Lately, I’ve been fielding a lot of questions and comments about how to control eating habits, cravings and the urge to eat unhealthy foods. On the one hand, it shows me that these people are making an effort to achieve their physique goals. However, on the other hand I am constantly being reminded of how people unwittingly sabotage their own efforts, and more importantly, how people talk themselves out of their own goals. Anyone can control their eating habits if they’re willing to. Everything else is simply an excuse! That being said, here are some suggestions that may help you get where you want to be.
1. Burn more calories than you eat. This is the basic rule of weight management. If you want to lose weight, you must burn more calories than you take in each day, each week, and each month. Now the neat part – It doesn’t matter if all the food you eat is healthy, wholesome or “clean.”The total calories from all of the food you eat – no matter what kind of food it is (protein, carbohydrate, fat) – must add up to fewer calories than your body efficiently burns each and every day. It’s that simple!
Unfortunately, you can’t just stop eating and expect to lose body fat…and you can’t just start eating like crazy in order to build muscle. If you want to gain quality weight, you must eat strategically.
2. Take the necessary steps to control your metabolism. Another key to effective weight management is regulating your metabolism. No matter what your physical challenges may be, you CAN do a better job of managing and regulating your metabolism. You must do the best with the gifts – and challenges – you are presented with.
Eating small meals throughout the day will help keep your metabolism operating at a steady rate. You should schedule meals every two to three hours throughout the entire day. Of course, weight training and cardio exercise will also help regulate your metabolism.
By following through with strategically-timed small meals, weight training workouts and cardio sessions for a series of days, weeks, months, you’ll improve your physique over time.
3. Stop searching for the perfect diet. It doesn’t exist! People are often distracted by the notion that there’s an easier diet somewhere that requires less discipline than the one they’re on. If the diet doesn’t work as quickly or effectively as they expect, they blame the diet – and not their own unreasonable standards or expectations.
Diets appeal to different people for different reasons besides the level of effectiveness. The Atkins Diet, for example, may seem great to some people because they love to eat meat. The Zone Diet may seem ideal to others because they love salads and vegetables. Even a strict, bland bodybuilding diet may appear to be the best option for some people because they like the idea of not having to make decisions on a continual basis or because they really enjoy the taste of protein shakes. I personally prefer food, but to each their own!
4. Keep your diet SIMPLE. Do you know people who always ask themselves, “What am I going to eat for dinner tonight?” Some people put a lot of effort into thinking about their meals. In my opinion, that makes the eating process far too complicated. The more complicated you make your nutritional program, the more difficult it will be to follow through.
During the week I intentionally keep my meal plan simple. My primary goal during that time is to add muscle to my body while keeping my body fat levels manageable. If I decide to relax at all, it will be during the weekends. Obviously, when I begin dieting my meal plan becomes even more simplified, and I do not allow myself the luxury of the weekend indulgences.
When it comes to feeding yourself properly, the less thinking and planning you have to do, the better. Try to look at eating as merely a method of constructing a muscular, lean and attractive-looking physique, instead of a source of recreation, pleasure and a way of connecting with your family and friends. Think of eating as a means to an end, not a social activity.
I realize that fine dining is one of life’s great pleasures (believe me, it’s one of my favorite pleasures), but try adjusting your thinking to that of an efficient, disciplined individual, instead of one of gluttony. Simple meals will help you be consistent with your eating habits. The K.I.S.S. Principle works wonders – Keep It Simple Stupid.
5. Give the diet you choose your full attention. Just about any diet, when applied on a consistent basis, will work for you, but you must have confidence in the diet you choose. Otherwise, you won’t be able to give it your complete focus.
With all of the diets available to choose from, it’s easy to get confused – and almost impossible to have 100% certainty about the one you’ve chosen. Just when you think you’re on the right track, you’ll hear or read about the new “miracle” diet. Just when you’re ready to dig in and get going on a structured meal plan, someone you know will tell you about all of the amazing results they’ve had with a diet that seems very different from yours. Hell, even if your diet is working, you will sometimes doubt if it’s working well or fast enough.
Instead of focusing on the differences, try to discover how the diets are similar. That way you will know you are already on the right track.
6. Take 100% responsibility for your successes and failures. In other words, if you’re not getting the results you want, it’s YOU and not necessarily the diet program that’s failing you. It’s not your challenging situation, genetic limitations or time-management dilemmas that are preventing you from reaching your goals. Your inability to do what it takes – or find out what it takes – is what must be overcome.
People often blame their circumstances or genetic conditions for their lack of progress. If you are truly committed, you’ll eventually find a way around your physical or emotional challenges to reach your goals. In other words, quit making excuses and do something about it!
People also occasionally unfairly compare themselves to others. “She can eat anything she wants and still look good, while I eat like a bird and gain weight!” The route you have to take may not seem as easy as that of someone else, but there is ALWAYS a way to overcome your challenges.
Realize that the decisions you make reflect on the quality of the physique you really want – and the one you ultimately get. EVERYTHING worth having has some sort of price tag on it. Usually, the more desirable something is, the higher the price. Maybe you don’t want to pay the price for having the physique you thought you wanted. That’s fine, but you must accept the consequences of that decision.
Don’t blame your lack of knowledge; blame your lack of desire.
Don’t blame your genetics or personal conditions; blame the fact that you decided not to overcome those challenges at this time.
7. If you’re not getting the results you want, you’ll need to raise your standards. You either need to do a little more of this or a little less of that. Food selection, food quantities, meal frequency, meal timing, cardio-training intensity and frequency, weight-training intensity and frequency are ALL factors that are 100% in YOUR CONTROL. Focus on finding the combination of those factors that works best for you; what you must do more of and what you must do less of to reach your personal goals.
It’s YOUR body, and no one else will care about it more than you. Never rely on someone else to solve your challenges for you. Take FULL responsibility for the task of finding what’s best for you and your body.
8. Don’t waste time talking to people about your eating, metabolic and genetic challenges. Are those other people really going to challenge your beliefs anyway? Do they really care? All of the talk about how difficult it is for you to lose body fat (or build muscle) reinforces your disempowering beliefs about what you cannot accomplish. It is self-defeating. By eliminating this negative talk, you will reach you goals much faster.
This does not mean to not ask questions or rely on someone else’s expertise. This does mean that you are ultimately responsible for the direction you go and your successes or failure ultimately fall on your shoulders.
9. Learn how to manage the emotional relationship you have with your current eating habit. Schedule your cheat meals in advance, and schedule your cheat days – those days when you plan to indulge your cravings – in advance, as well. Use those cheat meals, or days, as special rewards for being disciplined all week long or for putting together a series of weeks of good eating habits.
Do not use food as a reward for accomplishments in other areas of your life, however. You do not want to create, or strengthen, an emotional link between success and fattening foods. Also, you do not want to use delicious, not-so-healthy food to mask emotional pain that you might be feeling due to challenges in other areas of your life. In other words, don’t eat to make yourself feel better.
10. NEVER try to make up for poor eating habits with more exercise. Up to 80% of the way you look will be determined by the foods you eat – not by your training habits. You may mistakenly believe that you can make up for poor eating habits with a little extra exercise; NOPE, NO WAY, NO HOW! It will NEVER happen! The exchange rate between eating and exercise is not a fair exchange at all!
Rick Streb
