9 Ways to clean up your diet and start seeing results
It seems like a lifetime ago when you set those new years’ resolutions and the new healthy lifestyle goals. How’s that going? Feel good? Have you lost some weight? Started a new diet and feeling the benefits? No? You must be doing something wrong – are you eating clean? Are you sick of being told you should eat clean? What does that even mean?
Eating clean usually refers to cutting out processed foods, eating more vegetables, organic produce, limiting fast food intake, five a day and so on. For the many that follow this advice can lead to great health benefits, but for others, can lead to:
1) Frustration
2) Time wasting
3) Poor results
4) Wasting money
5) Damaging your gut microbiome
6) Slowing down your metabolism via crash diets and calorie counting
7) Further health and energy issues
8) Sleep issues
9) Yo yo dieting
10) Low motivation – decision fatigue
Problems can be heightened significantly if you have an underlining health problem that hasn’t been investigated and treated holistically such as gut permeability issues (leaky gut), bacterial overgrowth, hormone deficiencies and chronic fatigue.
Clean Eating Rules:
DON’T FOLLOW THE CROWD. Following your best friends diet, Instagram model or celeb diet can do more harm than good. You may get some short term results, but if the diet isn't right for you, your body and mind will suffer. Remember, your biology is UNIQUE to YOU your LIFESTYLE and your STRESS levels.
BE PRESENT. Notice how you feel. Do you feel energised, tired, bloated, hungry? Your body gives you signals, but you have to be present to dial into them. We are often eating while reading emails, watching TV, browsing social media that we miss these subtle signs. Notice how you feel after an hour of eating your food and write it down.
REMOVE KRYPTONITE FOODS. These foods are secretly damaging your body and holding you back from your goals, I have had many clients that have been eating food that they believe is healthy, but to their biology creates an inflammatory response. Keep a food diary and note what foods you are consuming over the week. It's easy to remove foods and add them back into your diet once you know they are not causing a problem. I like to run food intolerance tests to add to the bigger deeper picture.
MAKE SMALL CHANGES. Making small changes to your diet are going to help you to be consistent. Trying to change everything in one go takes willpower, so be kind to your self. Think about the long term, not just the short term. You want to be able to maintain your nutrition sustainably, not have a fad diet that you have to have extreme will power to stick too.
FIND YOUR FOOD SOURCES. When you are working away, you need to be able to find the sources of foods that feed your biology. Don’t follow a diet that restricts what you can only eat if you are at home. You need to be able to utilize the same food sources when you are away, so do some research on where you will be staying and when possible prep your snacks and meals.
TAKE WILL POWER OUT OF THE EQUATION. If you have to think about your food and where it is coming from you are more likely to eat something that was unplanned. Plan your meals for the week so that when you are tired or hungry, you don’t have to think about what you are going to eat you know exactly what you have and what you will prepare for each day. Decision fatigue, especially for busy professionals, can create havoc with clean eating.
BE CONSISTENT. If you want to see long term results you have to be consistent. It's very easy to “yo-yo” diet but stick to a plan for at least six weeks before you decide it's not right.
TAKE CONTROL – STOP GUESSING. Dig deep using science to investigate what is right for YOU. Lab testing can take away all the frustration from guessing and dial in on what foods and supplements your biology require. It can also open the door to finding out what is holding you back. For more information on testing or if you would like a free health questionnaire to see what areas can be improved get in touch.
STOP MAKING EXCUSES. Small steps can make a huge impact on your overall health and wellbeing; you just have to be consistent and mindful of your body and lifestyle. I call this process “Stacking”. If you make consistent changes to your lifestyle and diet, you will see the impact. If you have an excuse ask yourself “Ok, what can I do to get around this?”
Mark – Functional Diagnostic Nutrition Practitioner and Bulletproof High-Performance Coach
FREE 30 min Skype health assessments available - PM for details.
www.bperformance.co.uk
LIFE DOESN’T GET EASIER OR MORE FORGIVING – WE GET STRONGER AND MORE RESILIENT
