans fats in your diet have been thought to have some potential benefit to aid in both muscle building and fat loss efforts. However, keep in mind that the quantity of healthy trans fats in the meat and dairy of ruminant animals is greatly reduced by mass-production methods of farming and their grain and soy heavy diets. Meat and dairy from grass-fed, free-range animals always have much higher quantities of these beneficial fats. One such natural trans fat that you may have heard of is called conjugated linoleic acid (CLA) and has been marketed by many weight loss companies. Keep in mind that these man-made CLA pills you see in the stores may not be the best way to get CLA in your diet. They are artificially made from plant oils, instead of the natural process that happens in ruminant animals. Once again, man-made just doesn't compare to the benefits of natural sources. Read more about trans fats here.