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We all see the silly internet ads for “One Simple Rule To A Flat Stomach”. Here’s the real key to a flat stomach: Good diet and regular exercise, including a mix of cardio and core strength training.

It is diet in combination with exercise that does this. Neither by their own will get you a flat stomach and lose the weight you want.

The healthy diet will restrict calories and fat, while the exercise will help your body burn fat and tone up your muscles.

If you diet only, you may lose some weight, but it will be slow and you have a better chance of stalling out on your weight loss efforts at a much faster rate. Also, you will not have the tightening and toning that exercise offers, so you will look flabbier. It is important to do a combination of these things to get the full effect.

While we’re on the subject, you’re not dieting. You’re changing your lifestyle. A diet is somehow temporary; a healthy lifestyle changes what you eat, and how much, and when, and puts exercise into your core schedule every day to reap the benefits.

The first change to make in your diet is to begin drinking water. Water helps to cleanse your system and makes your body function at optimum levels. This should be the first step in your diet change.

Focus on eating more vegetables in general; eat from the entire cornucopia of veggies, and focus on leafy green vegetables, carrots, beets, and onions. Anything that has a good strong flavor is a solid candidate for a dietary change.

If you aren’t a vegetarian, consider it. Vegetarian diets are usually lower in fats. If you are eating meat, get the leanest cuts you can, and provide protein to build muscle from. (Vegetarians have other foods they eat to make proteins from, notably beans and rice in concert).

Remember the food pyramid, and how it was built off of whole grains as its bottom layer? That’s important too. They give your body minerals and fiber. Make sure that it is whole grain - whole grain bread and whole brain pasta and brown rice.

You’ll need to consume some fats; they’re part of what triggers satiation when eating. Try and limit your fats to whole dairy products, like milk or yogurt. Watch out excess sugar in yogurt.

Watch your free carbohydrates; these are most commonly taken in the form of sugar. Use honey as a sweetener, or go without. You’ll want to limit sugar to 12 grams or so per meal.

After your diet has been modified, get exercising. You want a mix of cardio work and abdominal strengthening drills, and maybe some weight training.

Cardio work is aerobics, basically. Walking, running, biking - anything that gets your heartrate up and keeps it up is what you want. It’s good for burning calories.

Abdominal strength is core body strength. Although they’re boring, crunches are the key exercise here, though Pilates and yoga also stack up well. A little weight training is good for general muscle toning.