In their new book,The Power of Small: Why Little Things Make All The Difference, Linda Kaplan Thaler and Robin Koval, explore a number of examples which prove that small efforts can accomplish big things. The book is NOT a diet book, but it got me thinking about how important the message is to the dieting process.

It’s easy to get intimidated by the idea of losing any number of pounds in the double digit range. Even as ten pounds can seem overwhelming. It’s easy to convince yourself that it’s an all or nothing proposition, and that your entire diet has to become something Richard Simmons would write home about, when in fact, if even just one of your small, daily habits could change, you could see visible results quickly. 

But if you think about the challenge in terms of the small efforts needed to make it happen, compounded over time, it is not nearly the feat that it seems. Ask any distance runner if they get through a marathon race by thinking “26 miles, 26 miles, 26 miles”, they will tell you it would be hard to complete the race with that mindset. Instead, most runners focus only on the few steps in front of them at that moment.

My long time favorite spiritual writer and speaker, Wayne Dyer, has said in some of his books, that he gave up his addiction to alcohol by fighting the temptation one minute at a time. You’d be best served to approach dieting in the same manner - focusing on something small - like the amount of calories that make up a snack.

Think about it this way: Since 3,500 calories equal a pound, if you cut out 200 calories per day, without changing anything else, you would lose a pound of weight every 18 days. I have a friend who is trying to lose weight. She bakes cookies for her kids, and insists that she doesn’t feel complete without eating a cookie herself, after lunch every day.

If she cut out that one ritual, without changing anything else in her diet or exercise program, She would lose 1.5 pounds per month. If she also cuts out the cookie after dinner as well, even 4 nights out of the week, she would be looking at about a 2.5 pound weight loss per month. By the end of summer, she’d be wearing a smaller size of jeans!

It’s not that hard to cut 200 calories per day, and if you implement some of the following changes multiple times per day, you will see results even more quickly!

I’ve created a list of 15 ideas on how to easily cut 200 calories, based on some of the small changes that have worked in my life, as well as some that I found on a great site, KimBensen.com.

1. Cut out wine with dinner 2. Snack on fruit vs. candy 3. Cut the mayo from your sandwich 4. Cut the cheese from your burger 5. Make light popcorn or rice cakes over chips 6. Put salsa on your potato instead of butter 7. Drink iced tea instead of soda 8. Use stevia sweetener instead of sugar 9. Eat grilled chicken rather than fried 10. Choose salsa or a light dressing for salads over Ranch 10. Use skim milk instead of 2% 11. Eliminate bread for lunch ie. salad over sub sandwich 12. Use non fat milk in coffee instead of half and half 13. Eat a bowl of sweetened cereal for dessert with low fat milk instead of ice cream 13. Use jam instead of butter on your toast 14. Choose a glass of water instead of juice 15. Cut your dinner portions in half.

Your small change can start today! Good luck and please let me hear about your success stories!!