5 Strategies For Long-Term Healthy Eating
Despite misinformation and conflicting opinions, most people intuitively understand “eating right.” It’s pretty simple: reasonable calories, get enough protein & fiber, and focus on more filling foods (example: 400 calories of chicken and carrots will be far more filling than 400 calories of chocolate croissant.) We can split hairs over meal frequency, alkaline water, etc, but no matter how you split the hair, the basics are still pretty simple.
If we basically know what to do, then why is it still so hard to eat right consistently? One answer is that simple is not the same as easy, and that hard things, are, well, hard things to get done. Another answer is that our willpower and self-control could use a little guidance or strategy to turn what we know into what we do.
1. Beliefs matter For Long-Term Healthy Eating:
Many influential people, who should know better, have spent time and energy promoting negative beliefs about willpower and self-control. These negative beliefs can be summarized as “ego depletion.” Ego depletion says self-control is scarce resource that needs to be conserved… in other words, if you exercise too much discipline or self-control, then you’ll run out and lose all self-control, becoming powerless to resist any temptation. This is not true, and this belief turns out to be very important.
In short, “reduced self-control after a depleting task or during demanding periods may reflect people’s beliefs about the availability of willpower rather than true resource depletion.” [Source]. So, at the very least, we all have far more self-control than we’d like to be true, and, it may be a resource that is effectively unlimited.
2. The 20 Second Rule:
Shawn Achor’s “20 second rule” is a simple and smart idea about putting friction or space between you and negative habits, and removing friction or space between you and positive habits.
For example, I love ice cream. If I buy ice cream on Sunday thinking I’ll eat it Friday night, I know that it’ll be gone by Monday (Tuesday at the latest). This is because keeping ice cream in my freezer eliminates the activation energy necessary to eat ice cream – I don’t even need to wear pants to enjoy.
However, if I leave the ice cream at the store, then ice cream becomes hard work. I would have to put on pants, walk or drive to the store, pick out the ice cream (and hope no clients see me in the store!), wait in line, and then get back home. At the same time, I also make sure that I always have plain Greek yogurt and frozen berries on hand. Now the yogurt and berries is the easy (even if less pleasurable) choice.
3. Rethink failure:
Everything you want is on the other side of failure. In other words, you will never acquire, be or do anything you want without failing. Even self-esteem and happiness are on the other side of failure, and yet, today, we are too often told that we need to avoid failing (or feeling bad) as if it were a plague. I will spoil the surprise for you: you will alternate success and failure in nutrition for as long as your work on your nutrition. With effort and time you can increase your ratio of successes to failures… in other words, it never really gets easy, but you get more skilled, but also, you never get perfect.
4. Have a “back up meal” in the freezer For Long-Term Healthy Eating:
In Gestalt they have a saying, “you can’t stop the rain, but you can choose to get wet.” In other words, if you don’t carry an umbrella you have chosen to get rained on. Sometimes events beyond your control will conspire to keep you from doing your normal grocery shopping or meal prep. You can’t control the world, but you can have some “back up” meals in the freezer.
Why the freezer? Because fresh food stays safe to eat for a long time in the freezer, and requires only reheating to be ready to go. Additionally, the freezer only requires temperature to preserve your food vs lots of added salt, sugar, etc.
One of the simplest ways to keep some back up meals in stock is to make and extra serving or two at your next meal prep, and squirrel that away in the freezer. Here’s one of my favorites for the freezer because you can make a lot at once without much additional effort and the freezer doesn’t ruin the texture.
5. Consistent exercise:
Yes, this is relevant to your diet. Consistently exercising at least 3 days per week is actually one of the most powerful strategies for cleaning up your diet and being consistent with your own long-term healthy eating habits. This is because exercise is what behavioral researchers call a keystone habit. Keystone habits create a positive chain reaction in the rest of your life because they generate positive momentum, increase self-discipline (as a mental resource), energy and confidence.
When you work at establishing a regular exercise habit you will find that you eat better, spend your money more wisely, and are nicer to the people in your life. Regular exercise gives you the internal resources to do everything else.
We hope these 5 Strategies For Long-Term Healthy Eating give you long-term success!
True 180 Personal Training for Women has been serving the Ballantyne community since 2016. We’re the go-to studio for South Charlotte women. who want real personalized coaching and accountability, not just a room full of equipment and a self-checkout membership.
Coach Josef Brandenburg — ACE | NASM | Precision Nutrition | Training Peri and Menopausal Women |Functional Kettlebell Training | 28 years coaching | Specializes in strength training for women over 40.
Josef Brandenburg, best selling author, is the co-owner and a coach at True 180 Personal Training, Charlotte’s most effective personal training studio for women since 2016. With decades of experience and multiple certifications, he shares his research with you!