In my last blog post, Exercise Motivation:Tips to Stay Consistent, I reviewed some tips to help you stay on the right track with your exercise routine. Today, I am focusing on what you eat. Healthy eating is another integral part of the Healthy Trinity.

Here are valuable tips to help you maintain healthy eating:

1) Be flexible with your diet. Everyone is allowed to eat dessert and a piece of pizza once in a while. The problem comes when you are eating too much of it. Binge eating a pint of Chunky Monkey in one sitting will ruin your goals for the whole week. Give yourself a couple of days where you will have dessert or junk food. It will help if you plan ahead exactly what type of food it will be and how much of it. That leads us to our next item…

2) Plan your meals. This only takes a few minutes a week but is incredibly valuable. It will help you stay organized and, if you have an eating plan, you are less likely improvise and eat something unhealthy. Meal planning also helps a lot with food shopping. Have you ever gone shopping without a list? You end up getting whatever looks good as you are browsing the aisles and that is usually junk food. There are many apps to assist you with meal planning.

3) Don’t keep junk food in the house. If it is there you will eat it. If there is a food you feel bad about eating in your house get rid of it.

4) Monitor what you eat in writing. If you are really serious about healthy eating, you will write down exactly what you are eating. Sometimes, we forget exactly what we have consumed in a day. Putting it on paper makes it real and alerts you to when you might be eating too much or consuming the wrong types of food. Once again, there are many apps to help you.

5) Do not count calories.  Counting calories may help you lose weight but that is not the primary goal.  Remember, the goal is healthy eating. You can eat ten potato chips for each meal and probably lose weight, but that is not healthy. Focusing too much on calorie intake may distract you from being healthy.  For example, nuts and avocados have a lot of calories.  If you are overly focused on calorie intake you would likely not eat them.  Those foods have a lot of great nutrients for our bodies.  A healthy person wants to eat them to get those nutrients, even if they are high in fat and calories.

6) Tell your friends and family you are trying to eat healthier. They will help hold you accountable for your behavior. Personally, I’m less likely to order that huge piece of cheesecake if the person next to me knows I’m trying to eat healthy. The guilt alone might be deter you from making a poor decision.

7) Take your time eating. This is my personal downfall. If you eat quickly you are more likely to eat larger portions. This is because it takes your body about 20 minutes to register what you just ate. If I eat too fast I am going to eat more because my body does not yet know that I am full. I’m not saying you have to chew each piece of food 20 times, but try to slow it down. Portion control is a key to healthy eating and is hard to achieve if you eat quickly. Keeping with that theme…

8) Be mindful when you eat. We tend to eat more when distracted. It is better to eat meals without the TV, phone, etc. Someone might eat one serving size of Doritos if they are paying attention. When distracted, it might balloon to three. In addition, food is much more enjoyable when you actually pay attention and taste it. Mindful eating is all about paying attention to your senses while you eat. What does your food smell like, feel like, etc.?

8) Avoid drinking too much alcohol or using marijuana. Alcohol disinhibits our behavior and can affect our judgment. When sober we tend to make better choices.  For instance, If you live in Rochester, N.Y., that “garbage plate” from Nick Tahou’s sounds good after a night of drinking but you probably would not touch it if you were sober. In addition, using marijuana gives you the “munchies”, which is the opposite of healthy eating. Let’s face it, there are not many people who regularly drink alcohol or use marijuana that eat healthily.

9) Eat out less. You can’t control what is in your food when you go to a restaurant. Big chain restaurants are now supposed to give you nutrition information for their food. Looking at that information can be a dissapointing experience. The amount of fat, sugar, and sodium in these meals is unbelievable. Non-chain restaurants don”t need to give you that information so you have no idea what is in there. Also, many restaurants are giving you more than the recommended portion size. If you finish an entrée at The Cheesecake Factory, you are probably eating at least 3 times the recommended portion size. Luckily, restaurants are catching on with America’s desire to eat healthier. There are definitely healthy options out there if you look for them.

10) Avoid most processed food. Processed foods are usually high in sugar, sodium, and artificial ingredients. Processed foods also don’t have the fiber you find in “real” food. I’m not saying all processed food is horrible but look at the box before you buy it. Which leads to….

11) Look at the nutrition information. Most people do not check the labels when they buy food. Some foods that you may think are good for you are actually unhealthy. For example, pressed juices are all the rage now. Most pressed juices possess good ingredients but they also have some hidden pitfalls. A lot of these juices have incredible amounts of sugar in them, many over 20 grams in one serving. They also do not have the fiber that makes produce so good for you. In general, when looking at nutritional information, there are two things to look at: 1) does this product have excessive sodium, artificial fat, and sugar? 2) avoid ingredients you can’t understand; they are most likely chemicals.

Regularly consuming food that is good for you requires lifestyle choices that may take time to carry out. These tips are a good first step on the road to healthy eating.