We all know that we want to eat healthily but what exactly does that look like.  Eating a balanced diet is key to health in food. You want to eat healthy protein, carbs, and fat in a good proportion. In general, you want to fill half your plate with fruits or veggies and divide the other half with grains and protein.

Include a protein, fat, and a carb in your meals

• Protein: Easy protein sources usually include lean meats, and eggs.
• Fat: Choose fats that are also healthy for you and don’t contribute to inflammation. Fats like avocados, olive oil, coconut oil, and butter from grass-fed cows. Nuts and seeds are also great sources of fat.  Eating a little fat with your veggies actually helps your body to absorb the nutrients and process the veggies better.
• Carbs: The struggle that most of us face is that we generally consume an imbalanced amount of carbs in our diet. Meaning we consume too much.  This isn’t usually because we are eating too many fruits and veggies. 🙂 Try to get your carbs from vegetables or fruits or whole grains in your meals. When choosing carbs try to balance out the grams of carbs and protein in your meal. This is important because when pairing protein with carbs it helps curb cravings and keeps you full longer. It also keeps your blood sugar from spiking and falling, which is important because if we can keep our blood sugar fairly stable then we regulate our hormones better and decrease the cravings for simple carbs.
  • When choosing Grains opt for whole wheat, brown rice, or oats. Skip out on white flour and sugary foods.

Choose foods that nourish you!

Most food will either fall into the category of energy dense and nutrient low, or nutrient high and energy low. You nutrient high foods are things that are super nutritious but don’t necessarily have a lot of calories.  Energy-dense foods have a lot of calories for how nutritious the food is. For instance, white sugar has no vitamins or minerals. It pretty much is just calories. It provided no nutritional value. Even just switching from white sugar to coconut palm sugar you are getting vitamins and minerals with your calories. So when picking your foods look for things that are dense in nutrition. This is why fruits and veggies are such great choices. They are loaded with whole nutrients and are generally lower caloric. 

Watch portion sizes. 

Most of the time we just eat too much. Try switching out to a smaller plate or when going out to eat asking for the to-go box in advance. You can also measure out the food you will be eating to know in advance how much you should have.  This is the hard part when trying to lose weight but if you fill your plate with lots of vegetables and healthy protein it is easier to eat fewer calories because it fills you up more and gives you the nutrition you need.

Start by looking up one new recipe each week to try and consciously pay attention to how your plate looks at mealtimes.

Plan your meals.

Whether you use a meal planner program like this one, write it out in your personal planner, or display it on a chalk board meal planning and prepping ahead of the time in the kitchen can be a game changer. This is especially helpful if tend to grab whatever is easy when you are hungry. If healthy food is already prepped, then it becomes the easy thing to grab. Win, win!

Other Posts in Our Healthy Habits Series:

• Sleep
• Addressing Emotional Eating
• Controlling our blood sugar.
• Ditching the junk in our foods
• Proportionate meals
• Discover a type of movement that inspires and invigorates us
• Make exercise a daily ritual
• Managing time to feel and be productive
• Take an inventory of my emotional health
• Time management
• Positive self-talk
• Addressing Food Addiction
• Addressing Leptin Resistance

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