Why is eating healthy so confusing? Think about how many polar-opposite dieting facts you’ve heard of in your lifetime.
Here are a few that came to my mind…
1) Eat eggs. No, don’t eat eggs. Nevermind, you can now eat them.
2) Eat fat. No, wait… fat is bad! Hold up, eat healthy fat and not bad fat.
3) Eat meat. Hold on, only eat lean meat. Actually eat any meat you want but make sure it’s pasture raised.
4) Eat fish. Don’t eat fish because of mercury. Eat wild fish… or maybe farmed.
5) Sugar is fine. Wait, no it’s not… try one of these sugar alternatives instead (like aspartame). Oh wait… maybe not aspartame!
Seriously. It’s confusing for me sometimes and I work in this industry every single day.
A long time ago I realized that my clients wanted to feel better, look better, and in some ways be informed about how food affected their goals.
I started out by trying to inform my clients of every single statistical fact, but I could see their eyes glaze over in boredom as I bestowed my gift of reciting dietary studies.
It finally hit me… people just want a few rules to live by when it comes to food.
Yes, some people want a detailed menu or require an intense nutrition program, but most of us… well a few good rules that we can understand and follow is exactly what we want.
So allow me to distill all my knowledge down into 3 main food rules for overall health and fitness.
1) Drink clean water often. A rough guide is to drink half your body weight. So if you weigh 200 pounds then consume around 100 ounces of water per day.
2) Eat more vegetables. Every single nutritionist, dietitian, fitness trainer, doctor, etc. will advise this. It must have some merit to have so many professionals actually agreeing on something. Fresh or frozen is fine… the goal is to eat more veggies. Add spinach to your morning scrambled eggs. Try cauliflower crust pizza! Just eat more vegetables.
3) Reduce or eliminate sugar. Sugar is in pretty much anything prepared or boxed. This rule can be the hardest for people to follow because sugar is quite addicting. Yes, I said addicting. Start by keeping a food journal of what you eat every single day. At the end of each day circle anything that has sugar in it (read the labels!). Then after a week… count the amount of circles you have and aim to eat less the following week.
Can food be confusing? YES!
But for most of us… following these simple rules can have a big impact on our weight loss goals as well as our overall health.
Schedule your free 30-minute consultation with me. We’ll work out a plan to reach your goals and ensure that you’re focusing on what matters and leaving the rest of the confusing stuff behind.
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