Have you ever been in a situation where you had so much passion and energy when you conceived an idea, but you couldn’t keep up again after giving the idea a shot? Have you ever tried to change the way you nourish yourself? Maybe you’ve even tried several times to embrace the healthy eating habit, but you find yourself crashing out, you find yourself craving for the unhealthy food, weeks or months after your decision.
You’re probably about to give up and live your life without focusing on healthy food and its benefits. The decision to eat healthy is a very crucial one, most people have tried several times to cultivate healthy eating habit, but they couldn’t get through with the plan mostly because they started on a wrong foot.
In most cases, newbies crash out of the healthy eating plan weeks into it due to inadequate information about what healthy eating entails. The good news is that, you can actually succeed with your decision of eating healthy, provided you get it right from the start, and that is exactly what I will be sharing with you in this post. I would show you practical ways on how to start eating healthy and what your preparation must cover as a healthy eater.
1. Psychology of Healthy Eating:
Your decision to start eating healthy must be settled mentally before you start making physical progress. And one of the crucial questions you should ask yourself is why you’re doing this is the first instance; “Why am I willing to start eating healthy?”
To most people, the answer is always very obvious, some decide to start eating healthy because they would like to shed some few pounds of body weight so as to look good for summer, some make their decision mainly because healthy eating is currently healthy.
The truth is this; healthy eating is a sub-section of a healthy lifestyle. And when we call it lifestyle, it means it’s a complete way of life! It’s not just what you do for few months and abandon; it’s what you keep doing until your last breath.
Because it’s a life-time decision, your reason for adopting this healthy eating lifestyle must be strong enough to keep you in-track for the rest of your life.
So if you’re doing this because of a perfect summer bikini body, you might crash out before you know it. Why not think about healthy eating as a way of staying healthy? And save money by keeping the doctor away?
Your psychology about this lifestyle matters a lot, and you should settle it before you move on to the next step.
ACTION PLAN: Get a clean sheet and write out your reasons for adopting a healthy eating lifestyle. Stick your reasons and goals on your kitchen wall or on your refrigerator. It’s a good starting point, as you can always re-read them whenever you feel like giving up on your plan.
2. Buy Necessary Materials
Eating healthy means you would have to start preparing your meal at home, as a result of this, you would need to get yourself some kitchen utensils. Depending on your current status; single or you have a family, you can always get the basic item and buy more as you progress.
For a start, you will need two or three cooking pot, frying pan, slow cooker, electric blender and a microwave. These items are not really expensive and you can check them out on Amazon to get a new or used one.
3. Learn How to Prepare Healthy Recipes
The key to healthy eating is creativity. You can make your meal attractive by being creative. It may take some few trials before you get a complete hang of how to prepare healthy meal. But there are great blogs (like this one) with quality information on healthy recipes; most of these blogs share weekly recipes. You can subscribe to their newsletter and have them deliver recipes ideas to your email on weekly basis.
4. Buy in Bulk
Buying your groceries in bulk does not only save cost, it also saves time. Try as much as possible to make a comprehensive list of the items you want to buy before going to the store, be on the lookout for discount sales especially when bulk purchase is involved. You can always store them in your refrigerator until the need to their use arises.
5. Make a Meal Plan
Draw a meal plan and stick to it. Having to think about what to cook all the time might be exhausting or tiring. But once you have a meal plan, you don’t have to undergo any mental stress when it’s time to prepare your dinner or breakfast, all you have to do is check your meal plan and commence your cooking.
There are various resources on the internet with detailed instruction on preparing a healthy meal plan, you can read this and this for more information on preparing a healthy meal plan.
6. Cook and Preserve
Thank God for inventions like microwave and refrigerators, it has never been easier to cook and preserve you meal for days. If you fall into the busy people category, this is a very good tip on healthy eating. All you have to do is prepare your dish during weekend and freeze them; you can always microwave them for breakfast or lunch.
7. Be Conscious Of Your Decision
Transitioning from unhealthy lifestyle to a healthy one might take some time and a bit of work to get your brain around your newly adopted lifestyle. But being conscious of your decision to eat healthy would help you navigate the hard times.
Try as much as possible to always remind yourself that you’re now eating healthy, and stay away from things that might be tempting. For example, avoid meeting people in restaurants.
8. Pack Your Lunch/Snacks
Packing your own lunch before leaving for work or school goes a long way in keeping you away from eating junks. Before you leave your house, prepare your healthy lunch (it might even be left-over from your breakfast), put them in your lunch box and add two varieties of fruits. You can always find solace in your own meal when the hunger pang begins; it’s healthier than finding solace in pizza and other unhealthy junks.
9. Get Help
The best way to stick to your healthy eating decision is by seeking advice from those that have gone ahead of you. The good thing is that, there are numerous resources on eating healthy online, most of which are free guides. Blogs like this share posts on healthy eating tips and healthy lifestyle in general. You can join healthy living forum and ask questions, make use of subreddit on healthy eating to gather more knowledge about what healthy eating entails.
10. Drink More Water
The importance of water cannot be overemphasized. The good thing about drinking water is that, you don’t have to be hungry to drink water, but when you drink more water, your bowel functions very well, and your kidney gets to filter and absorb the nutrient required by your body in appropriate proportion.
11. Use Your Smartphone Smartly
It’s technology age, and the rate at which smart technology is being incorporated into our life is a little bit overwhelming. There is always an app for everything. Visit the Google Play store (for android users) or Apple Store (for iOS users) and download apps that would help in planning and keeping record of your progress.
Use your Smartphone to aggregate news and articles that has to do with healthy eating.
