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lovenotereminders · 6 years

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Hey! Do you have any advice for getting over... let's say disordered eating, when you realize how toxic it is, but are still an average weight instead of reaching where you wanted? How to be okay with that? Thank you!

I’ll say this with the disclaimer that I’ve never had an actual ED myself, but I’ve had experience with disordered/poor eating habits briefly whilst I was trying to lose weight whilst not being in a good place with my mental health.

It’s a good idea to take a break from losing weight until you’re in a better place mentally. Your mental and physical health are the priority, and continuing to try and lose weight can just cause more harm. It may be the case that you don’t feel the need to start losing weight again when you’re in a better place mentally.

It’s okay to reach out for help if you can. Friends and family can be great sources of support, and if you’re able to, consider consulting a counsellor, therapist, GP, etc. They will be able to give you more helpful support and coping mechanisms. You don’t have to have a mental illness to benefit from these services, and there’s no minimum threshold of suffering you need to reach before you’re entitled to reach out for help.

Equally, try to identify the things in your environment that encourage unhealthy beliefs about body image and food, and try to eliminate them. Maybe following celebrities on social media who set unrealistic standards, maybe things like calorie tracking apps are harmful, maybe you’re following blogs who promote unhealthy habits, etc. Try to remove these influences and replace them with positive ones.

A lot of it is about changing your mindset. It can be difficult to unlearn the harmful beliefs society impresses on people about their body and weight, but trying to internalise more positive mindsets is a good first step. When you notice yourself having unhealthy thoughts, try to stop yourself, and instead remember things like: “My worth is not intrinsically tied to my weight.” “I do not have to reach a certain weight before I have permission to love myself.” “The only person who needs to approve of me is me.” “Fat is a normal, natural part of my body that I don’t need to get rid of.” “My body needs fuel and food is that fuel.” “Three things I love about my body are…” You could try writing these things down in a notebook if you carry one with you, or putting them in your phone to look at when you need to.

It can be very easy to feel inadequate when you’re focusing too much on numbers and scales - scales aren’t always the most effective measure of body and health. Your weight in numbers can be affected by the tiniest things - when you last went to the bathroom, how hydrated you are, how much salt you’ve consumed over the past few days, and even things like what point in your menstrual cycle you’re in if you menstruate, because it can affect water retention. This can lead to you beating yourself up for ‘gaining weight’ when you actually haven’t. Weight fluctuates naturally from week to week, and it can fluctuate by a few pounds within the space of a day. If you think this is a trigger for you, stop weighing yourself. Consider taking batteries out of your scales/putting them somewhere difficult to get to, i.e. in the attic or on top of a cupboard if you think you’ll be tempted. If you decide you want to continue losing weight, a better measure of success are things like progress photos and measurements - focus on things like how healthy your body feels, and whether the way you look makes you comfortable and happy, rather than choosing a value that you need to be at or under.

Another thing to try and change is your mindset around certain foods - there are no such thing as bad foods. The only things you shouldn’t eat are things you’re allergic to. Sugary or fatty foods are not “bad” or “sinful” or “cheats”. It’s about forming a healthy relationship with food. Food is not a reward for good behaviour, and restricting food is not a punishment for bad behaviour - there is no moral value assigned to a cupcake or an apple. They’re just food, and it’s all about making sensible choices to provide your body with the nutrients it needs and enjoying things in moderation, rather than bingeing or restricting completely.

If you have any clothes that are too small, that you’re losing weight to try and “get in to” I would suggest getting rid of them, as part of the “I do not have to reach a certain weight before I have permission to love myself.” If you have the resources, something that can really boost confidence is buying new clothes that fit comfortably and make you feel good - wearing clothes that pinch or are too tight, or are baggy and hide parts of your body, can only exacerbate the insecurities you have. It also gives you permission to just be the weight that you are, instead of always looking ahead to a time when you’re going to be smaller. You don’t have to get smaller.

Instead of focusing on weight and body shape, try and shift your focus to lifestyle. Instead of attempting to reach xyz lbs, or eating under xyz calories a day, try to set different, healthier goals for yourself - things like eating a minimum of xyz portions of fruit and veg a day, drinking plenty of water, making high-fibre choices such as wholemeal cereals, bread and pastas, finding a type of exercise you enjoy doing like swimming or going for a walk and trying to raise your heartrate for instance for at least 20 minutes 3 times a week. Of course, you don’t have to do all of these - even if your goals are seemingly small, like “eat three meals a day at least five days a week”. Changing your focus to taking care of your body and doing things to ensure it’s healthy is a better goal than simply “losing weight” - lower weight =/ more healthy.

Doing other things to encourage self-love other than just diet and exercise related stuff can also be a good outlet to help you get into a healthy mindset. People might have different ways of doing this - some people find comfort in things like wearing makeup or doing their nails to boost their confidence, doing skincare things like exfoliating or using a fancy face mask or applying some nice-smelling lotion, some people like yoga to improve flexibility, making sure you’re getting plenty of sleep, getting at least 15 minutes per day of daylight on your skin, anything that makes you feel good and like you’re taking care of yourself.

If you count calories, make sure your MINIMUM daily intake is 1200 calories per day. This in itself is very low for most people - this is the minimum intake for short, smaller-framed, AFAB people/people with estrogen as their dominant hormone. The minimum for other people is often more like 1500kcal per day. But counting calories is often not the best idea if you have a poor relationship with food, because assigning a number value to certain food items can encourage those harmful behaviours.

This isn’t a complete list or a how-to to cure disordered eating issues, but these are some coping mechanisms that might help you on the path to recovery, either things that I’ve found helpful or that others have reported finding helpful. Not everything will work for everyone, and that’s okay - just try things out, and see how you feel.

I hope that’s useful, and I wish you strength and serenity on your journey 💗

#advice #not positivity #disordered eating /#weight /#mental illness /#long post #pinkladiesinleather #answered #eating disorder /#eating disorder positivity

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scordilischiropractic · 2 years

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OH NO! I Broke My Diet, What Now?!

Bottom Line

You go away for a weekend but you have been following a diet for a month. You have been consistent and sticking to the plan. But you are going out and you won’t be able to stick to your diet. Does this mean you failed? Does this mean you have to do something extra to make up for the ‘bad’ food you ate? No not at all! All this means is that you are human and you decided to enjoy food rather than demonize it.

Why it Matters

Diets are a helpful tool to help people to lose weight but also to stick to a healthier way of eating. But diets can be a bad thing at the same time. It will tend to put you in a mindset where you are looking at food, deciding whether or not it is good or bad. Food is neither good nor bad, it is how we eat it and how much of it we eat. When we make certain foods out to be bad, it can create a negative storm in our mind. Thus, making it hard for us to actually enjoy the meals we have.

Constantly overthinking every little thing, making ourselves go crazy trying to stick to a plan. That turns into instances where you are eating something not because you want to but because it is ‘good’ for you. Completely taking the joy out of the food and making it a chore, rather than a pleasure.

Next steps

Now I am not saying that we should be eating junk food and drinking sugary drinks all the time. But I am saying it is ok to indulge in these things from time to time without feeling horrible. All in moderation of course. Life is about moderation and if we overdo it, we can have issues. Even when eating healthy food, we can have negative effects. If you eat too many vegetables and not enough meat you could become vitamin B deficient. If you drink too much water you can become over hydrated.

Don’t look at food as good or bad, look at it from a neutral perspective. Too much of anything can have adverse effects on one’s health. If you want to eat out with friends, when ordering, try to sprinkle in some healthy choices. Rather than having French Fries with your burger, have a salad. Don’t get upset if you can’t, just try to find the balance. Food is meant to be enjoyed, not treated like the enemy.

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transformedmind · 3 years

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The Donut Sin

I can often be found on social media sharing healthy recipes, exercise tips, and pieces of my weight loss journey in hopes that it will encourage others. After losing 140 pounds status-post bariatric surgery, I have largely changed my relationship with food. Food is no longer a source of comfort. I found that turning to food for relief in this way actually ended up hurting myself even more. I now follow a strict, low-fat and low-sugar, 3 meals a day, roughly 1200 calorie diet that is mainly protein. I’ve done fairly well with it, results themselves being evident.

However, I am still human. Which means sometimes I mess up.

Coming home from the July 4th fireworks last night, Ethan and I had a sweet craving. “We’ve got halo top ice cream at home,” we told ourselves. But that wasn’t enough. We craved something tastier than “just the stuff we have at home”; something worthy of a holiday. It’s all right to indulge on a holiday, right? It’s America’s birthday, after all!

Fortunately, or unfortunately, busy post-firework traffic kept us from getting to Sonic, one of the only restaurants still open after 10. We considered McDonald’s, but the parking lot was packed. “Let’s try the one by the interstate,” I told myself. But as we drove toward it… drats, it was closed! We had finally resigned ourselves to our already-at-home treat.

But then I saw it on the side of the highway: a gas station. Guess what gas stations have? An ice cream freezer!

I turned my blinker on and pulled in. “I’ll wait in the car,” Ethan said, trusting me to find something he’d like.

The ice cream freezer was right next to the front door. It had multiple delights: ice cream cones, Snickers bars, strawberry shortcake bars, ice cream cookies… I made my selection of two, completely ignoring any nutrition facts labels, and went to pay at the register.

While waiting in line, I saw another devilish delight. Something I haven’t eaten in well over a year, because it has absolutely zero nutritional value, and is literally the antithesis of my diet.

Donuts.

I knew I shouldn’t. I hoped the patron in front of me hurried so I wouldn’t have time to look at the options. But it was too late. I was in too deep. I had seen them all: mini donuts; devil’s food donuts; frosted donuts; cinnamon sugar donuts.

I stepped forward, laid my ice cream on the counter, which was already contraband for me, and quickly grabbed a bag of mini chocolate donuts, too. I paid the man, said I didn’t want a receipt or a bag, scooped up my guilty pleasures and ran out.

Ethan shortly scolded me when he saw the donuts, but then immediately opened them after he had finished off his ice cream. I also indulged in a few - who keeps count when they’re eating mini donuts? - and went to bed.

The next morning, there they sat on the coffee table. The evidence of our poor decision-making late at night. But now it’s the light of day, we’re well rested, and we can now make better, healthier decisions, right?

Right!

So we threw the bag away, right?

(I’m now thinking this would make a great Anakin/Padme meme.) The answer is, nope!

This morning we got up, sat on the couch, and opened that bag up again. Because even though we knew it was wrong… boy, it still tasted just as good as it did last night.

There are a few things I want to pick out from this story.

Why did we get donuts? It started with a desire. We had a desire for something sweet. I think there was some nostalgia for Independence Days when we were kids, linking fireworks to ice cream/tasty treats in our brains. That desire led to a plan. A plan that was initially thwarted by busy traffic, busy parking lots, and closed restaurants. Every avenue we could have taken to get to a restaurant for ice cream was essentially blocked.

We could have stopped there. But once that desire got deep inside of us, it had taken root. It wanted to be fed. It was so hungry, it was even willing to compromise. Gas station ice cream isn’t quite the same thing as a blizzard/McFlurry/Sonic blast… but we were willing to settle. Anything even remotely resembling ice cream would have sufficed.

Once we had made the decision to get ice cream, it could have even stopped there. But once I let go of that boundary that says I won’t eat something against my diet… the possibilities were endless. Nothing was against the rules. My mind (re: not my stomach) wanted sweets, and temptations abounded. The list of attempted justifications my mind set forth were endless:

“It’s America’s birthday! Calories don’t count on holidays.”

“It’s just this once. Just tonight. It won’t happen again.”

“You’ve worked so hard, and you haven’t had it in so long. You deserve this.”

“Look, it’s even on sale! It’s a sign.”

And that’s how my decision to go against my diet for ice cream, also led to my donut purchase.

What were the consequences of my decision? Well, not only did I go against my diet, but I also encouraged Ethan to break his. Sure, he could have refused… but I placed that temptation in front of him.

Okay so what, I broke my diet one - err, two times (last night and this morning). Big deal. So what, right? Well there are other consequences. I’ve likely either gained a pound or stalled in my weight loss (I know what you’re thinking, “boo hoo,” right?). I ate more than a day’s worth of calories, not to mention the fat and sugar content. Another possible consequence could have been falling ill. I could have gotten physically sick as a result of my decision, if my body had rejected it, as is easily possible after bariatric surgery.

But I didn’t get sick. And my clothes still fit. So what’s the harm?

Well, the harm now is that I have to essentially restart my diet. Because diets aren’t about the foods we eat, not really. It’s about our mindset. Our relationship with food and its purpose in our lives. That’s why I typically prefer to call it a “lifestyle” because it’s meant to be permanent, not a temporary fad. And now I have to make it through the next several weeks, knowing in the back of my mind I ate something bad and nothing too bad resulted from it.

What’s to stop me from doing it again? Or doing something even worse next time? Because often times it is like a cascade. Those with food addictions will continue to eat more and more, and can’t even consider quitting until they come face-to-face with serious consequences. And even then, if their addiction is too deep, it may be too late to turn back, at least of their own accord.

So why have I titled this piece, “The Donut Sin?” Well, when we sin, it often starts the same way. It starts with a desire. My and Ethan’s desire to eat something sweet was not in and of itself a bad thing. In fact, I would say it’s God-ordained, because He created us with the taste buds to appreciate sweet foods, and also created our neurologic pathways that lead to dopamine release - meaning, for most of us, we see eating something sweet as a treat, or “reward.”

