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Healthy Eating – Keep it interesting
While keeping it simple is key to sticking with a diet and creating healthy habits, keeping things interesting is key to healthy eating longevity.
If you get bored, you are going to give up or give in to temptation.
So while I like to get the same basic groceries week in and week out and I like to make the same basic recipes over and over again, I DO make sure to change things up.
And one of my favorite ways to change thing up is by using new tools!
I love getting a food processor or blender, or pressure cooker…And learning how to use a new tool and create even more delicious meals. (I also love getting new tools so Ryan can create even more delicious meals while I chatter away to him and simply enjoy.)
For our wedding, we asked for a couple of different things….
- A cast iron stove-top reversible grill/griddle
- Pressure cooker
- Yonanas
Today we used the grill/griddle to make some delicious burgers. It’s crazy how burgers can taste so different just by changing the way you cook them!
I can’t wait to try the pressure cooker and yonanas this weekend!
While I’m not a fan of paleo baked goods or any of that crap, I am in favor of truly healthy SIMPLE treats…like frozen fruit that is made into a frozen yogurt like substance.
So now my question to all of you on this wonderful Friday is…Do you own any of the tools I listed above? And if so, what are your favorite recipes to make using them!?! Or do you have other tools that you love to use?
Stay tuned for some cool new recipes!!! YUM!
When Healthy Living Becomes Obsession
In clients I deal with two very different issues almost every day –
1. The people who can’t get started and make excuses as to why they can’t create a healthy lifestyle.
OR
2. The people who become OBSESSED with eating well and working out every day to the point that they almost can’t take a day off.
And trust me, neither is really HEALTHY.
When I say OBSESSED, I’m talking about mentally and physically overtraining. I’m talking about never giving yourself a break and doing as much as you possibly can every single day with no break.
I’m talking about training way too often for way too long because you feel like you NEED to do a certain amount each day.
I’m talking about never letting yourself indulge in a treat and/or restricting your calories as low as possible to force weight loss.
I’m talking about the MORE IS MORE ATTITUDE when as I’ve stated numerous times recently MORE IS ACTUALLY LESS.
Yes, it can be good for periods to do MORE, but those periods should all have an expiration date and be used to KICKSTART your program or break a plateau.
You simply shouldn’t workout every day.
RECOVERY IS WHEN YOU REBUILD! Days off are KEY TO GETTING RESULTS.
When you don’t take days off, you are basically hindering yourself from getting the results that you should be getting from your workouts.
And two a days?!?!
While as I said, I can see using them for a few weeks to create big changes, they shouldn’t be used in the long run!
Exercise breaks down our body. We only regrow stronger with more muscle and lean body mass if our body has the change to RECOVER.
So while going hard for a few days, a few weeks, can be a great push in the right direction, YOU CAN’T MAINTAIN IT!
Going that hard leads ultimately to you falling off your program – either due to injury or due to the fact that you’ve created something that is truly unmanageable long-term.
Same goes for obsessing over eating cleanly.
I won’t go into a whole rant here, as I already have numerous times recently, but IF YOU RESTRICT YOUR CALORIES TOO MUCH YOU WILL COMPLETELY STALL YOUR WEIGHT LOSS!
Not to mention you will PREVENT LEAN MASS GAINS! Aka…all those workouts will be for nothing because you aren’t fueling them properly.
Plus, most people can’t eat 100% clean day in and day out without it eventually leading to a complete, uncontrolled binge, which in turn leads to them giving up on their healthy eating program all together. We just don’t have that much self-control especially with all the other life stressors we have to deal with each day.
Just think about how much self-control you are expending by trying to go so intense and PERFECT your diet and exercise program. Self-control isn’t infinite. And trying to control ever last detail is STRESSFUL!
Think about how much you STRESS over not missing a workout. Over eating cleanly even when there is no healthy food around.
STRESS can negatively impact our progress. It can negatively impact our healthy. Heck if you are trying to lose weight, STRESS can prevent you from getting the results you are working so hard for!
Geez…Cut yourself some slack, people!
