How many times have you ditched your diet thinking, ‘it’s just a pizza slice, it’s not like I’m eating all of it’ and then complain about how you can’t stick to healthy eating? Honestly? We have all been there! It’s not easy giving up your favorite food, especially when it’s right there! Waiting for you to bite.
A healthy lifestyle, on the other hand, has its perks you look good, you feel good and whatnot. The goal isn't to just cut off all junk food in your diet but instead, you’re just going to start prioritizing certain foods over other foods to serve your goals.
The Basics: Know What’s Healthy and What’s Not
First things first, if it is processed, fried, comes from a drive-thru window, a vending machine, bag, or wrapper, nine out of ten times it’s unhealthy and just the kind of food that you need to avoid. Or maybe if it has an ingredient list longer than the end scroll of your favorite movie, it’s probably not good for you. If it started out as real food and then went through fourteen steps to get to the point where you’re about to eat it, it’s definitely not healthy anymore.
Okay then, what’s healthy for you? A healthy diet consists of a combination of minerals, vitamins, proteins, fat, and carbs all in fixed amounts that benefit overall health. Here's a list of edibles that your diet should consist of:
- Vegetables: These should play a fundamental role in most meals. They are low in calories yet full of important micronutrients and fiber.
- Fruits: A naturally sweet treat, fruit provides micronutrients and antioxidants that can help improve health.
- Meat and fish: Meat and fish have been the major sources of protein throughout evolution. They are a staple in the human diet, although vegetarian and vegan diets have become popular as well.
- Nuts and seeds: These are one of the best fat sources available and also contain important micronutrients.
- Eggs: Considered one of the healthiest foods on the planet, whole eggs pack a powerful combination of protein, beneficial fats, and micronutrients
- Dairy: Dairy products such as natural yogurt and milk are convenient, low-cost sources of protein and calcium.
- Healthy starches: For those who aren't on a low-carb diet, whole food starchy foods like potatoes, quinoa are healthy and nutritious.
- Beans and legumes: These are fantastic sources of fiber, protein, and micronutrients.
- Beverages: Water should make up the majority of your fluid intake, along with fresh juices, coffee, and tea.
- Herbs and spices: These are often very high in nutrients and beneficial plant compounds.
Portion Control: Why Is It Important?
Whether you want to lose a few pounds or just maintain a healthy weight, eating proper portions is as important as eating the right food.
Your calorie intake is a key factor in weight control and health. By controlling your portions, you are more likely to avoid consuming too many calories. While whole foods are certainly a lot harder to overeat than processed foods, they can still be eaten in excess. If you are overweight or trying to lose body fat, it's particularly important to monitor your portion size.
Quick tip: you can use smaller plates and take a smaller-than-average first serving of whatever you eat.
The hassle of managing portion size has been dealt with by meal services like Activeats, which allow you to browse through a number of tailor-made healthy meals for all kinds of diets. Fresh, healthy and wholesome food could be easily delivered right at your doorsteps, what a time to be alive!
Does Having Cheat Days Hurt?
Having one cheat day a week doesn’t harm much, but it’s a noticeable trend that the cheat day usually gets prolonged to cheat days and you find yourself helplessly wasting away all the previous effort you put in by eating healthy. In order to balance the two, there’s a simple rule that you need to follow: Whenever you eat an unhealthy meal, workout harder to burn it off to maintain the calorie deficit.
Tips and Tricks To Stick To A Healthy Diet:
1) Know your motivation: When you have a powerful motivation, it’s easier to be strong when you’d otherwise cave in.
2) Take gradual steps: You don’t have to overhaul your diet overnight. Changing your diet in small steps makes it much easier to stick with a healthy diet.
3) Don't have an ‘all or nothing’ approach: A major roadblock to achieving a healthy diet and lifestyle is black-and-white thinking. Even if you had a few unhealthy appetizers at a party, it doesn't mean your diet is ruined for the day.
4) Exercise is a must: Working out and following a healthy lifestyle go hand in hand, when you make both dietary and physical activity changes at the same time, the results tend to positively reinforce each other.
5) Have realistic expectations: Expecting too much out of merely a diet doesn’t do any good. You can’t magically get six pack abs by eating clean for a month so it’s important to set attainable and realistic goals and expectations.
6) Don’t starve yourself: You only want to cut a moderate number of calories from your diet, so if you starve yourself, you’ll lose muscle, you’ll get unhealthy and you’ll end up falling off the diet eventually.
7) Be patient with yourself: You need to keep in mind that results don’t just start appearing out of nowhere. It takes time, so you need to keep calm and monitor your progress as you work your way through.
8) If you indulge, burn it off: Sometimes, we all cave in and that's fine. Don't beat yourself up about it. Just get back on the wagon, back on track. Look at it as a small bump in the road. And better yet, get outside and burn off the calories by running, working out, cardio, etc.
9) Carry healthy snacks: If you get hungry on the go, you may end up grabbing whatever is available, so it is important to carry healthy snacks while you are out.
10) Eat small portions: If you divide several small portions over the course of a couple of hours, you’ll feel satisfied but never take in too much.
Breaking your habits and improving your diet is never easy and sticking to it is even harder, but if you are consistent and you don’t give up quick, the results make it worth the struggle.