Desires in and of themselves are not sinful. After all, even the Bible says God will give the desires of our hearts to those who delight in Him (Psalm 37:4). Many desires are universal, meaning all humans experience them. These typically include things like the desire to love and be loved, to feel wanted, to feel satiated/quenched, etc.

God made us to have these desires. He also created a way for us to achieve these desires: He calls on us to trust in Him. God created us with a need to know Him. We were made to be in relationship with Him. He teaches us through His Word that all our needs can be found in Him.

In Matthew 4, we read about Jesus’ experience in the wilderness. He fasted 40 days and nights, and he was hungry (v. 2). Satan used Jesus’ hunger and tempts Him to betray His trust in God by using His power to turn stones into bread (v. 3). But Jesus thwarted the temptation, stating, “Man shall not live on bread alone” (v. 4). Jesus was both man and God. Because He was man, He was tempted, as are we all. But because He was also God, He was able to subdue these temptations, and lived a sin-free life.

Satan is often referred to as the Tempter in Scripture. He also knows what desires we were created to have. And he tries to pervert these desires in ways that cause us to set our hearts on this world, rather than setting our hearts on God. He does this by using temptation. After all, he tempted Eve in the Garden (Genesis 3). “Did God really say…” and “you will not surely die…” he told her, encouraging her to doubt, setting his trap (emphasis added). We all know how that story ends.

When we are faced with temptation, we can do one of three things. First, we can give in. This is what happened to me. I had an innocent desire for something sweet. I was tempted with donuts (which it should be noted, I only saw because I put myself there in the first place) and gave in. Second, we can let it linger. Considering. Day in and day out, we can let it sit there. Looking at it from time to time. Occasionally reaching out for it, but no, deciding against it, pulling away. Friends, let me tell you, if you are in that metaphorical gas station and those donuts are sitting there tempting you, you need to leave. Because this second option always ends up with the same results as the first. If you allow temptation to set itself up in your life, your inaction by not tearing it down, will in fact allow it to grow. Unfortunately, because of the fall, we are all addicts. We’re sin addicts. And like my example of food addiction above, one sin can lead to another, and another. Oftentimes with growing consequences. Sometimes those consequences affect other people. When that temptation takes root, and our initially innocent desire becomes more important than our desire for God, we will let anything satiate it. I initially desired a DQ blizzard, but settled for gas station ice cream… close enough. Although we have a desire to be loved, and that desire can be fulfilled by God’s love, too often we allow Satan to pervert it, by convincing us that someone loving us on this earth is “good enough.” I’ve certainly been guilty of this in my life.

The third option when we are faced with temptation, is to turn to the One who was tempted and overcame it. We turn to God. We fill our hearts and desires from knowing and cherishing Him, by being in relationship with our Creator. In so doing, we destroy the temptation. Not only do we prevent it from taking root in our hearts, but we also often have to take physical action. We have to leave that gas station.

For those who may be thinking they are only tempted because God allowed it to happen, let me be clear: God will never tempt you. That’s what Satan does. We see several stories in the Bible where God tests the faith of those who believe in Him. Job comes to mind. But God will never encourage you to fall into sin. That is the complete and utter opposite of who He is. I could have said, “well, God let me walk right into that gas station.” And that would be right, He did. He didn’t strike me down with a lightning bolt to stop me. But do you know what He did do? He made traffic busy so I couldn’t get to Sonic. He made the one McDonald’s parking lot seem unappealing, and the second one closed. He put several obstacles in my way to stop me.

Friends, know this: if you turn to God when you are tempted, and ask that He keep you from falling, He will protect you. But if you keep running toward that sin, despite every obstacle put in front of you, eventually He will let you do it. That’s the beautiful irony of free will. We are free to trust in Jesus to break our chains that bind us to sin, but we are also free to sit there and continue to be trapped. God won’t force us. And unfortunately, many of us will choose to sit there, when the escape from our cage is so readily available.

A lot of times we will try to justify our sins, as I did. Well it’s just this once… I deserve this…

Sin is sin. It is dirty. It is unrighteous. It is an act of rebellion against God (Isaiah 66:24). There is no justification for it, despite our feeble attempts. Our Creator is yes loving, but He is also holy, sovereign, and just. To tell of only one part of Him is to miss how mind-blowing and awe-inspiring He is. Because He is holy, He cannot allow sin, which is unholy, to enter His Kingdom. Because He is just, He is the Judge, therefore the One who will determine our fate. The punishment for our sins? Death (Romans 6:23). An eternity apart from God. But if there is no justification for our sins, and because we are human and therefore can’t help but to keep on sinning, despite our best efforts… what hope do we have?

This is where Jesus comes in. God saw our sin dilemma, and sent His Son to solve it. “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life” (John‬ ‭3:16‬). Some might say, well why didn’t He just say sin doesn’t matter anymore, and let everyone go to heaven? Because He is just. There is no justice in pretending our moral failings simply didn’t happen. Imagine a mass murderer on trial, but instead the judge not only stopped the trial, but gave the mass murderer a mansion and a million dollars and a clean record. How would we respond to that? “That’s not fair!” True, it wouldn’t be fair. Because God instilled us with the same sense of fairness, or justice, that He also has.

When we read Scripture, we find that we are that criminal on trial. But God doesn’t just cancel the trial like the judge I described above. The trial still happens. But instead of us being found guilty, God declares His own Son, Jesus, as the guilty party. He stands up and pleads guilty, although He was guilt-free. He does this so we can be found innocent. And similarly to the judge above, God not only doesn’t give us what we do deserve (which is God’s mercy), He also gives us something we don’t deserve (which is God’s grace). But what He gives us is so much sweeter than a mansion and a million dollars… He allows us to live in relationship with Him, having His Spirit inside of us, with the promise we will live with Him in eternity. In effect, He does give us that clean record as the criminal above. Though we were dirty, He can make us purer than snow (Psalm 51:7).

“Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” (Romans 8:1)

“If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.” (1 John 1:9)

“For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.” (Hebrews 8:12)

It’s true, eating a donut is not in and of itself a sin… but the mindset behind it could be. Let’s examine our hearts and minds today, and remember where our priorities lie.

#Bible #Jesus #Scripture #truth #donuts #sin #God #holy #righteous #weight loss #temptation #transformedmind

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brie-haus · 4 years

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A Note to Those Feeling the Diet Culture Pressure

Let’s talk about diets. I do not do them. I can’t stick with them. Or I will not make myself, rather. I am someone that has strong cravings for a variety of things all over the sweet and salty spectrum and I have found it best to simply indulge myself in the things I enjoy in a moderate way and then pick back up the next meal with a better, healthier choice for something my body needs.

As I have alluded to before, I suffered from an eating disorder when I was younger. I did see a counselor for it and underwent treatment. Truthfully, though, issues like that are deeply rooted and are rarely “cured.” You can overcome them and live healthy in spite of that mindset but the seeds are always there.

So what I have done these last two years is research and cultivate a lifestyle that involves better, healthier choices for the long run. A huge part of my new lifestyle involves exercise. Exercise is what kicked off my weight loss journey (and so many more benefits, including being able to drop my depression meds). However, you cannot out-train or out-run a bad diet. Your success will not be long term or as robust as it would be if you changed your diet too.

I tried Weight Watchers. I tried diet pills. I tried intermittent fasting. All the things, and they all lead to the same outcome. Right back in my disordered way of thinking. And then I found Ultimate Portion Fix. You don’t hold back, you don’t cut out whole food groups. No food is the enemy. You don’t get “points” back from exercising (?!!!). They just lay out the foods you should be eating in categories (Carbs, Proteins, Fruits, Fats, etc) and you build your day around that, tracking your containers. I have trouble eating them all, rather than feeling restricted (and hungry!) This system works well for me, but you need to find YOUR niche program or system! Life is not one size fits all!

Getting myself into the frame of mind to exercise consistently was hard. But getting myself mentally prepared to change to a healthier diet long term felt like a fantasy. Trust me when I say I’d I can do it, anyone can do it. I had to completely change the way I look at food. I was raised in a home where we “cleared our plates” to show we were grateful for the food we were able to eat. I grew up in a culture of associating certain (mostly unhealthy) foods with special occasions, holidays, and as rewards. I had to stop looking at food as a treat or something that had to be irresistibly tasty and instead began looking at food as a fuel source. We all need food to live; to survive. But you don’t have to love and be excited about that every single item that crosses your lips. For me, carbs (especially breads) are my favorite. But vegetables, fruit, etc are just as important to being healthy and balanced. I don’t have to enjoy every serving of vegetables but I do need to make sure I am eating more of them.

I feel like this goes hand in hand with taking care of your body. I used to be of the mindset that when you ate too much or “cheated on your diet” you need to exercise extra hard to work it off. Let me tell you, drop that mindset and set it on fire! Your body wasn’t built in a day and one chest meal or day won’t ruin your body (or progress) in the same way that eating one good, healthy meal won’t solve your dietary or health goals. Your body powers your life. It allows you to live the life you do, have the ability to exercise, the ability to think, love, and so much more. Appreciate the body you have, work hard to get in touch with your body, and love it while always working to make it even better. When you are at peace with your body and genuinely appreciate it, you will naturally begin wanting to take care of your body by giving it all the best fuel you need to power it effectively.

A big adjustment for me was water. I know that sounds silly, you need water to live. But I could go a whole meal and only take two sips of water. Now I make sure I always have it with me. I see much better results not only on the scale but in my skin, energy, gut health (I struggle with GI issues), and more if I stick to my 100 Oz a day. Also, water is great, your body is made up of it and you need a lot. But don’t listen to anyone who tells you to chug water when you’re hungry to fight off cravings! This is toxic. Drink your water and eat your food. But don’t drink your water instead of your food!

I was not someone, and still to this day am not someone who can just 100% cut things out of my life. For example, I grew up truly enjoying Dewey’s cake squares. I don’t want to give them up and I don’t need to. What I decided was best for me is using portion control. If I want a cake square, I enjoy one or two and get back to my regularly scheduled program. Denying your cravings will ultimately lead to a binge and dissatisfaction. You can make room in your lifestyle for treats often if you do it in the right proportion.

Those that are trained or gifted in the kitchen may not need this but I really had to learn through trial and error ways to prepare foods that I don’t “get excited” about or have much experience with. I grew up eating very few vegetables so when I started trying to make healthier decisions about my eating, incorporating new vegetables was overwhelming. Pinterest is a great resource and there are tons of cooking pages on Instagram. But ultimately you just have to lean in to the flavor profiles that speak to you and make tweaks to recipes to fit your needs. For example, it feels like 80% of smoothie recipes call for half a banana but I am VERY intolerant to them. So I learned for a lot of recipes, unsweetened applesauce also does the trick. I still struggle with things like spinach and prefer to just blend it into a shake so I don’t really taste it. Baby steps.

One thing that has really helped me is being very intentional. Not just in my meal planning (making sure to stock healthy foods, buying little to no junk, etc) and never setting out to have a cheat day but letting cheat meals naturally occur as needed so a whole day isn’t sabotaged from the start. But also sitting down for each meal and focusing on what todos eating and how you’re feeling. You notice when you’re full way faster that way. As an added bonus, you spend time with the other humans in your life as opposed to the cast of a TV show or your phone. We 100% know we are going to have meals where we deviate from “the plan” we are following, whatever it may be. One “bad” meal won’t break you, just like one “healthy” meal won’t make you lose loads of weight. But I genuinely know from experience that when you wake up with the plan in mind to eat poorly all day, it becomes a free for all and can go south very quickly. Are you craving a donut? Cake? Onion rings? It is 100% fine to go off script and have a serving to fulfill that craving. It does your mind good. We can’t sustain a diet lifestyle of never giving in to anything fun ever. But if you say well, I had a donut for breakfast so I’m gonna make this whole day a cheat day and try to make any normal decisions, you’ll likely wake up with regret (and a food hangover) the next day.

Alcohol is such a touchy subject. Some people need it, some people are 100% against it. I’m team do what you need to do but keep your eye on the prize. I still drink socially (about once a month at this point) but in my day to day hustle I have cut it out entirely. I feel so much better. No headaches. No fullness. Better focus. But that is ME. Incorporate what you need to, keeping in mind the ingredients of your drink of choice.

I hope this was helpful! I am not a registered dietician or anything; just someone who has struggled with diet culture for 3/4 of my life. If you have lots of food sensitivities, I highly recommend seeing an RD, they are super helpful!

