Eight strategies for a simple, reasonable (December) diet.
To avoid holiday weight gain or (gasp) even lose weight in December, your weight loss plan must include simplifying your diet choices.
Food marketing researchers say that we are faced with 200 food choices a day. I'm guessing that those choices are doubled in December and the average calorie per choice is probably doubled too. That is too many choices for our will power to withstand, so we will break down and over indulge. The key to weight loss; the key to food sanity; the key to a reasonable December diet is to focus on simplification.
Ask yourself how you can eliminate, what we in Reasonable Diet-land, call moments-of-choice by establishing simple routines.
1. Breakfast
Do you have a simple weekday breakfast routine that works for when you are in weight loss mode? If so, then for this month extend your simple weekday routine to the weekends. For example, eat at home, eat within a half hour of rising and pick from the same select menu that you have on weekday mornings.
2. Lunch
Can you name five to seven weight loss friendly (and convenient) lunch choices? Write them on index cards. Then (just for December) make your lunch choice only from what is on the cards.
3. Dinner
Have a half-hour weekly meeting on Sunday to plan the dinners for the week. Ask all household members to join you with their calendars. At the least, identify which meals will be eaten at home that week, so you can make these weight loss friendly. Divide up the cooking and grocery shopping if possible.
4. Snacks
Pack pre-measured snacks such as almonds, whole-wheat crackers and pretzels in sandwich bags. Buy apples, bananas, grapes and Clementine oranges -- the grab-and-eat fruits. Keep some of these weight loss friendly snacks in the car. This can help eliminate vending machines, which are rarely diet friendly.
5. Liquor
Consider eliminating at-home drinking, if you know that you'll be consuming more at parties. (Did you know that typically, in a month, one bottle of beer or one cup of wine per day equals one pound at the scale? )
6. Workplace eating
Bless the bosses who have put their foot down about workplace eating. (You are brave and noble people.) But for those of you who have coworkers with bring-it-to-the-office-to-get-it-out-of-the-house attitudes, you need to set your own limits. Decide on one of these strategies (1) Eat only food that you have brought. (2) Eat only one small item at a certain time of day.
7. Red-light food
Red light food is diet lingo for food that you can't stop eating. My friend, Jonathan calls cookies his gateway drug. Your red-light food might be nuts, chips or bread with dinner. Consider eliminating it during the month of December. One year I didn't have any sugar from Thanksgiving to New Years Day. Having no desserts really did simplify my life and, believe it or not, there were plenty of tasty treats still available to me.
8. Finally
After choosing your strategies -- honor them. These are just guidelines that you will set in place for one month out of your life. Don't decide and then re-decide. One-time decision making is essential to simplification.
About Author:
Sandra Ahten, a diet and wellness coach, motivation expert extraordinaire, and Reasonable Diet program author transforms her clients from the "I know what to do -- I just don't do it crowd." She conducts a free Reasonable Diet coaching call or gives all of her subscribers a diet-tip booklet, recipe book, (or other motivational gem) every month. www.reasonablediet.com. Sign up for her free newsletter to be eligible.
Disclaimer: All information on this site is provided for informational purposes only! By no means is any
information presented herein intended to substitute for the advice provided to you by any health care or other professional
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