Plus you need energy from food not only to function throughout the day, but to get the exercise you need to accelerate your weight loss.

Really, Don’t Stop Eating! – We eat food for energy, but we also need food to get the required vitamins and nutrients we need to survive. Vitamin pills are no replacement for the natural vitamins found in food. Deficiencies in vitamins and minerals can lead to all sorts of health problems, depending on what you’re lacking.

When you are eating the right amount of calories per day, and the food you are eating is healthy, then your vitamin and mineral intake will be sufficient. Most people eating healthy diets do not need additional vitamin supplements.

Do the Math – Losing weight is a simple equation. The amount of calories you consume must be less than the amount of calories you use per day. If the amount you eat is more than the amount you expend, then you will gain weight.

Track your calorie intake with a website like Fitday.com. Then you can track the amount of calories you burn when you exercise. You can do that in Fitday.com too, or use this calorie tool to estimate how much you burn with exercise and daily living. Keep in mind, that being relatively close is fine, and you should not worry about your day-to-day changes. Just look at your progress week to week and month to month.

Chew More – This is a simple trick you can do. Slow down the speed at which you chew (for example, count 20 chews before swallowing). This not only helps with your digestion (digestion starts in the mouth where the saliva begins to break down food) but also tricks your brain into thinking you are eating more than you usually do.

If you’re not a nutritionist, it can be tough to tell what is healthy for you and what is not. But there are some hard and fast rules you can apply to your life today to generally improve your overall healthy diet.

Cut the soda and juice – Soda is a diet killer. There are about 40 grams of sugar per one 12oz can of soda. You could lose 1-4 lbs a month alone if you cut this out of your diet. Most juices aren’t any healthier. Check the nutrition labels and you’ll see their sugar levels are on par with sodas.

Replace sodas and juices with ice cold water. It might be hard to get used to at first, but eventually you won’t be able to go back to soda and juices knowing how bad they are for you! You’ll actually start to enjoy the taste of food more.

Turn Chips in Pretzels – If you’re a potato chip eater, replace them with pretzels. One serving of chips has 60 calories more than pretzels, and 10 times more fat grams. This can help you lose half a pound this month. That said, pretzels are incredibly high in sodium. If you switched that snack to baby carrots, expect to lose another half-pound and be a whole lot healthier!

Stop Eating Fast Food – It took years and years for laws to come into place that forced fast food restaurants to provide their nutritional information. There’s a reason for that: They don’t want you to know! The average menu at your fast food restaurant is full of fat and carbohydrates and very little nutrition The best solution is to stop all together, but if you absolutely have to have fast food, stick with their healthier options. Always go for a smaller size (value “pricing” is designed to get you to order more!) and cut out the soft drink (replace it with water).

Fixing Breakfast – You must always eat breakfast! Some people tend to think by skipping this very important meal, they are helping their diet. That’s not the case. Eating breakfast allows you to get more nutrition and energy throughout the day, while helping you avoid cravings for bigger meals had you avoided breakfast.

Aim for lower calorie breakfast choices like 1% milk, low fat cottage cheese (with fruit or all-fruit jelly), and healthier cereal (Kashi is an absolutely amazing brand of cereal!)

Skin the Fat – This goes for all the chicken lovers out there – Always have broiled or grilled chicken over the very unhealthy alternative: Fried chicken. Chicken skin is incredibly high in calories and fat – about 200 calories per average serving.