#dietculture #diets #lifestylechange #ultimate portion fix #Beachbody #takecontrol #water #alcohol #portion control #weigthloss #fitnessjourney #fuel your body

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angocanhha · 4 years

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i can’t be private

i was thinking about typing these thoughts in my private google doc but i couldn’t bring myself to do it. i couldn’t be by myself. i didn’t want to be alone in that google doc. that’s not to say that you should stay here, come back but i guess i’d rather share here with the possibility of someone reading, whether it be you or i could share a link to this post, as opposed to sharing my google doc, which i am also considering doing.

but more on not wanting to be alone, i need to have this out in the world. do i know what loneliness is? yes, i guess i do. it feels nice when there are people who care about me. yes, my parents and my sister care about me. my extended family, aunts and probably uncles care about me. maybe i should share this blog post with them. that thought kinda scares me a little because what if they judge me. what if they find out things about me that i’ve kept from them. although it does give me solace that they are getting old and even if they do judge me, we won’t have to spend as much time together anyways (morbid but also possible to re-interpret.)

being not skinny is hard in my world. as comforting as it is to eat, i think i’ve reached a point where looking at my belly in the mirror, seeing my face reflecting back at me and hearing my thoughts are too painful. i am but a product of the society that i live in. from my aunt always pointing out her gut to always seeing skinny girls making it in the place where i want to be, going against the tide is tiring and i am tired. i applaud girls like lizzo and body positivity and roxane gay. being obese in america and the world is harrrrrrd. i’m not even obese and i’m tearing myself down. i just weighed myself and i am 145 pounds, oof. we are getting there, we’ve been there. and as much as i don’t want to get heavier, losing weight seems hard. i guess i’ve been trying to do it for over a year now. is this time going to be the time that i can do it? my mind feels stronger than it has before. i do feel mentally healthier than i have been within the last couple of years. i’m supposed to be eating lunch now but after weighing myself and then looking at the food that’s available, i’ve both lost my appetite and can’t care enough to put anything solid in my mouth. quaranfifteen eh, i just had the thought that i am an oracle and everything that the world is going through, i went through a couple months prior. the solitude, the weight gain, the confusion.

what have i swallowed that isn’t edible. i’ve swallowed my partner’s depression. the way he stays in bed, eyes glued to the screen watching korean dramas, listening to audiobooks. i stomach the things he buys and the accumulation of clutter. i will no longer be keeping boxes in the name of zero waste. i have cut up tshirts to make napkins/rags but those are soon to be thrown out. the world has so much waste and it makes me so sad to know that it’s ending up in Vietnam and China where the poor live amongst our trash. it’s like super hoarders but so much more tragic. but i also can’t swallow that responsibility either. clothes will now be dropped off at donation sites or thrown away. i’m sorry but i gotta do it. i’m cleaning up my life!

this meditation retreat schedule feels good to me. it’s bringing a structure and calmness that i haven’t felt in so long, probably since the last time i’ve been to a retreat which was probably in 2018 or earlier. it’s possible that it’s too early to call but i do feel like this schedule is breaking a cycle of me putting myself down for not being able to accomplish my goals. the designated periods for rest is really actually allowing me the mental space to get tasks done and feel good about it. of course, i’m scared that i’m being overly optimistic, hoping that thinking positive will will my mind and body to continue on this trajectory but let me ride this wave for as long as i can.

the break with q is good. as much as solitary tears fall and my yearning and pining causes me pain, seeing that he has not changed is really causing me to wake up. i brought up the housing thing again, not paying for rent for the last two years, and he asked why do i keep bringing that up. i told him i feel like i’m being punished. and he comforted me. we have our faults. hopefully we are working on them. i am trying to work on mine. writing in this blog is helping i think. but let me repeat, that, i cannot hold him anymore. i might need to start over but life is impermanent. i am living in every moment and i have the opportunity to live for me. i can return to my breath and let it guide me, away from my parent’s worry about financial security, away from demoralizing beauty standards, away from my own worries. i am alive, and i am well, and i am fortunate, and i have everything within me to exist in joy.

it’s been so long since i’ve written like this that i’m surprised i even know how. it’s like this is the first time i’ve typed so many of my thoughts and i’m loving how things are coming together. the idea of having a before 30 bucket list seems fun, bring on the next decade baby. the party is only getting started.

now i really don’t want to end this but like many things, there will be another time. i think that’s what parents say to their kids when the kids want to stay and play for longer. but i’m an adult, and i get to decide what i want to do. i’m taking off the cloak of shoulds and i’m going to play! how did this structure of shoulds come about. was i living this mindset in college? when i first started working? where did this accumulation of plaque come from, that has now formed walls and hallways in my mind.

my thighs are sore from two days ago. it’s quite the sensation.

alright, i’ll leave now, but i’ll be back again. byyyyyeeee.

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gabriellakirtonblog · 4 years

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How Five Coaches Grew Their Online Business in Difficult Times

The coronavirus hit the fitness industry especially hard.

Gyms closed with little to no warning, leaving trainers scrambling.

But not every coach was devastated. Some earned more money and expanded their businesses.

The following five case studies show you how they did it.

Read them to learn how you too can build a resilient online fitness business that not only survives tough times, but actually thrives.

How to Make Money as an Online Trainer

Case study #1: How a scientist and single mom escaped a toxic work environment to become a successful hybrid coach

Case study #2: How a part-time nutrition coach went from charging $95 a month to $1,500 for three months, and adds a new client every week

Case study #3: How an engineer found meaning in his work as a part-time coach and trained 300-plus clients in 16 countries

Case study #4: How Nelao helps trauma survivors with their fitness through online coaching

Case study #5: How a gym owner increased his income after the pandemic forced him to close his facility

Case study #1: Leanne Salisbury

How a scientist and single mom escaped a toxic work environment to become a successful hybrid coach

It was a slow day at the lab, and Leanne Salisbury asked her boss if she could use an hour of paid time off to take her teenage son to a meeting to help plan his college education.

She thought it was a reasonable request, and was surprised when he said no.

He told her to use the time to defrost the biomedical lab’s freezer, where they kept the ice used to cut the human tissues they tested for cancer and other diseases.

That afternoon she got a call from her son’s school, demanding that she pick him up because he’d been suspended for acting out.

“I broke,” she recalled in an Instagram post. “I told the boss he could kiss my ass, in front of the entire room. I left and had a complete breakdown in my car.”

Because she worked for the National Health Service in Liverpool, England, she wasn’t immediately fired, as she would have been in just about any private-sector job. (“At the NHS, you have to kill about 10 people to get fired,” she jokes.) They let her transfer to another department.

But she knew her life had to change. As she wrote on Instagram, “This was the moment I knew I had to create my own job, live my own life, and stop being everyone else’s puppet.”

From scientist to personal trainer

Fitness was an unlikely career choice for Salisbury. She didn’t even own a pair of sneakers until she was 27.

But then she got a wake-up call.

“One of my friends in the laboratory died of cervical cancer,” she says. “It really made me assess a lot about my life.”

She started running, figuring that “it shouldn’t be too hard to run for 30 minutes without stopping.”

It was. She nearly threw up at the end of a charity 5k run. But the experience made an impression. “That’s one of the first times I saw you can push through,” she says.

In 2013, the year she told her boss to kiss her ass, she got a personal training certification and began coaching clients part-time—first in their homes, then in a studio where she rented space by the hour, and then in a commercial gym, an environment she says she “absolutely hated.”

She left her day job in 2015 with only three months of severance. It was make it or break it time.

Building her client base was “a huge rollercoaster,” she remembers. She’d spend months growing her clientele, then switch venues and have to build it back up again.

Finally, she hit on a solution. Two of them actually:

She opened a fitness studio about 20 minutes from her home.

She turned her son’s bedroom (he had recently moved out) into a workout space for coaching online clients.

The online coaching breakthrough

Salisbury enrolled in the Online Trainer Academy Level 1 Certification course in 2018. She’d been a member of the Online Trainers Unite Facebook group for a while, but resisted making the leap to OTA.

OTA reminds her not to get distracted by shiny objects, she says. “I go back to it all the time. When I feel myself going off on a tangent, I’ll book a call with the coaches.”

Salisbury’s Instagram feed is a masterful example of connecting with clients and prospects by mixing deeply personal admissions of her past struggles with upbeat stories about her current life and work.

One consistent message: Your life doesn’t have to suck. You can choose to make it better.

“I’m not perfect,” she wrote in one post, “but I’m healthier, happier, have more friends, have more fun. … I get to help people all over the world with their food, training and mindset. And I’m really good at it, because I’m sharing the tools that helped me, not just what I listened to in a podcast. I’ve been in that place where it’s all just far too much, you know?”

Case study #2: Jim Gazzale

How a part-time nutrition coach went from charging $95 a month to $1,500 for three months, and adds a new client every week

From the outside, Jim Gazzale appeared to be a successful online trainer.

His Facebook description of his business—“I help moms over 40 lose up to 20 pounds in 12 weeks by drinking wine and eating whatever they want”—seems irresistible. His website shows a suite of services encompassing strength, endurance, nutrition, and lifestyle coaching.

What you couldn’t see was a struggling part-time nutrition coach who made so little profit from coaching that he wasn’t sure if he could afford to continue.

His day job was safe and steady. But it wasn’t enough to support his young and growing family.

If he couldn’t generate more income from coaching, he’d have to find another part-time job.

But instead of giving up, he doubled down, stretching his finances to the limit to learn a more profitable system to train clients.

The evolution of an unlikely nutrition coach

Gazzale and his wife, Karen, are broadcast journalists.

As an on-air talent, Karen had plenty of incentive to stay in shape. But Jim had never found a fitness or diet regimen he could stick with. “I knew I was overweight,” he says. “I would follow her to a workout here or there. But I hated it.”

He found his motivation in 2015, when they joined a gym with the goal of getting in shape for their wedding. And he stayed with the program after the wedding, even though the results were disappointing.

That all changed in early 2016, when they hired the owner of the gym to be their nutrition coach.

“I followed it to the letter and got absolutely shredded,” he says. “That opened my mind to what’s possible. I was strong, I was confident, I was fearless. It was really a life-changing thing.”

It was so life-changing that he and Karen decided to help other people change their own lives. They get certified through Precision Nutrition, set up a website, and waited for clients to find them.

They quickly realized it takes a lot more than the desire to help people. It only works when you combine your knowledge and good intentions with marketing and business development.

Finding an online training model that works

Thinking “how hard could this online coaching thing be?” (sound familiar?), they spent that year “trying to build the business flying by the seat of our pants,” Gazzale recalls. “We took our lumps early on trying to figure the whole thing out.”

They had what looked like a breakthrough in 2018, when they helped a woman with a big Instagram following lose weight. Her story brought in 30 clients virtually overnight.

“But I didn’t have a way to service them,” Gazzale says. “After a few weeks, they all kind of dropped off.”

That’s when he started looking at the Online Trainer Academy.

“We were living paycheck to paycheck, sometimes even operating in the red,” he says.

“I knew I had to get a part-time job. Why would I want to spend my time doing something I didn’t enjoy? That’s where the impetus to make this a profitable business took shape.”

Gazzale saved his pennies, and enrolled in OTA, and never looked back.

Balancing a family, a full-time job, and part-time nutrition coaching gig required structure that Gazzale couldn’t build on his own. He leaned into OTA for help and hasn’t looked back.

“Having a structure in place was the biggest thing I got from OTA,” he says. “Some months were better than others, but I was confident it could grow over time, rather than fizzling out like that influx we saw in 2018.”

It was working, but not as well as it could have.

The problem, he says, is that the business “was structured to always be a side hustle.” Each of his clients paid about $95 a month for a la carte services, which meant each of them required more or less the same amount of attention.

He needed a way to scale it up so he could coach more clients in the same amount of time. To do that, he decided to once again stretch his finances to the breaking point.

How a high-ticket coaching program pays off

Gazzale was one of the first coaches to be accepted into the Online Trainer Academy Level 2. He had to spread the enrollment fee over three different credit cards and bank accounts.

Level 2 teaches coaches how to create, market, and operate a premium coaching service. It’s for online coaches who already have a strong foundation, either from OTA Level 1 or somewhere else. His clients now pay $1,500 for the 12-week program, and he’s been adding four to five new ones a month.

He’s also learned to follow the same advice he gives his clients. Be patient. Be consistent.

“I have to remind myself to replay the conversations I have with clients and apply them to myself,” he says. “It’s why I’ve had a good run of success lately.”

Case study #3: Gil Mesina

How an engineer found meaning in his work as a part-time coach and trained 340-plus clients in 19 countries

Gil Mesina is an electrical engineer, a job he’s been doing for 20 years and counting.

It’s the kind of steady, high-paying gig a lot of people fantasize about, especially if they happen to be math nerds with boatloads of student debt.

“It’s a great job, with great people,” he says.

But …?

“Fitness is my true passion.”

It just took him a while to figure out how to act on it.

From dancer to online trainer

Mesina met his future wife through bachata, a Dominican dance style, where they competed internationally. His passion for fitness emerged when he got in peak shape for their final contest.

By then he was on the cusp of 40 years old, and the grind of training for competition had taken the fun out of dancing. But he’d found a new calling.

“Dancers started coming up to me and asking me to help them,” he says.

In early 2016, he trained four male friends from the dance world—all online, all for free. (To this day he’s never trained anyone in person.)

“One of the guys said, you should try it with females,” he remembers. The four women he recruited helped him launch a thriving online training business.

Mesina’s first four clients. (His wife is in the middle.) After showcasing their results, Mesina says, “a lot of people started reaching out.”

He began running groups for 10 to 15 clients, and their results led to even more referrals.

Now that it was a business, he looked for ways to run it more efficiently. John Berardi, cofounder of Precision Nutrition, told him about Jonathan Goodman and the Online Trainer Academy.

“What I saw from Jon and his tribe is no-nonsense,” he says. “There’s a trust factor because I never felt Jon was there to sell to me. He never said ‘buy, buy, buy.’”

Mesina launches four 12-week group challenges each year, using the same basic program each time. After averaging 20 clients per group, recent challenges have brought in about 30.

His marketing is mainly word of mouth, much of it generated when he shares his clients’ before-and-after photos and testimonials on Facebook. “Just do a damned good job, and make sure everybody knows about it,” he says, quoting one of Goodman’s favorite exhortations.

Until recently, he’d never considered training clients who want to continue beyond the 12-week challenge, even though the demand was there. “My philosophy was, after 12 weeks, you’re done with me. You’re good to go.”

Soon after COVID-19 hit, the OTA coaches convinced him to add a “legacy” group.

