If you struggle to eat healthy and have asked yourself “What
diet should I be on?” It would be more appropriate to ask yourself
“Why do I make poor food choices?”
People generally know that it is healthier to eat a yummy apple than a crispy crème. Despite this fact, many struggle to make the correct choices when it comes to nutrition. Why?
Here are some of the reasons:
Poor sleep habits: sleep is one of the PRIMARY regulators of appetite. If you don’t recharge yourself sufficiently through sleep, then your body will try and make up the deficit by making you grab quick energy sources (.i.e. sugar, coffee, white flour and alcohol). 8 hours a night is good. 9 hours is even better.
Social: Food and drink are at the center of many social situations. It’s a big reason why some people lose discipline. Remember you don’t need to eat or drink in excess to have fun. Learning to establish stronger personal boundaries and speak your needs is key in these situations.
Emotional Eating/Addiction: Food is a very common way of coping with emotional stress. Having some mindful skills to control your pleasure seeking impulses or getting help to deal with intense emotional stress is essential with this issue.
Misinformation: if you see a piece of crap with the labels “low fat”, “cholesterol free” and “natural” it’s still just a piece of crap. Unfortunately, clever marketing rules the food industry and still manages to convince many that eating crap is somehow healthy.
Poor Body Awareness: your body is always sending you feedback. Start paying closer attention to how your body responds to certain foods/diets and learn to listen. It will never steer you wrong. Learning to meditate on the more subtle body sensations to discern the various impulses that drive poor food choices is of immense value here.
Overworking: There was a time I would work 12 hours on one specific day of the week. At the end of that day, it would be SO EASY for me to plow down on a container of haagen dazs. By forcing my body to do more than it could I was creating huge energy deficit that had to be made up for. No dietary changes were ever going to work until I cut back on my hours.
All of these things have on thing in common. They require you to recognize and manage a separate lifestyle situation FIRST, in order for any following dietary change to be lasting and effective.
What scenario fits you best? If you have been struggling to make healthy eating stick, come at it from another angle and start with managing the scenario that causes you to make the poor food choice in the first place. It takes time but can be quite effective.