I know many of you don’t want to believe it, but LESS IS MORE. Working out every day and eating 100% clean really aren’t going to get you greater results.
Actually they may get you WORSE RESULTS.
So stop obsessing.
Don’t stress over miss workouts.
Don’t stress over a treat.
STOP OBSESSING and try ENJOYING.
Seriously, stop bragging about how you workout EVERY DAY. Or do two-a-days. Stop bragging about how you don’t eat ANYTHING BAD EVER.
There is no pride in being stupid and wasting your time!
Trust me…I want people to get results and if I’m saying there is such a thing as too much…THERE IS!
A quick guide to healthy eating
So a huge part of being healthy, looking great, feeling great and performing well is eating the RIGHT foods.
If you don’t fuel properly, your body isn’t going to run properly – it’s as simple as that.
And while I’m most definitely not a car aficionado (and I’m sure anyone who really knows anything about cars will roll their eyes at how I use the analogy) I do believe that one of the best ways to describe eating healthily is by comparing it to fueling a car.
If you use bad fuel, your car won’t run properly. You will get bad gas mileage and your car will probably break down. However, if you give your car the proper fuel, your car will run great and you most likely won’t have near as many problems with it.
Same goes for your body…Eat crap food and your body will run, but not near as well as it could. Eat healthy food and you will be able to perform a lot better (not to mention you will FEEL a lot better!).
And you may be thinking right now…I haven’t had problems so why should I change my diet.
Let me just say this..Just because you aren’t having problems doesn’t mean your body feels or functions as well as it could.
You might not even realize you aren’t running as well as you could until you fuel properly and see just how great your “mileage” could actually be. And once you do fuel properly, trust me, you won’t want to go back!
Ok so let’s say you buy it and know that you need to fuel properly.
How do you then decide what you should eat?
I live by these two simple rules:
- Eat whole, natural foods – Foods raised or grown in the way they should be. Cage-free chickens, grass-fed beef. Organic fruits and veggies. Unprocessed. Local. Seasonal.
- Eat as little processed food as possible – There is a spectrum of processed. From a veggie you can pick and eat right of the ground to a Twinkie which is so processed it will never ever go bad and doesn’t contain even one ingredient that you can even pronounce. If something lasts longer than it should, like the difference between freshly home-made bread and store bought bread that last years, you know that it is highly processed. Your goal is to eat as much as you can from the unprocessed to only slightly processed side while still occasionally indulging in deliciousness from the processed side.
On the image below that sums up this post, you will see that I break down foods with the best options in green and the worst in red. There are a lot of different levels of processing…To keep it simple, I’ve broken it down into four different levels. If you follow the two rules above, the majority of your diet will come from the green list (which is by no means all-inclusive) with some of your daily foods coming from the yellow list. You will also occasionally indulge in foods from both the orange and red lists, which are more highly processed foods that contain little to no nutritional value.
Anyway, take a look at the infographic below for a quick guide to healthy eating!
Your guide to fuel your body!
One last Twinkie?
Everyone seems to be talking about the shutdown of Hostess.
Some people worry they will never get another Twinkie while others talk about how this may help the obesity epidemic.
Honestly, I have no desire for a Twinkie AND I don’t believe the shutdown of Hostess will have any effect on our nation’s obesity rate.
It’s the same thing as McDonald’s and other fast food places offering “healthy” foods – If people really want unhealthy food, they will still find a way to get it.
I firmly believe that eating healthy is a CHOICE we can make, no matter our backgrounds or economic status.
If we CHOOSE to eat well, we will buy healthy foods no matter how much money we have or what we ate when we were little.
People claim that if there are more healthy options available then people won’t choose the crap.
I completely disagree. There are healthy options out there. They are pretty easily available – even markets like Walmart now have local, organic produce.
PEOPLE STILL DECIDE TO EAT CRAP!
It is PEOPLE that aren’t making the healthy decision.
I mean shoot even people I know who haven’t eaten Twinkies in years are getting one because it may be the last!
We are in control. We decide whether or not we are going to eat well.
What do you think?
Man Bicep 