Training those clients along with his challenge groups would seem to be a full-time job, but Mesina still manages to run it in his spare time.

“A lot of it is already automated, so it doesn’t take as much time as people think,” he explains. As for the legacy clients, “They don’t need as much hand-holding because they know how it works in terms of accountability.”

That said, he is considering his exit strategy from his original career. “It’s something I’m working toward,” he says.

“The engineering job is still really good. But fitness is my passion.”

Case study #4: Nelao Nengola

How Nelao helps trauma survivors with their fitness through online coaching

“I didn’t ask to be in this stupid-ass survivors club,” Nelao Nengola once said in a powerful video. “I didn’t sign up for lifelong depression.”

What she survived is a sexual assault when she was a high school student in Namibia.

Until recently, she wasn’t sure how to address the attack that so profoundly changed her life. She first shared her story a few years ago, but stopped when she realized she wasn’t ready.

“I used to think you heal by telling,” she says. “But I realized not everyone deserves to hear your story.”

Nengola decided to start sharing it again when she discovered an audience who deserved to hear it: assault survivors interested in fitness.

It made perfect sense.

Like many survivors, she rapidly gained weight following the assault, part of a downward spiral both caused by and feeding depression.

Running, Pilates, and eventually strength training helped her regain some control over her body and emotions. She got certified as a personal trainer shortly after.

Building a career beyond borders

Namibia is a big country with a small population.

The challenges, though, go far beyond population. Sub-Saharan Africa has the world’s most extreme income inequality. That means every fitness pro competes for the small handful of people who can afford to pay for personal training.

Nengola started out in a franchise gym in Windhoek, the capital, but left that job after three months to open her own training studio.

“It was awful,” she says. “I was training from 5 in the morning until almost 10 in the evening sometimes. I loved what I did, but I had no energy for anything else at all.”

By the time she closed the studio, after two and a half years, she was deep in debt and looking for a way to survive as a personal trainer. For a while she ran group fitness classes in a gym owned by a prominent local businessman. But the early morning hours “reminded me of all the things I hated about training.”

Online training was the obvious answer. She signed up for the Online Trainer Academy within a week of finding it. “It seemed to be exactly what I was looking for,” she says.

Nengola in her home, where she now runs her online business—filming workouts, coaching clients, and creating content.

That’s when she realized there was a natural audience for her message, if she was willing to start sharing again.

“When I asked myself who I’m best suited to serve, and what would be in line with my purpose, it was trauma survivors,” she says. “Fitness is what pulled me out of my dark place. Why shouldn’t I teach other women that they can do this as well?”

She currently has online clients on three different continents—North America, Europe, and Africa—and no longer trains anyone in person.

“The way I see trainers here grinding, I could never go back to that,” she says.

Case study #5: Jesus Acuna

How a gym owner increased his income after the pandemic forced him to close his facility

Timing is a mysterious thing.

If you try to do the perfect thing at the perfect time, odds are you’ll fail. The only way to ensure success is to put things in place before cataclysmic events happen so when they do, you’re prepared.

Perhaps this is why Jesus Acuna, owner of Resilient Fitness in Tucson, Arizona, has the most appropriate gym name in history.

On March 13, he got the call to shut down his gym because of the pandemic.

“That was a punch in the gut,” he says. “They gave us maybe eight hours’ notice. I didn’t sleep that night.”

But when he got up the next morning, he realized it might actually be a blessing in disguise.

An injury, weight gain, and busting his butt in the gym

Acuna started lifting as a high school football player in Tucson. “The technique was crap,” he acknowledges. “But the idea was, if you bust your ass in the gym, you’ll beat the other guys.”

A shoulder injury and corresponding recovery caused him to gain 40 pounds. And he continued packing it on after he returned to the weight room.

By his senior year of college, he estimates he weighed 300 pounds—more than 100 pounds above his pre-surgery weight.

That led to his lowest moment. While training a group of young athletes, one of them said, “Hey, I bet your fat ass can’t do this. Why are you making us do it?”

He lost 20 pounds the next month, on his way to losing all the weight he’d gained.

The next 10 years were the typical grind—five years as an independent trainer, followed by five at a powerlifting gym, which he eventually managed.

In July 2019 he opened his own studio gym with two clear goals:

“I had to be able to make the money I wanted to make.”

“I had to do it on my own time.”

And for the first seven months, it worked exactly as he planned. He got to the gym at 9 a.m., went home at 7 p.m., and made $7,500 a month “working as much as I allowed myself to.”

The only problem was, his business was already maxed out, and didn’t know how to ramp up.

When preparation meets opportunity

At a fitness event in 2011, someone recommended Ignite the Fire, Jonathan Goodman’s first book. Acuna read it, started following the PTDC, enrolled in 1K Extra (the precursor to the Online Trainer Academy), and eventually became a Certified Online Trainer.

But online training was still a small part of his business in January 2020. His gym was going well and, like so many of us, he had no idea what was about to happen.

When he got the pandemic shutdown announcement and suffered through that sleepless night, he saw the solution right there on his computer screen. Why couldn’t he offer his group workouts on Zoom?

He contacted his gym members and told them the new plan. “Maybe four or five clients said, ‘Hey, we’re going to stop,’” Acuna says. But the rest of them thanked him for setting up the online system and not leaving them to figure it out for themselves.

In March, 2020, when the first shutdown happened, he made $10,000 online. (The most he had ever made with his studio before the pandemic was $8,000 a month.)

His income rose to $11,000 in April and to $12,000 in August. Through all the twists and turns, with his gym reopening and then closing again, his revenue has remained higher than it was before the pandemic upended his business.

More important, he found a workable model that allowed him to grow his business without canceling his life.

It worked because he was prepared (even if he didn’t quite realize it at the time), and the result is more profit without sacrificing any time with his family.

The Acuna family repping the Resilient Fitness brand.

But there’s one more twist to the story.

On June 27—Father’s Day—Acuna noticed he was struggling to breathe.

He assumed it was because of a wildfire in the local mountains.

When he woke up the next morning, the breathing difficulty was accompanied by a migraine and aching joints. “I felt like I was hit by a truck,” he says. A test confirmed that he had COVID-19.

He was flat on his back for the first three days, and mostly out of commission that first week.

He started taking walks the second week, and thought he was healthy enough to train the third week. The headaches convinced him to wait another week. “I started lifting heavy again, and felt fine,” he says.

His three weeks of illness and recovery are a wakeup call to all the fitness pros who believe young, fit, healthy people are somehow immune.

“People reached out and said, ‘You’re the healthiest guy we know!’” Acuna recalls. If he could get this illness, anyone can.

But he knows it could’ve been worse.

“When I was 300 pounds, I used an inhaler daily,” he says. “I had asthma. Getting COVID in that condition would’ve ruined me. I have no doubt about it.”

Acuna didn’t know that he’d contract a potentially deadly disease when he lost all that weight. But the fact he prepared his body may have saved his life, just as his OTA certification prepared his business for a potentially catastrophic closure.

It’s a double endorsement for the value of preparation meeting opportunity. And it illustrates how smart it was to call his gym Resilient Fitness.

If You’re an Online Trainer, or Want to Be …

You can’t move forward in your career until you learn how to coach fitness and nutrition online responsibly, effectively, efficiently, and confidently.

If you’d like to get ahead, and stay ahead, consider enrolling in the Online Trainer Academy Level 1 Certification.

If you’re already training clients online, making more than $1,000 a month, and looking for a more scalable business model, you may be a better fit for the Online Trainer Academy Level 2.

The post How Five Coaches Grew Their Online Business in Difficult Times appeared first on The PTDC.

How Five Coaches Grew Their Online Business in Difficult Times published first on https://onezeroonesarms.tumblr.com/

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juliehbutler · 6 years

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Here’s the Simple Guide That Shows You How to Eat Healthy

Would you rather listen to this article? Use the player below or download on iTunes.

Does it ever feel like you spend way more time than you should have to thinking about food? What you should eat and shouldn’t eat; how many meals you should eat; are any foods best for fat loss; what’s best for improving overall health; is there such a thing as an all-you-can-eat peanut butter diet; are total calories or food quality more important.

Eating healthy is complicated.

Not really. Eating healthy seems complicated because of the abundance of information on food, weight loss, disease prevention and what you should and shouldn’t eat to look better naked. It’s no wonder people are frustrated and discouraged because they’ve tried popular diets that promised to be the diet for effortless fat loss: low fat, low carb, vegetarian, intermittent fasting, ketogenic, and all the rest.

The Basics are Not Replaceable

It’s not uncommon for someone to read the information below and scoff that it’s “too simple.” They want more than the basics. They think a diet that emulates their favorite Instagram fit-pro’s habits will yield better results. They think they’re above the basics.

The problem, however, is that most people have not even mastered the basics. Complex, restrictive diets that eliminate foods or food groups don’t produce better, lasting results – they just reduce calorie intake. People falsely think they’re more effective because of their complexity. These unnecessarily obsessive, restrictive diets can lead to things you don’t want like binge eating, negative body image, or incessant yo-yo dieting.

Complex or complicated does not mean better. Don’t delude yourself into thinking you need something more advanced if you don’t apply the information shared here for months at a time.

Do You Want a Diet or a Lifestyle?

Most diets have a timeframe. You follow it for 12-16 weeks (or until your willpower bleeds dry) and then you’re done and go back to eating whatever was normal pre-diet, or worse because you can’t stop eating all the stuff that was banned from the diet. Sound familiar?

Someone who will stand on stage in a bikini to be judged will follow a diet that meticulously tracks calories to reach ultra-low levels of body fat that’s meant to be sustained for a short period of time (people often forget this part and think it’s easy, or healthy, to have very low body fat levels long term). Problems arise when the average person who just wants to feel great and look better naked attempts to mimic those diets.

Most people need to create a sustainable lifestyle built upon simple habits that can be maintained long term. Not for 12-16 weeks, but for 12-16 months and beyond. A major distinction between a diet and lifestyle: quick-fix diets instill a perfection mindset (never missing a meal, hitting the exact calorie target every day, never “cheating,” you go all in); a healthy-eating lifestyle is about consistency, not perfection, so there’s no burden or stress of thinking you need to be perfect day in, day out – it is not an “all or nothing” game.

Rigid diets that create a perfection-obsessed mindset around food can drown you in their monstrous wake of negative body image and disordered eating habits.

You Must Find Pleasure in the Process

You can only force yourself to follow a style of eating you hate, or that dominates your life, for so long. Eventually you’ll say Screw it! and throw your hands in the air as a declaration of frustration and signaling the end of the diet’s lifespan.

Many people mistakenly look at eating healthy as being torturous, bland, boring, difficult. Establishing better eating habits may be difficult in the beginning, depending on your current food habits, but you must focus on the pleasure that accompanies the process. The pleasure of nourishing your body; properly fueling and recovering from workouts; forging new habits that serve you; actively investing in your health; proving to yourself you can establish rewarding, positive habits.

If you get frustrated from trying to find vegetables or lean-protein sources you enjoy, or have trouble hitting the 80% whole-food target discussed below, refocus on the pleasures you should be reaping from this lifestyle change.

Does It Have to be about Fat Loss?

Tips for weight loss are laced throughout this article, because many people want to lose fat. If you’re burned out on constantly thinking about fat loss, watching what you eat, or otherwise being on a never-ending journey of trying to whittle down to a smaller size, don’t think about fat loss.

If your brain is begging for a break from basing every food choice on losing body fat, choose other reasons for changing your eating habits. Choose to adjust your eating choices to:

Improve overall health (physical and mental)

Increase energy levels

Improve sleep quality

Fuel and recover from workouts

Slow down the aging process

Contribute to self-care

Increase physical strength and build muscle

There are, as you can see, lots of reasons to eat well that have nothing to do with fat loss. Depending on your history it may behoove you to say Screw fat loss! and focus on other healthy eating benefits.

How to Eat Healthy

Whatever your why may be for wanting to eat healthy, here are the foods that should make up most of your eating choices.

Eat These Foods Most of The Time

The common thread connecting these foods – they’re minimally processed whole foods. Why have these foods been chosen? Because eating mostly nutrient-dense whole foods, including lots of plant-based foods, has been shown to be most important for improving health and warding off disease.

The following images and examples are not exhaustive, and many could fall in other categories. Eggs, for example, could be listed in the fat and protein groups but appear under fats; corn is a grain when eaten as popcorn but considered a starchy vegetable when consumed as corn on the cob. Don’t get obsessed with minor details but use this as a guide for building meals and snacks.

Fats

These whole-food sources are packed with healthy fats. Other examples not shown include fatty fish like salmon and mackerel; plant sources include flax seeds, olives, chia seeds.

Protein

Notice that lean sources of protein are shown. Fattier cuts of meat and dairy are fine but shouldn’t make up the bulk of your protein choices.

Starchy Vegetables

Non-Starchy Vegetables

Why two vegetable categories? Because some people rely too much on the starchy vegetables and eat nothing but potatoes. Potatoes are healthy and satiating, but don’t neglect non-starchy veggies. A good rule of thumb is to “eat the rainbow” as often as possible so you get tons of nutrients in a fiber-packed package. Non-starchy veggies are a great way to increase satiety because they take up a lot of space in the stomach without packing a lot of calories (i.e., they’re high-volume, low-calorie foods).

Bake them, sauté them, grill them, steam them, eat them raw, turn them into noodles and use in place of traditional pasta, blend them in smoothies. Doesn’t matter how you get them in your belly, just eat them.

