What I have seen over the years with most people I have come in contact with, is that most of them relate any problem in life to food. I see a trend of emotional eating highly prevalent especially with the women folks. Somehow people depend on food, because it is easily available and there is not much of a social stigma attached to over eating compared to other.
When consumption of food goes beyond control and becomes loaded with sugars and Trans fat, then the problem begins to creep in. With more people moving on to an extremely sedentary lifestyle, the problem gets compounded. Just like any relationship with your spouse, partner or boss needs to be worked on, so it is with food. This is what I am going to do in the next few paragraphs
Recognize what & when you eat: Keeping a track of what & when you eat is the key. I know many people who give too much of a gap in the morning before they begin their day and this plays a critical role, in how the whole day does go by with respect to their food intake. The first thing according to me,is to recognize what is it you are eating wrong and regulate the timings as far as possible.The key factor is,food does play a big role on our emotions.
Eat how much you need: I was guilty of eating more than necessary at one point of time and paid a huge price for it. However I began to realize that the key in eating well is to satisfy how much we need and not more just because food is available. This requires a major shift from the inside, as there will be tremendous pressure from your family & friends when you work on this. The Thumb rule I follow & advocate it to my own clients, is not to eat more than the size of one’s fist @ any point of time. The Logic is that, one’s stomach is as big as one’s fist size. I would go one step further, in saying that keep your food quantity intake to 75-80 % of the size of your fist. This will be hard initially, but over a period of time you will begin to feel light and this will help you keep the metabolism high and peppy.
Work on being addicted to certain food: All of us do have some kind of addiction to certain kinds of food. Once in a while it is fine, but going overboard on certain food is definitely asking for trouble. For example foods rich in sugar & Trans fat are what most people are addicted to because somewhere they have internalized the pleasure of these kinds of food to some kind of comfort. The only way in overcoming this is to consciously work on this and replace this kind of food with some kind of healthy replacement.To begin with, work on the theory “out of sight is out of mind”.This simple strategy works wonderfully well for most.
Stay hydrated: Most of the time I have realized, that one is usually thirsty and not hungry. Good consumption of water is what is required when you have moved into some kind of discipline with your eating patterns. If at any point of time, you feel hungry try drinking a glass full of water and usually the hunger pangs will disappear. What is Important over here is to keep the water consumption to recommended level of 8-10 glasses per day and gradually increase it based on your overall fitness levels.
In the end, let’s teach ourselves some simple things: food is just fuel. Most of us need to eat less. Food isn’t love or entertainment or anything else like that. It’s just fuel.
At the end of the day what I have realised is that to keep things simple and consider food as a fuel. We should not connect food with our emotions, relationship or anything else. Just be aware that our body does need the right quantity & quality of food and nothing more than this. By working on keeping it simple, you are ensuring that you do not Anchor yourself and become too dependent on food. I have realised this long time ago and work with my clients on the same principal to help them move away from unhealthy food habits. I would love to hear from you on your thoughts on food and how much of an importance you would like to give to food going forward on my Facebook fan page or at my mail ID coach@satishrao.in