Your Diet Fitness Plan
Achieve a Balanced Healthy Diet!
Start your diet fitness plan today. Learn how to eat a variety of food including the food you love. You can do it.
Ok so you've decided to make some simple changes in your diet? Yes? Just making sure!
Your diet fitness plan will help you to:
Know what you currently eat with a Food Diary.Know what you should be eating in a balanced diet.Make the necessary changes (goals) to make your diet balanced and healthy.Combine your balanced diet with exercise for weight loss.Enter your E-mail Address and First Name below, then click Subscribe to get weekly fitness and nutrition tips and motivational advice:
Yes it can be this easy to improve your diet, but it's still
you that will be making those simple changes.
No one else can do it for you....it's down to you, with some guidance from me of course! Before we get started with the specifics, here are five general tips on eating:
Try and have structured eating times. I know it's hard with busy lifestyles, but the more your body gets used to eating at certain times in the day, the less it will crave food at random times when all you have is a quick junk snack or fast food.Eat breakfast! Yes it IS the most important meal of the day. A healthy fibre rich breakfast will set you up great for the rest of the day.Eat slowly - give your brain time to swallow each bite and process that you've eaten it.Use smaller plates - the plate will still look full and "trick" your brain to thinking you're eating more than you are.Drink water - hunger after a meal could be because you're dehydrated. Also water will make you feel full.Now let's get started with the good stuff, your diet fitness plan!
Food Diary
The scientists (boffs to you and me) say that people who record and monitor what they eat, lose weight. And more importantly I think, you keep the weight off.
You'll have written proof of what you've eaten (no chance to sneak a doughnut and tell yourself it never happened!). And the act of writing it down will give you that second chance to think 'do I really need or want to eat this?'
The best way to do this is to get a standard diary. Make sure it has a good space for each day. Judge it yourself, the more you eat the more space you'll need. But you need to be able to take it everywhere you go. You could get a notebook instead and write the date on each page as you go along.
Record everything and anything you eat or drink throughout the day, and the time you ate it. Write it down in your diary either directly before (for snacks) or directly after (for meals) eating.
Use headings such as Time, Food/Drink (food group), Notes. Use the notes section to record, for example, how full you felt after, or whether you ate for comfort (due to stress) or because you were actually hungry.
I know it sounds tedious carrying a diary everywhere. But it really will make your diet fitness plan work. And once you get used to it then it becomes just as simple as writing a text message.
Balanced Diet
The key to a balanced diet is variety. This is why I said you can still eat the food you love (you may have to cut down on it though). As long as you eat a combination of the other food groups too, and in the correct proportions.
Here are the 5 food groups, with examples and correct proportions (in %) of your overall diet:
Carbohydrates (33%). Examples are bread, cereals, rice, pasta, potatoes, noodles.
Click here for advice on eating more carbs.
Fruit and Vegetables (33%). Examples are any fresh or tinned fruit and vegetables. If tinned make sure they are in natural juice.
Try and have your 5 (portions) a day. These are your main supply of
vitamins, minerals and fibre.
Protein (14%). Examples are any meat, chicken (poultry) or fish products, eggs, beans and nuts.Dairy Foods (14%). Examples are milk, cheese and yoghurt.Fatty Foods (6%). Examples are cooking oils, mayonnaise, butter, margarine, cakes, chocolate, crisps, sugar, biscuits, soft drinks.
Click here to eat less fat.
Click here to eat less sugar and salt.
Your Goals for a Healthy Diet
Now you know what you're eating, and what you should be eating and in what proportions, you can make the necessary changes. It may sound tricky, but when you have it all written in your food diary it's not so bad.
Your food diary will be unique to you, so make sure the changes you make are according to that.
Don't try and make all the changes at once. It's best to change one thing at a time and keep your food diary going.
Change one thing (i.e. eat more fruit), until you're used to it and it is the healthy proportion your diet needs. Then make the next change. Keep going until your food diary shows that you are eating a healthy balanced diet.
You'll get used to eating these new proportions of each food group. I know you will because you will feel the change in your body. You will feel healthy. It is truly uplifting. A sense of achievement that will keep your diet healthy.
After a while of using a food diary, you'll find that you're so into your eating routine, you may not need it anymore. This is great. But if you ever see your eating habits changing due to any reason, then start up the diary again, even if it's only for a month.
Final WordPlease don't get lost in this whole process. Remember to enjoy your food. If you eat a variety of foods then you're on the right path. Don't get sucked in by any fad 'diets'. It will take more than 7 days to lose weight and keep it off.
For weight loss eat the right amount (in calories) to be a healthy weight.
Combine your diet fitness plan with your exercise program, they should go hand-in-hand. You'll need to burn more calories than you eat, to lose weight.
In my opinion this diet fitness plan is the best and only way to eat healthy. Have fun with it.
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