Beans and Legumes

Tasty protein and fiber combined in a cheap package, especially if you buy dried beans and prepare them yourself. If you don’t eat meat, or much of it, this will be one of your main sources of protein. Even if you do eat meat, include these tasty foods.

Whole Grains

This category also includes foods like whole wheat pasta and breads.

Why is white rice shown instead of brown rice — I thought brown rice was “less processed” and therefore healthier, you may be wondering. There’s not much nutritional difference between white and brown rice beyond fiber (which favors brown rice), so let your taste decide. Some people find white rice easier to digest than brown rice. In the end, choosing between them is a minute detail not worth obsessing over.

Herbs and Spices

If you don’t use herbs and spices with your cooking, start. I’ve cooked countless meals that were bland and boring, but the right blend of spices made these meals delightfully craveable. Find recipes that use herbs and spices if you’re not a creative cook. They can make the difference between a meal you feel like you have to choke down and one that creates a symphony of flavors on your tastebuds.

Fruits

Choose from fresh or frozen. Canned fruits are okay if they’re packed in water and don’t have added sugar. Buy what’s in season or on sale to save money. Keep apples and other easy-to-grab fruits nearby if you tend to snack frequently.

Recommended Article: The Chocolate Protein Shake That Actually Tastes Like a Milkshake

Calorie-Free Beverages

Sparkling water is another option and the carbonation can help curb appetite. Calorie-free soft drinks are okay in moderation and can help satisfy your sweet tooth. One of the simplest changes worth making is swapping calorie-laden beverages for their calorie-free or low-calorie equivalent.

If you can only drink coffee with cream and sugar, that’s fine. You don’t have to force yourself to drink black coffee. This can only become something that might need to be kept in check if you use a lot of cream and sugar, or drink multiple cups of coffee throughout the day (then those spoonfuls of sugar and cream add up).

Want a low-calorie way to flavor your coffee? Mix a sugar-free hot cocoa packet (they’re only 25 calories) in your coffee. Makes a tasty low-calorie mocha.

What is “Most of The Time”?

The above food categories fall under the umbrella of foods to eat most of the time, meaning they should make up at least 80% of your food choices; this can be a daily or weekly average. The following image shows the percentage of whole and “fun” foods (covered next) consumed each day over the course of a week — the whole-foods average is 81%.

The tremendous benefit of aiming for at least an 80% average of whole foods is the flexibility it provides. Remember, this is a flexible lifestyle, not a perfection-obsessed diet. You can socialize and enjoy your favorite foods without feeling deprived or like you’re “on a diet.”

Eat These Foods Less Often

You know what to eat at least 80% of the time, so let’s go over the foods that can make up the remaining 0-20% depending on your needs and preferences.

But first, notice what is not being said. These foods are not bad, evil, forbidden, dirty, off limits, or guilty pleasures. Eating them does not make you bad, ugly, shameful, disgusting, a failure or anything else someone who wrote a diet book that bans these foods may have said you’d be if you enjoy them. Nor will eating these foods occasionally in reasonable amounts miraculously cause you to gain body fat. Only eating more than your body uses for a prolonged period causes the accumulation of body fat, and this can come from eating an excess of anything.

The eat less of these foods are typically calorie dense, not nutrient dense like the whole foods above. They’re hyperpalatable by design typically using a combination of sugar, fat, and salt. For a fascinating look at how foods are intentionally and painstakingly designed to keep us eating more and wanting to eat more, read The End of Overeating.

The best guideline for the eat less of these foods: be consciously selective of what you will enjoy. Actively choose. Don’t just eat something because it’s there or someone offers it to you.

Recommended Article: Eating in Moderation: How to Do It Right

Are Processed Foods Evil?

Unless you grow it or hunt it yourself, your food is technically processed.

Plain oats are processed, but they’re considered a whole food.

Pop Tarts are processed, and they are not a whole food.

Food-of-the-gods peanut butter is processed; it’s a good source of fat that delivers some protein and is considered a whole food.

Protein powder is processed, yet it’s a staple in many people’s eating choices because it’s a food source packaged in a convenient form, like a stick of string cheese.

Aim to eat mostly minimally processed foods. There’s a difference between oats and peanut butter and Pop Tarts and fried mozzarella sticks. And, remember, if Pop Tarts and mozzarella sticks happen to be two of your favorite foods, you can, and should, eat them in moderation.

Why is it important to eat your favorite foods, even if they’re heavily processed or deep fried and not so healthy?

How (and Why) to Make Room for Foods You Love

Want to throw yourself into a relentless battle with disordered and obsessive eating habits?

Heck no you don’t.

The best way to avoid that miserable struggle (i.e., the ugly side of health and fitness) is to not have “forbidden” or “off limit” foods, or to attempt to abstain from your favorite foods or food groups because you think they’re “bad” or solely responsible for fat gain. Do not fall into the disordered-eating trap of labeling foods “good” and “bad” or becoming obsessively neurotic with what you eat.

Optimizing physical health is important and is achieved by eating mostly whole foods. Mental health is also important yet is often omitted from a diet discussion, and that’s a mistake. A way to help ensure you don’t develop obsessive, unhealthy habits with food is to have flexibility built into your food choices.

Make room for your favorite foods. If a variety of whole foods make up at least 80% of your daily/weekly food choices, you can enjoy other favorite foods in moderate amounts. You don’t need to have an “all or nothing” mentality that rigid diets create. You needn’t “eat perfectly” all the time.

Do the right things most of the time.

It’s time to stop looking at food subjectively. A cupcake is not a “bad” food that will instantly put fat on your body. A spinach salad with low-calorie dressing is not a “good” food that will instantly remove fat from your body.

Analyzing food like that exacerbates, or leads to, disordered eating habits. If you find yourself looking at food through a good/bad lens, make it a priority to catch yourself and start reversing that mindset. If you typically look at a tasty cupcake and think I shouldn’t eat this, it’s bad, and it’ll cause me to gain fat, become aware of that response and change the conversation. Recall that it’s a piece of food; it’s not bad or evil. You can have it, enjoy it, and then move on.

This is a lifestyle, and your favorite foods belong in your lifestyle.

To get stronger and change the shape of your body you must show up to the gym week after week and put in consistent effort. You can’t go sporadically and expect noticeable results. Building a healthier mindset with food requires the same commitment and consistent practice.

Tailor to Your Needs and Preferences

You know which foods should make up the bulk of your eating choices, and how to work in your other favorite foods. Great! Why do you need to “tailor” those guidelines to your needs and preferences?

Because doing something you enjoy and that fits into your life matters. A lot. An eating style is only as effective as your adherence to it. Take the time, if needed, to see how many meals per day you prefer to eat and any other practices you need to adopt (or avoid, more on this below) to reach your goals.

Maybe you prefer to eat two big meals per day because you love feeling full and eating smaller meals causes you to overeat. Maybe you prefer carb-rich foods, so a low-carb diet would be worse than getting a root canal from a drunk dentist with a shaky hand. Maybe you need to measure your protein intake and loosely track calories to reach your goals.

Recommended Article: Why That Diet Didn’t Work for You

Maybe you don’t know what you prefer because you never took the time to ask yourself, so you have to try a few things to see what works best. That’s fine too. Becoming your own guru and approaching your eating preferences like a scientist can be a good thing. Take a pragmatic, objective approach to your eating choices. Keep emotion out of it. Take note of what works and keep doing it; if something doesn’t work or you absolutely hate it, scratch it off the at-least-I-tried list and move on to the next thing.

Does Every Meal Have to Look Like This?

Nope. Mine certainly don’t.

There’s nothing wrong with having a vegetable, protein, and starch on your plate, but it doesn’t mean every meal has to be made of single ingredient foods, each having its designated spot.

Some people love using that template to design their meals because of its simplicity and the ease it provides for prepping lots of meals at once, but not me. Some of my meals look that way, but it’s certainly not mandatory.

I enjoy cooking and trying new recipes so I routinely make stir-frys, casseroles, slow cooker meals, stews, chilis, curries. My criteria for most recipes is that they use mostly whole-food ingredients. (For a few recipes you can check out my Instagram: chicken salad, banana-oat cookies, sweet potato pumpkin curry.)

Let your preferences determine how your meals look. Make what you enjoy eating.

Total Calories and Food Quality

Do Calories Matter?

Yes. Using an extreme example, you can go on a Snickers diet and lose weight if you stayed in a caloric deficit. Sure, you’d get to eat nothing but Snickers every day and lose weight, but you’d likely be ravenous most of the time since an all-Snickers diet isn’t very satiating. And, not to mention, you wouldn’t consume enough fiber, vitamins, and other nutrients to optimize health.

The point here isn’t to eat nothing but junk – it’s to emphasize the point that no single food or food group causes fat gain on its own.

Does That Mean Food Quality is Less Important?

Not at all. Just because you can lose fat eating nothing but Snickers or McDonald’s doesn’t mean food quality is less important. As stated above, maximizing overall health is the primary objective, and eating mostly whole foods does that. Food quality is also important for energy levels and satiety.

Let’s say your body needs 1,900 calories per day to stay the same (i.e., if you burn 1,900 calories and eat 1,900 calories, your body composition won’t change). You could eat 1,600 calories worth of Snickers bars each day for a month and you’d lose weight from being in a caloric deficit, though you probably wouldn’t feel too great and would likely experience ravenous hunger.

Some people claim you’d instantly pack on fat eating nothing but Snickers bars because of the insulin response, but that’s incorrect. An insulin response won’t lead to fat storage in the absence of a caloric surplus.

Contrast this candy-bar diet with eating 1,600 calories of nutritious whole foods from the eat more of these foods discussed above for a month and weight loss would occur, but unlike the all-Snickers diet you’d experience greater satiety from the higher intake of protein and fiber and higher volume whole foods provide.

Whole foods provide greater satiety than heavily processed calorie-dense foods.

And, bonus, as you can see, Snickers can still be a part of a mostly whole-foods lifestyle. Deprivation has no place in eating healthy. Moderation is a habit worth developing.

This isn’t to suggest the results from both diets, if all else was equal, would be identical. If strength training was part of the regimen you may lose more fat and build more muscle with the whole-food diet from consuming more nutrients and protein than the theoretical all-Snickers diet; no doubt your health would benefit from the former.

Do You Need to Count Calories?

I would rather saw off the little toe on my right foot with a rusty pocket knife than count calories. That exercise would send me plunging headfirst back into obsessive, disordered eating habits. That is why I don’t count calories, and why many of my clients with a similar history don’t either. It creates more problems than it solves.

There are plenty of people who like tracking calories. It’s a lifestyle practice they enjoy, or one they find necessary to achieve and maintain their goals, otherwise they get off track quickly.

The option of tracking calories varies from person to person and depends on their goals and needs. Do what works best for you and avoid anything that exacerbates issues with food.

If you’re not sure what you need to do, start by applying the above information for at least six weeks and see what happens. You very well may not need to do anything else. Why make things more complicated than necessary? Try the simplest things first, and tweak only if necessary.

Some people don’t need to count calories (or disdain the mere thought of doing so) yet could benefit from tracking certain foods or macronutrients.

What Should be Tracked?

Maybe something. Maybe nothing.

Let’s say you want to lose weight. You aptly apply the above information for six weeks but don’t feel like you’ve made progress, and you don’t want to resort to counting calories. In other words, what should you do if you’re eating healthy but still can’t lose weight?

Most people don’t overeat lean protein, non-starchy vegetables, or fruits. You can track the two most likely culprits preventing fat loss: fat sources and “fun” foods.

Fat sources are calorically dense, and the calories can add up quickly. For example, one-quarter cup of mixed nuts contains 160 calories. If you eat out of the container instead of putting one serving into a bowl, you may end up eating one cup (I’ve been there and done that). Instead of eating 160 calories, it was 640. If you frequently eat high-fat foods like nuts and nut butters, avocados, cheese, olive oil drizzled on salads, track or measure those fat sources for a week. It may be helpful to measure a serving size of those foods to become aware of what a serving size truly is.

I love carbs. If I had my way a bucket of mashed potatoes would be considered one serving. If you eat more carb sources than fat, track your starchy-vegetable and grain intake. You could try replacing some of the starchy vegetables with non-starchy vegetables (since they’re lower in calories for an equal volume) or simply decrease the serving portions a bit: instead of eating two heaping serving spoons of mashed potatoes, eat one.

“Fun” foods can also be easy to overeat. It’s not hard to eat a few too many tasty cookies or French fries or doughnuts. You may be eating more of those than you realize. Track everything you eat and drink for a week to see what’s going on. You may discover you snacked on a doughnut a few times throughout the week and drank a few sugar-loaded lattes you weren’t accounting for previously. Choose which “fun” foods to enjoy more diligently. Either eat a smaller amount and/or swap them out for lower-calorie whole foods.

If fat loss is the goal and you’re not losing weight, this means, very simply, that you’re consuming too many calories. Find simple ways to consume fewer calories: eat more veggies instead of whole grains, swap out sugar-laden beverages for calorie-free drinks, eat a good source of lean protein with all meals, track fat sources, eat more high-volume, low-calorie foods like non-starchy vegetables and fruits. It really can be that simple.

You could summarize the information above into:

Eat whole foods at least 80% of the time

Make room for your favorite foods

Think flexible, sustainable lifestyle – not a soul-sucking diet

Master the basics – no seriously, do them consistently for months

Consistency matters most – forget about perfection; this is not an “all or nothing” game

Want to Really Change How Your Body Looks?

Healthy eating and strength training go together like peanut butter and jelly. While proper nutrition can improve your health and is instrumental in losing body fat, an intelligent progressive strength training program is the tool that changes the shape of your body. Eating well can help you lose body fat, but only strength training can help you maintain, and build, muscle.

For maximum results, combine the nutrition guidelines here with a progressive strength training program. Check out the women’s beginner strength training guide or Lift Like a Girl workout template to get started.

Want to know when a new article is released? Want insider-only information not shared here? Enter your email below to join the newsletter.

The post Here’s the Simple Guide That Shows You How to Eat Healthy appeared first on Nia Shanks.

from Healthy Living http://www.niashanks.com/simple-guide-how-to-eat-healthy/

0 notes

sarahzlukeuk · 6 years

Text

Here’s the Simple Guide That Shows You How to Eat Healthy

Would you rather listen to this article? Use the player below or download on iTunes.

Eating healthy is complicated.

The Basics are Not Replaceable

Complex or complicated does not mean better. Don’t delude yourself into thinking you need something more advanced if you don’t apply the information shared here for months at a time.

Do You Want a Diet or a Lifestyle?

Rigid diets that create a perfection-obsessed mindset around food can drown you in their monstrous wake of negative body image and disordered eating habits.

You Must Find Pleasure in the Process

Does It Have to be about Fat Loss?

If your brain is begging for a break from basing every food choice on losing body fat, choose other reasons for changing your eating habits. Choose to adjust your eating choices to:

Improve overall health (physical and mental)

Increase energy levels

Improve sleep quality

Fuel and recover from workouts

Slow down the aging process

Contribute to self-care

Increase physical strength and build muscle

How to Eat Healthy

Whatever your why may be for wanting to eat healthy, here are the foods that should make up most of your eating choices.

Eat These Foods Most of The Time

Fats

These whole-food sources are packed with healthy fats. Other examples not shown include fatty fish like salmon and mackerel; plant sources include flax seeds, olives, chia seeds.

Protein

Notice that lean sources of protein are shown. Fattier cuts of meat and dairy are fine but shouldn’t make up the bulk of your protein choices.

Starchy Vegetables

Non-Starchy Vegetables

Beans and Legumes

Whole Grains

This category also includes foods like whole wheat pasta and breads.

Herbs and Spices

Fruits

Recommended Article: The Chocolate Protein Shake That Actually Tastes Like a Milkshake

Calorie-Free Beverages

Want a low-calorie way to flavor your coffee? Mix a sugar-free hot cocoa packet (they’re only 25 calories) in your coffee. Makes a tasty low-calorie mocha.

What is “Most of The Time”?

Eat These Foods Less Often

You know what to eat at least 80% of the time, so let’s go over the foods that can make up the remaining 0-20% depending on your needs and preferences.

The best guideline for the eat less of these foods: be consciously selective of what you will enjoy. Actively choose. Don’t just eat something because it’s there or someone offers it to you.

Recommended Article: Eating in Moderation: How to Do It Right

Are Processed Foods Evil?

Unless you grow it or hunt it yourself, your food is technically processed.

Plain oats are processed, but they’re considered a whole food.

Pop Tarts are processed, and they are not a whole food.

Food-of-the-gods peanut butter is processed; it’s a good source of fat that delivers some protein and is considered a whole food.

Protein powder is processed, yet it’s a staple in many people’s eating choices because it’s a food source packaged in a convenient form, like a stick of string cheese.

Why is it important to eat your favorite foods, even if they’re heavily processed or deep fried and not so healthy?

How (and Why) to Make Room for Foods You Love

Want to throw yourself into a relentless battle with disordered and obsessive eating habits?

Heck no you don’t.

Do the right things most of the time.

This is a lifestyle, and your favorite foods belong in your lifestyle.

Tailor to Your Needs and Preferences

Recommended Article: Why That Diet Didn’t Work for You

Does Every Meal Have to Look Like This?

Nope. Mine certainly don’t.

There’s nothing wrong with having a vegetable, protein, and starch on your plate, but it doesn’t mean every meal has to be made of single ingredient foods, each having its designated spot.

Let your preferences determine how your meals look. Make what you enjoy eating.

Total Calories and Food Quality

Do Calories Matter?

The point here isn’t to eat nothing but junk – it’s to emphasize the point that no single food or food group causes fat gain on its own.

Does That Mean Food Quality is Less Important?

Whole foods provide greater satiety than heavily processed calorie-dense foods.

And, bonus, as you can see, Snickers can still be a part of a mostly whole-foods lifestyle. Deprivation has no place in eating healthy. Moderation is a habit worth developing.

Do You Need to Count Calories?

There are plenty of people who like tracking calories. It’s a lifestyle practice they enjoy, or one they find necessary to achieve and maintain their goals, otherwise they get off track quickly.

The option of tracking calories varies from person to person and depends on their goals and needs. Do what works best for you and avoid anything that exacerbates issues with food.

Some people don’t need to count calories (or disdain the mere thought of doing so) yet could benefit from tracking certain foods or macronutrients.

What Should be Tracked?

Maybe something. Maybe nothing.

Most people don’t overeat lean protein, non-starchy vegetables, or fruits. You can track the two most likely culprits preventing fat loss: fat sources and “fun” foods.

You could summarize the information above into:

Eat whole foods at least 80% of the time

Make room for your favorite foods

Think flexible, sustainable lifestyle – not a soul-sucking diet

Master the basics – no seriously, do them consistently for months

Consistency matters most – forget about perfection; this is not an “all or nothing” game

Want to Really Change How Your Body Looks?

Want to know when a new article is released? Want insider-only information not shared here? Enter your email below to join the newsletter.

The post Here’s the Simple Guide That Shows You How to Eat Healthy appeared first on Nia Shanks.

from Sarah Luke Fitness Updates http://www.niashanks.com/simple-guide-how-to-eat-healthy/

0 notes

joelandryus · 6 years

Text

Here’s the Simple Guide That Shows You How to Eat Healthy

Would you rather listen to this article? Use the player below or download on iTunes.

Eating healthy is complicated.

The Basics are Not Replaceable

Complex or complicated does not mean better. Don’t delude yourself into thinking you need something more advanced if you don’t apply the information shared here for months at a time.

Do You Want a Diet or a Lifestyle?

Rigid diets that create a perfection-obsessed mindset around food can drown you in their monstrous wake of negative body image and disordered eating habits.

You Must Find Pleasure in the Process

Does It Have to be about Fat Loss?

If your brain is begging for a break from basing every food choice on losing body fat, choose other reasons for changing your eating habits. Choose to adjust your eating choices to:

Improve overall health (physical and mental)

Increase energy levels

Improve sleep quality

Fuel and recover from workouts

Slow down the aging process

Contribute to self-care

Increase physical strength and build muscle

How to Eat Healthy

Whatever your why may be for wanting to eat healthy, here are the foods that should make up most of your eating choices.

Eat These Foods Most of The Time

Fats

These whole-food sources are packed with healthy fats. Other examples not shown include fatty fish like salmon and mackerel; plant sources include flax seeds, olives, chia seeds.

Protein

Notice that lean sources of protein are shown. Fattier cuts of meat and dairy are fine but shouldn’t make up the bulk of your protein choices.

Starchy Vegetables

Non-Starchy Vegetables

Beans and Legumes

Whole Grains

This category also includes foods like whole wheat pasta and breads.

Herbs and Spices

Fruits

Recommended Article: The Chocolate Protein Shake That Actually Tastes Like a Milkshake

Calorie-Free Beverages

Want a low-calorie way to flavor your coffee? Mix a sugar-free hot cocoa packet (they’re only 25 calories) in your coffee. Makes a tasty low-calorie mocha.

What is “Most of The Time”?

Eat These Foods Less Often

You know what to eat at least 80% of the time, so let’s go over the foods that can make up the remaining 0-20% depending on your needs and preferences.

The best guideline for the eat less of these foods: be consciously selective of what you will enjoy. Actively choose. Don’t just eat something because it’s there or someone offers it to you.

Recommended Article: Eating in Moderation: How to Do It Right

Are Processed Foods Evil?

Unless you grow it or hunt it yourself, your food is technically processed.

Plain oats are processed, but they’re considered a whole food.

Pop Tarts are processed, and they are not a whole food.

Food-of-the-gods peanut butter is processed; it’s a good source of fat that delivers some protein and is considered a whole food.

Protein powder is processed, yet it’s a staple in many people’s eating choices because it’s a food source packaged in a convenient form, like a stick of string cheese.

Why is it important to eat your favorite foods, even if they’re heavily processed or deep fried and not so healthy?

How (and Why) to Make Room for Foods You Love

Want to throw yourself into a relentless battle with disordered and obsessive eating habits?

Heck no you don’t.

Do the right things most of the time.

This is a lifestyle, and your favorite foods belong in your lifestyle.

Tailor to Your Needs and Preferences

Recommended Article: Why That Diet Didn’t Work for You

Does Every Meal Have to Look Like This?

Nope. Mine certainly don’t.

There’s nothing wrong with having a vegetable, protein, and starch on your plate, but it doesn’t mean every meal has to be made of single ingredient foods, each having its designated spot.

Let your preferences determine how your meals look. Make what you enjoy eating.

Total Calories and Food Quality

Do Calories Matter?

The point here isn’t to eat nothing but junk – it’s to emphasize the point that no single food or food group causes fat gain on its own.

Does That Mean Food Quality is Less Important?

Whole foods provide greater satiety than heavily processed calorie-dense foods.

And, bonus, as you can see, Snickers can still be a part of a mostly whole-foods lifestyle. Deprivation has no place in eating healthy. Moderation is a habit worth developing.

Do You Need to Count Calories?

There are plenty of people who like tracking calories. It’s a lifestyle practice they enjoy, or one they find necessary to achieve and maintain their goals, otherwise they get off track quickly.

The option of tracking calories varies from person to person and depends on their goals and needs. Do what works best for you and avoid anything that exacerbates issues with food.

Some people don’t need to count calories (or disdain the mere thought of doing so) yet could benefit from tracking certain foods or macronutrients.

What Should be Tracked?

Maybe something. Maybe nothing.

Most people don’t overeat lean protein, non-starchy vegetables, or fruits. You can track the two most likely culprits preventing fat loss: fat sources and “fun” foods.

You could summarize the information above into:

Eat whole foods at least 80% of the time

Make room for your favorite foods

Think flexible, sustainable lifestyle – not a soul-sucking diet

Master the basics – no seriously, do them consistently for months

Consistency matters most – forget about perfection; this is not an “all or nothing” game

Want to Really Change How Your Body Looks?

Want to know when a new article is released? Want insider-only information not shared here? Enter your email below to join the newsletter.

The post Here’s the Simple Guide That Shows You How to Eat Healthy appeared first on Nia Shanks.

from Sarah Luke Fitness Updates http://www.niashanks.com/simple-guide-how-to-eat-healthy/

0 notes

evajrobinsontx · 6 years

Text

Here’s the Simple Guide That Shows You How to Eat Healthy

Would you rather listen to this article? Use the player below or download on iTunes.

Eating healthy is complicated.

The Basics are Not Replaceable

Complex or complicated does not mean better. Don’t delude yourself into thinking you need something more advanced if you don’t apply the information shared here for months at a time.

Do You Want a Diet or a Lifestyle?

Rigid diets that create a perfection-obsessed mindset around food can drown you in their monstrous wake of negative body image and disordered eating habits.

You Must Find Pleasure in the Process

Does It Have to be about Fat Loss?

If your brain is begging for a break from basing every food choice on losing body fat, choose other reasons for changing your eating habits. Choose to adjust your eating choices to:

Improve overall health (physical and mental)

Increase energy levels

Improve sleep quality

Fuel and recover from workouts

Slow down the aging process

Contribute to self-care

Increase physical strength and build muscle

How to Eat Healthy

Whatever your why may be for wanting to eat healthy, here are the foods that should make up most of your eating choices.

Eat These Foods Most of The Time

Fats

These whole-food sources are packed with healthy fats. Other examples not shown include fatty fish like salmon and mackerel; plant sources include flax seeds, olives, chia seeds.

Protein

Notice that lean sources of protein are shown. Fattier cuts of meat and dairy are fine but shouldn’t make up the bulk of your protein choices.

Starchy Vegetables

Non-Starchy Vegetables

Beans and Legumes

Whole Grains

This category also includes foods like whole wheat pasta and breads.

Herbs and Spices

Fruits

Recommended Article: The Chocolate Protein Shake That Actually Tastes Like a Milkshake

Calorie-Free Beverages

Want a low-calorie way to flavor your coffee? Mix a sugar-free hot cocoa packet (they’re only 25 calories) in your coffee. Makes a tasty low-calorie mocha.

What is “Most of The Time”?

Eat These Foods Less Often

You know what to eat at least 80% of the time, so let’s go over the foods that can make up the remaining 0-20% depending on your needs and preferences.

The best guideline for the eat less of these foods: be consciously selective of what you will enjoy. Actively choose. Don’t just eat something because it’s there or someone offers it to you.

Recommended Article: Eating in Moderation: How to Do It Right

Are Processed Foods Evil?

Unless you grow it or hunt it yourself, your food is technically processed.

Plain oats are processed, but they’re considered a whole food.

Pop Tarts are processed, and they are not a whole food.

Food-of-the-gods peanut butter is processed; it’s a good source of fat that delivers some protein and is considered a whole food.

Protein powder is processed, yet it’s a staple in many people’s eating choices because it’s a food source packaged in a convenient form, like a stick of string cheese.

Why is it important to eat your favorite foods, even if they’re heavily processed or deep fried and not so healthy?

How (and Why) to Make Room for Foods You Love

Want to throw yourself into a relentless battle with disordered and obsessive eating habits?

Heck no you don’t.

Do the right things most of the time.

This is a lifestyle, and your favorite foods belong in your lifestyle.

Tailor to Your Needs and Preferences

Recommended Article: Why That Diet Didn’t Work for You

Does Every Meal Have to Look Like This?

Nope. Mine certainly don’t.

There’s nothing wrong with having a vegetable, protein, and starch on your plate, but it doesn’t mean every meal has to be made of single ingredient foods, each having its designated spot.

Let your preferences determine how your meals look. Make what you enjoy eating.

Total Calories and Food Quality

Do Calories Matter?

The point here isn’t to eat nothing but junk – it’s to emphasize the point that no single food or food group causes fat gain on its own.

Does That Mean Food Quality is Less Important?

Whole foods provide greater satiety than heavily processed calorie-dense foods.

And, bonus, as you can see, Snickers can still be a part of a mostly whole-foods lifestyle. Deprivation has no place in eating healthy. Moderation is a habit worth developing.

Do You Need to Count Calories?

There are plenty of people who like tracking calories. It’s a lifestyle practice they enjoy, or one they find necessary to achieve and maintain their goals, otherwise they get off track quickly.

The option of tracking calories varies from person to person and depends on their goals and needs. Do what works best for you and avoid anything that exacerbates issues with food.

Some people don’t need to count calories (or disdain the mere thought of doing so) yet could benefit from tracking certain foods or macronutrients.

What Should be Tracked?

Maybe something. Maybe nothing.

Most people don’t overeat lean protein, non-starchy vegetables, or fruits. You can track the two most likely culprits preventing fat loss: fat sources and “fun” foods.

You could summarize the information above into:

Eat whole foods at least 80% of the time

Make room for your favorite foods

Think flexible, sustainable lifestyle – not a soul-sucking diet

Master the basics �� no seriously, do them consistently for months

Consistency matters most – forget about perfection; this is not an “all or nothing” game

Want to Really Change How Your Body Looks?

Want to know when a new article is released? Want insider-only information not shared here? Enter your email below to join the newsletter.

The post Here’s the Simple Guide That Shows You How to Eat Healthy appeared first on Nia Shanks.

from Sarah Luke Fitness Updates http://www.niashanks.com/simple-guide-how-to-eat-healthy/

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crystalgibsus · 6 years

Text

Here’s the Simple Guide That Shows You How to Eat Healthy

Would you rather listen to this article? Use the player below or download on iTunes.

Eating healthy is complicated.

The Basics are Not Replaceable

Complex or complicated does not mean better. Don’t delude yourself into thinking you need something more advanced if you don’t apply the information shared here for months at a time.

Do You Want a Diet or a Lifestyle?

Rigid diets that create a perfection-obsessed mindset around food can drown you in their monstrous wake of negative body image and disordered eating habits.

You Must Find Pleasure in the Process

Does It Have to be about Fat Loss?

If your brain is begging for a break from basing every food choice on losing body fat, choose other reasons for changing your eating habits. Choose to adjust your eating choices to:

Improve overall health (physical and mental)

Increase energy levels

Improve sleep quality

Fuel and recover from workouts

Slow down the aging process

Contribute to self-care

Increase physical strength and build muscle

How to Eat Healthy

Whatever your why may be for wanting to eat healthy, here are the foods that should make up most of your eating choices.

Eat These Foods Most of The Time

Fats

These whole-food sources are packed with healthy fats. Other examples not shown include fatty fish like salmon and mackerel; plant sources include flax seeds, olives, chia seeds.

Protein

Notice that lean sources of protein are shown. Fattier cuts of meat and dairy are fine but shouldn’t make up the bulk of your protein choices.

Starchy Vegetables

Non-Starchy Vegetables

Beans and Legumes

Whole Grains

This category also includes foods like whole wheat pasta and breads.

Herbs and Spices

Fruits

Recommended Article: The Chocolate Protein Shake That Actually Tastes Like a Milkshake

Calorie-Free Beverages

Want a low-calorie way to flavor your coffee? Mix a sugar-free hot cocoa packet (they’re only 25 calories) in your coffee. Makes a tasty low-calorie mocha.

What is “Most of The Time”?

Eat These Foods Less Often

You know what to eat at least 80% of the time, so let’s go over the foods that can make up the remaining 0-20% depending on your needs and preferences.

The best guideline for the eat less of these foods: be consciously selective of what you will enjoy. Actively choose. Don’t just eat something because it’s there or someone offers it to you.

Recommended Article: Eating in Moderation: How to Do It Right

Are Processed Foods Evil?

Unless you grow it or hunt it yourself, your food is technically processed.

Plain oats are processed, but they’re considered a whole food.

Pop Tarts are processed, and they are not a whole food.

Food-of-the-gods peanut butter is processed; it’s a good source of fat that delivers some protein and is considered a whole food.

Protein powder is processed, yet it’s a staple in many people’s eating choices because it’s a food source packaged in a convenient form, like a stick of string cheese.

Why is it important to eat your favorite foods, even if they’re heavily processed or deep fried and not so healthy?

How (and Why) to Make Room for Foods You Love

Want to throw yourself into a relentless battle with disordered and obsessive eating habits?

Heck no you don’t.

Do the right things most of the time.

This is a lifestyle, and your favorite foods belong in your lifestyle.

Tailor to Your Needs and Preferences

Recommended Article: Why That Diet Didn’t Work for You

Does Every Meal Have to Look Like This?

Nope. Mine certainly don’t.

There’s nothing wrong with having a vegetable, protein, and starch on your plate, but it doesn’t mean every meal has to be made of single ingredient foods, each having its designated spot.

Let your preferences determine how your meals look. Make what you enjoy eating.

Total Calories and Food Quality

Do Calories Matter?

The point here isn’t to eat nothing but junk – it’s to emphasize the point that no single food or food group causes fat gain on its own.

Does That Mean Food Quality is Less Important?

Whole foods provide greater satiety than heavily processed calorie-dense foods.

And, bonus, as you can see, Snickers can still be a part of a mostly whole-foods lifestyle. Deprivation has no place in eating healthy. Moderation is a habit worth developing.

Do You Need to Count Calories?

There are plenty of people who like tracking calories. It’s a lifestyle practice they enjoy, or one they find necessary to achieve and maintain their goals, otherwise they get off track quickly.

The option of tracking calories varies from person to person and depends on their goals and needs. Do what works best for you and avoid anything that exacerbates issues with food.

Some people don’t need to count calories (or disdain the mere thought of doing so) yet could benefit from tracking certain foods or macronutrients.

What Should be Tracked?

Maybe something. Maybe nothing.

Most people don’t overeat lean protein, non-starchy vegetables, or fruits. You can track the two most likely culprits preventing fat loss: fat sources and “fun” foods.

You could summarize the information above into:

Eat whole foods at least 80% of the time

Make room for your favorite foods

Think flexible, sustainable lifestyle – not a soul-sucking diet

Master the basics – no seriously, do them consistently for months

Consistency matters most – forget about perfection; this is not an “all or nothing” game

Want to Really Change How Your Body Looks?

Want to know when a new article is released? Want insider-only information not shared here? Enter your email below to join the newsletter.

The post Here’s the Simple Guide That Shows You How to Eat Healthy appeared first on Nia Shanks.

from Tips By Crystal http://www.niashanks.com/simple-guide-how-to-eat-healthy/

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gabriellakirtonblog · 5 years

Text

Personal Trainer Nutrition Guidance 101

My colleagues and I have worked with a lot of elite athletes at Precision Nutrition. And we’ve worked with countless regular folks—people exactly like your clients.

The two groups have a lot more in common than you’d expect. In fact, a surprising number of coaching principles apply across the board, no matter who the clients are and what they do.

Here are nine lessons that apply to just about any client who’ll come to you for nutrition guidance.

READ ALSO: How to Become an Online Nutrition Coach

Lesson #1: The best meal plan is worthless if your client doesn’t like the food

Imagine if, instead of crafting an individualized training program for each client, you simply handed them a written workout and told them to follow it.

If they wanted a generic workout, they could easily find one online. Many of them have already tried, which is why they came to you. They need a program that takes into account their goals, training history, abilities, limitations, and all the other variables you consider.

It works the same way with a nutrition plan. No matter how precisely you calculate calories and macros, if it doesn’t include some of your client’s favorite foods, it’s dead on arrival.

Brian St. Pierre, Precision Nutrition’s director of sport nutrition, learned this from working with pro athletes. Some of those at the top of their game are extremely picky eaters. They have favorites they can’t live without, and aversions to foods you think every good diet should include.

A few tactics to make sure your clients follow the plans you come up with*:

1. Start with a template

Just as you build your training programs from a handful of basic templates, so can you write many different meal plans from a relatively simple structure.

READ ALSO: A Plug-and-Play Template for Program Design

2. Include the client’s favorite foods

The client can’t start the day without a supersweet Frappuccino? Can’t turn down her mother-in-law’s casserole on Sunday evenings? Assume those things are part of the diet, and adjust the rest of the meal plan accordingly.

To make room for them, ask your client what she wouldn’t miss if she substituted something else. What does she eat out of habit rather than hunger? Replace those with healthier, lower-calorie options, and she can mitigate the damage of the calorie bombs she can’t live without.

3. Make sure it’s convenient

You’d think the highest-earning pro athletes live in a hermetically sealed world where they only see the food their private chefs prepare for them. But in reality, those athletes travel constantly, and when they do, their food options are often limited to the burgers, wings, and pizza on late-night room service menus.

Your clients often face similar constraints. Maybe they work in a place with limited nearby food choices. Maybe they’re stuck in morning meetings where “breakfast” is platters of pastries. Maybe they have young children, and their weekends are so jam-packed with activities that fast food is their default option.

Help them navigate these obstacles. Suggest microwavable meals for work, smoothies they can make at home and drink at the meeting, and lists of the best options at the major fast food chains.

* This assumes you’re capable, confident, and qualified to provide meal plans. (Most personal trainers aren’t.) For more on providing nutrition advice, check out this article.

Lesson #2: Sometimes you have to shape the environment before you can get results

Where is your client’s nutrition plan most likely to fall apart? At home? In the office? On the road? At restaurants? If the biggest problems tend to occur in the same place, you may need to pay a visit.

When you visit the client’s home, for example, check out the kitchen. What’s on the counters? Are they so cluttered your client has no room to prepare meals? What about the cabinets? Does your client have staple ingredients for healthy meals, or are the shelves stocked with all the things they’re trying to avoid?

You can give your client grocery lists, or even go shopping with them. You can also share recipes and cooking demos.

Same with the office, or restaurants, or the client’s commute. Seeing those environments should help you come up with ways for your client to navigate them.

Lesson #3: Get buy-in from your client’s influencers

I used to work with junior hockey players in Canada. They were elite athletes, but they were also young, and either living with their parents or with host families if they didn’t play in their hometown.

I did my best to teach them the basics of nutrition and meal prep, but I quickly realized it didn’t matter unless I focused on the people who actually prepared their meals. The more buy-in I got from them, the better the athletes’ adherence would be.

The same applies to your clients. Their biggest challenges may come from the other people in their lives: spouses, kids, roommates, coworkers, friends, extended family.

If a spouse cooks most of the meals, see if you can sit down and talk through some meal options. Perhaps you can even cook a meal for them, or share one of theirs.

READ ALSO: Why You Should Have Dinner With Your Clients

Lesson #4: Don’t assume anything about the client’s skill in the kitchen

Appearances can be deceiving. Just because someone is a star in their sport, or is leaner and fitter than your average client, doesn’t mean they have advanced nutrition knowledge, or know how to prepare anything more complex than a bowl of oatmeal.

The opposite may also be true. Someone who’s seriously overweight or deconditioned may have Top Chef-level culinary skill.

Instead of making assumptions or guesses about where your client is at, ask questions. Listen. Observe. Seek to understand rather than to prove yourself right.

Lesson #5: Forget perfection

If you’re training competitive physique athletes, the diet has to be near-perfect for the client to succeed.

But most of your clients will see real, significant, measurable progress toward their goals if they can get 80 percent of their meals on point, especially if they aren’t close to that now.

Sometimes they’re so far away that the best you can do is make things less terrible. A little less fast food. Fewer non-diet sodas or teas or coffees or juices. Less alcohol. Smaller portions.

As long as it’s a little better than before, they’re moving in the right direction. As we learned from this huge data set, the little changes can add up to powerful results.

Lesson #6: Beware of fanatical adherence

Then there’s the opposite type of client, the one who defines success as 100 percent adherence.

They’re often trying to emulate athletes or celebrities who’re celebrated for a dramatic transformation or uncompromising discipline. But for most of their role models, the extreme diets have a natural cutoff point—the end of the season, or the conclusion of a movie role. They don’t try to deprive themselves 52 weeks a year.

If your client has the same idea—lose a bunch of weight by a specific deadline, like a wedding or reunion—it’s rarely dangerous. Perfection only has a dark side if the client sees it as a permanent condition. Because it’s an impossible standard, your client is set up for failure.

Countering that mindset can be tricky. You don’t want to discourage the client, or imply they can’t pull it off. Talk about the importance of seasonality, and putting a time limit on a goal like getting as lean as possible. Maybe focus on strength for a few months, or endurance, with the understanding they’ll need to be fully nourished to make it work.

And if the client’s only goal is to lose as much fat as possible? Keep the long game in mind. Discuss how to get there as safely as possible, and why it’s important to back off and recover from time to time.

READ ALSO: What Do You Do with a Client Who Wants too Much, too Soon?

Lesson #7: What works for one client won’t work for all your clients

And what works for you might not work for any of them. This is especially true if you’re a true believer in whatever diet happens to be trending at the moment.

I’ve seen this at all levels, from a strength coach who put NFL linemen on strict ketogenic diets to trainers in commercial gyms who pushed their clients to follow their favorite plan. Once a fitness pro decides they’ve found the one true path, they turn into evangelists, trying to convince everyone to use the diet for every goal, and to keep using it indefinitely.

Taken to the most absurd extremes, a client who’s trying to gain muscle might be fasting for much of the day, while someone trying to lose weight is putting butter and coconut oil in his coffee.

Individual needs should come before trends every time. And individual habits, preferences, and circumstances matter more than “this works for some guy on Instagram” or “this should work in theory.”

READ ALSO: 11 Diet and Fitness Trends That Aren’t Actually New

Lesson #8: “Healthy” foods aren’t healthy for everyone

You already know that lots of people have food allergies or sensitivities, and not just to peanuts or gluten or dairy. Some are allergic to fruit, red meat, or celery.

Allergies aside, even the healthiest foods aren’t optimal for every client, especially when they’re calorie-dense and easily overconsumed. How they’re prepared also matters. “Superfoods” aren’t quite so super if the dark leafy greens are drenched in high-calorie dressing or the salmon is sautéed and topped with a creamy sauce.

Lesson #9: Take advantage of your client’s strengths

Every single client, whether they’re a gold medalist or someone who’s never been past the front desk of a gym, has at least one superpower.

One of your jobs as a coach is to help them figure out what they’re already good at and put those abilities to use.

Maybe that middle-aged guy is a spreadsheet ninja, and the opportunity to track every bite of food leads to better adherence. Or maybe that mild-mannered accountant loves to get outside and wander around, and you can steer her toward local farmers markets.

Maybe they have the ability to learn, but until they worked with you they were never interested in nutrition. Maybe they struggle with impulse control, but make up for it with a surprising ability to get back on the wagon every time they fall off.

Help your clients recognize their own superpowers, and then put them to use. Celebrate every step forward, no matter how modest.

No, they’ll never be the star of the team. But you can still be their cheerleader.

John Berardi’s latest book is Change Maker: Turn Your Passion for Health and Fitness into a Powerful Purpose and a Wildly Successful Career. A version of this article originally appeared at Precision Nutrition.

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The post Personal Trainer Nutrition Guidance 101 appeared first on The PTDC.

Personal Trainer Nutrition Guidance 101 published first on https://onezeroonesarms.tumblr.com/

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niknaknix · 7 years

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Weight-Loss Rules You'll Love to Follow 1. Eat more often. Out-of-control hunger is a common predictor of overeating—and giving up on any diet. When you go too long without food, your blood sugar drops, your mood and focus plummet, and you often grab the easiest thing you can, which usually isn't healthy. Instead of skipping meals and starving yourself, don't go more than 3-4 hours without eating. This will keep your hunger monster at bay and keep you happy and satisfied on your program. 2. Treat yourself. When you decide that a particular food (or even an entire food group), is off limits for your diet, research shows that we focus on that one food even more than if we simply allowed ourselves permission to eat it from time to time. If you told me I could never eat cookies again, I probably wouldn't be able to stop thinking about how much I like cookies and would feel miserable that I couldn't have them. Since willpoweris in such short supply in humans, there's a really good chance that anyone would cave in eventually—and likely go overboard. So give yourself permission—and make a plan—to make room in your diet for your favorite treats. 3. Stop searching for the best workout. What's the ideal workout for weight loss? The workout you'll actually do—not the one that worked for your friend, or that you heard burned the most calories. Research shows that if you can match the exercise plan to your preference and personality, you'll be more consistent. If you pick what works for others or what you perceive is best despite not enjoying it, you're setting yourself up for failure. When you find something that is fun, who cares how many calories it burns. In the end you'll burn the most calories when you stop making excuses to avoid a workout and actually want to do an activity! 4. Love what you eat. When you eat or drink anything, do so slowly, mindfully and without distraction. By doing so, you'll increase your enjoyment and slow down your eating which will allow you the time to notice when you've had enough. And if it's a treat you're having, you'll feel so much more satisfied even if eating less because you'll have relished every bite, guilt free. 5. Lie around and do nothing. If you've ever stayed awake burning the midnight oil, here's your excuse to shut off the lights: Getting 7-8 hours of sleep every night is essential for weight loss. Individuals who are sleep deprived have higher levels of the hunger hormone ghrelin and lower levels of the fullness hormone leptin, which causes them to eat more calories. Perhaps we should rename beauty sleep to slimming sleep! 6. Don't skip breakfast. Think you'll be saving calories by skipping your morning meal? Think again. After an all-night fast, the best way to jump-start your metabolism is to eat within the first hour of waking. Studies have shown individuals who skip breakfast tend to over-consume at lunchtime or later in the day, offsetting all the calories they saved by skipping breakfast. Even if it's something small, try a quick and healthy morning meal to help set you up for success later in the day. 7. Dig into carbohydrates! Lately, carbs have gotten a bad rap. But not all carbs are created equal. We'd all be better off skimping on the sweets, processed foods and refined flours that make up so many snack foods. Leave those on the grocery shelf! But there's no reason to give up all carbs, especially the whole sources you'll get in healthful fruits, vegetables, beans, legumes, whole grains are dairy products. 8. Go out to eat. One of the first things people are told when losing weight is to cook more at home and stop eating out. This is good advice in general—but you don't have to give up on a fast takeout meal or your favorite restaurant in order to slim down—especially these days when restaurants are creating healthier, lighter fare than ever before, and sharing those nutrition facts on menu boards and their websites. There are loads of ways to enjoy eating out without blowing your diet. Many menus offer lighter options, and good chefs are more than willing to accommodate special requests. Because restaurant portions do tend to be larger than normal, bring a friend. Split an entree to save calories and money. Or, order an appetizer as your main course. 9. Indulge in gourmet delights. If you eat foods you don't enjoy, you'll feel dissatisfied and find yourself searching for more food, even if you aren't hungry. While budgetary constraints are real and you shouldn't spend above your means, you might find that occasionally splurging on high-quality foods (even if the portions are smaller) can really make your food fun and enjoyable. My favorite low-calorie luxury is lobster or Alaskan king crab legs. Or sometimes I opt for the small 4-ounce prime cut of beef because it tastes so much better than 8 ounces of a tougher, inexpensive cut. A few more budget-friendly luxuries might be gourmet coffee and tea or a small bar of rich, dark chocolate. Seek pleasure from your foods as much as your budget allows. 10. Keep your workouts short. If time or boredom are a problem and you find yourself skipping exercise because you just don't have an hour to spare, no worries! Short bouts, as little as 10 minutes at a time, done several times over the course of the day, have similar calorie burning and health benefits as long, sustained sessions. What's more, surveys of the most motivated and successful SparkPeople members found that those who exercised less than 30 minutes a day got better weight loss results than those whose exercise plans called for an hour or more a day. Here's why. 11. Hang with your friends. Having support and camaraderie is a huge help while working on healthy lifestyle changes. Make weight loss a team effort by asking friends with similar goals to work out with you. Rather than go out for meals, cook healthy potluck dinners together. Join a bowling league. Participate in weight-loss forums such as the ones on SparkPeople. You can swap healthy recipes, share success stories and disappointments, and have friends to whom you are accountable and who are also there to cheer you on. 12. Go shopping! If you love to shop or hunt for bargains, then you'll have fun scoring deals on all the gadgets and gear you need to change your lifestyle. If part of your plan is to cook at home more, shop for the kitchen tools you'll need (think slow cooker, griddle pan or blender), fun storage containers, plus an insulated bag for your snacks and lunch. To make your workouts more enjoyable and effective, you can buy some low-cost equipment to help you reach your goals. As you lose weight, you'll notice your clothing getting a bit baggy. Ignite your workout by dressing in great fitting exercise apparel, and show off your toned body in smaller sized clothing. Weight loss isn't a big industry for nothing. If you love to shop, you'll find plenty of opportunities to shop for a good reason. 13. Don't diet. This may be the most important rule of all. "Going on a diet" implies a start and a stop, but that's not how sustainable weight loss is achieved. Diets often slow down your metabolism due to the drastic cut back in calories your body is used to, and many diets that are advertised today are just plain unhealthy. Following rigid plans requires constant willpower, something we know humans have only a short supply of! Change and adjust your lifestyle habits a little at a time and you will lose excess pounds and achieve and maintain the healthy body weight that is right for you. From now on, define the word "diet" as the food plan you use to maintain a healthy body weight, supply you the energy to support your busy lifestyle and keep you well. Sources Dweck, Carol. 2006. Mindset: The New Psychology of Success. New York: Ballantine Books. Psychology Today, "Why Diets Don't Work...And What Does," www.psychologytoday.com, accessed on October 3, 2013. WebMD, "Coping with Excessive Sleepiness: Sleep and Weight Gain," www.webmd.com, accessed on October 3, 2013.

#sparkpeople

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richardshaver1955 · 8 years

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Why you lose motivation and what you can do about it.

Hey guys!

How are you doing? No, really. Honestly.

Are you still staying on track and being consistent with the goals you made for the new year? The truth is, we are most motivated at the start of the year and then that motivation begins to slow down. But why? What happens to that fire and drive? Why does it diminish? Where does it go!!???

Well, today, we’re gonna talk about all that!

Here are some of the main reasons you tend to lose motivation:

#1. You get bored!

Qhen you’re working towards something, which usually takes a lot of determination, time and patience, it may seem like it’s never ending. Day after day, it feels like you’re not even accomplishing anything, even though you’re working SO HARD. And sometimes the tasks may seem mundane and boring. So of COURSE you’re going to lose motivation if you’re bored doing something day in and day out.

What to do about it?

Get creative – have fun! Okay so maybe eating healthy and meal prepping is the most boring task and you dread it every week. So, turn it into something fun! Invite friends over to have a big cook fest! Meal prep with friends and fam, and put on some good music! It’s like social hour while you’re getting your healthy meals prepped for the week. Trust me, it’s a lot more fun when you’re doing it with people you love, rather than alone. Plus, you may even motivate them to eat healthier!

Now, if your workouts seem boring, then maybe it’s time to switch it up. Your workouts SHOULD NOT be boring – they should be fun and you should look forward to them. So, try something new. Try a new fitness class. Workout with a buddy. Or alternate different styles of workouts throughout the week. For example, do Pilates one day, yoga another and weight lifting on other days. Mix things up! It’s all about variety (and that’s also how you get great results!).

#2. Results aren’t happening fast enough!

Okay so maybe you want to lose 5 lbs, or be able to do 30 burpees in a minute (ugh can you imagine!!!) or do 3 unassisted pull ups – all awesome goals! But you didn’t reach your goal in a few days, a week, or even a month. You get upset and you lose motivation. It’s natural to get frustrated and just throw the towel in.

What to do about it?

Know your goal and accept that it’s going to take a long time to reach it. Think about it this way – if it wasn’t tough and grueling, would the end result be worth it? Probably not. When you FINALLY reach your goal, you’ll be even more proud of yourself because you know how much work it took. Set realistic goals and be okay with the fact that it might take a while. Results take time.

#3. You’re not being honest with yourself!

Are you sticking with your plan? Are you staying true to one YOLO meal a week? Or are you sneaking in more YOLOs than you wanted? Are you committed to your workouts? Or are you slacking on a regular basis? A lot of the time, we aren’t seeing results, and therefore lose motivation because we aren’t truly being honest with ourselves and our actions.

What to do about it?

Ensure you get the job done by:

Writing down your to-do list

Journaling your food intake

Make your workouts fun

Being proud of yourself and rewarding yourself for accomplishing your tasks. Maybe even reward yourself by relaxing and watching your fave TV show after your workout. Or having the most rejuvenating bubble bath at the end of the day. Stay true to your goals and your plan. That’s the ONLY way you will see results.

#4. You’re procrastinating!

Oh this is a big one! We are all guilty of it. We want to do something. The drive and desire is there, buttttttt let’s just put it off for a few hours. What if you intended to do your workout at 9am, but decided to meet a friend for breakfast instead. But then after your meal you decide to go shopping, then one thing leads to the next and your workout is missed that day! Okay, one day isn’t the end of the world, but if these habits keep happening, you’ll never reach your goal, right?

What to do about it?

Stay committed. Write down what tasks you need to do that day and make SURE you finish them. Make them a priority. Your friends will understand if you’d rather have lunch than breakfast so you can get your workout in, or if you need to reschedule your shopping date until later. Once you get into the habit of procrastination, it BECOMES a habit! And that’s one you don’t want. Say no to procrastination when the thought creeps up. You’ll be much happier with yourself when you get the job done!

With all that being said, motivation is a mindset. Motivation comes and goes. People rely on motivation and they think they should be motivated all the time and that’s how they will get the job done. But that’s not true. If you only worked out and ate healthy when you were motivated, would you get where you want to be? Probably not. Trust me. Even I have days when I’m not motivated, but I don’t let that stop me. I push myself to get into the office and work because I KNOW that I won’t regret it. And you know what? It’s usually on those unmotivated days when you have the best workout, or do your best work.

Be honest, how are your goals going so far? Let me know in the comments below. Let’s keep each other accountable!

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