Habits

7 Habits To Healthy Eating for Wellbeing

We keep looking for the magic bullet superfoods that will overcome our health problems instead of thinking more broadly about the overall pattern of foods we are choosing to eat each day.”

Food As Medicine, Monash University

Everyone is looking for it. That one food. Or that one diet. One big thing that is going to change everything. It will make us healthier. We will loose that weight. It might even improve our mood.

And yes, there most certainly are foods that appear to have superpowers. These are ‘functional foods’ that have additional health benefits beyond basic nutrition. A personal favourite of mine in the functional food arena is fermented foods, which host a large range of benefits for both physical and mental health. 

As fantastic and exciting as the world of functional foods is, the truth is in the fine print. They provide a benefit beyond basic nutrition. Beyond. We really need to nail that basic nutrition first. The food that we eat on a daily basis. Not just the good food, and not just the bad food, but all of it. The food that we eat every day, out of habit.

Habits

Let me ask you this – have you ever tried to make a change?

Tried to implement a healthy eating plan, diet, menu?

It started off well, but after awhile….

Well, maybe there was a birthday. A holiday. Or… maybe things got a bit stressful. At home, at work. Stress, overload, overwhelm. Those changes you worked so hard for, they all just fell away.

Have you been there? I have. Many times.

Trying to make a change

For me, the first examples that immediately come to mind are when I have tried to make changes in the way I eat, or the way I exercise.

After having my kids, I was trying desperately to get back to a better standard of eating and regular exercise. But it felt like a vicious cycle. I was tired, I was feeling pretty stressed and overwhelmed. I knew that eating well and exercising regularly would make me feel better. But it just felt too hard.

When I would get a moment of energy or inspiration, I knew what I had to do. I would overhaul my diet. And I would go for a run daily.

Starting Monday.

And I would usually make it thought Monday, and would be feeling good. Sometimes it would last a couple of days or a week. Or longer.

And it all fell apart

But then one night I wouldn’t get enough sleep. Life would get busy with the kids and work and commitments. I would forget my morning smoothie and jump right to coffee. Morning tea at the cafe was a delicious muffin because I was hungry from not having a proper breakfast. I would feel like I had already failed the day regarding food and would just enjoy the evening snacks when the kids were in bed.

I didn’t have the energy to exercise so I would put it off until tomorrow.

And then tomorrow would come and I would realize I was right back where I started. My diet and lifestyle were not horrible. Overall I ate pretty well, and I was hardly a couch potato.

But I wasn’t feeling any better. I was lacking in energy. There was no motivation to make what felt like epic lifestyle changes necessary to meet my goals. My fitness was not coming back, and I was not loosing the weight I wanted to. I wanted to get my body and fitness back to a place where exercise was enjoyable, not an undesirable item on my never ending to-do list.

What I was doing – it just wasn’t working. I was trying to go back to ‘what has always worked before’. And with that approach, it was never going to work.

I needed a new approach

If you have ever tried to make significant changes to your healthy lifestyle and not been able to sustain them, you are not alone. And you’re not weak. And you most certainly did not fail.

But possibly, you did what I did and the steps you took were too big. You were so eager to get to your goal that make the changes all at once. An extreme change in diet. An intensive exercise plan.

When the steps are too big is that there are too many barriers. We make it so hard, that as soon as life gets in the way (and it ALWAYS does) we do not have the structures in place to sustain the changes we made.

Because they had not become habits.

How do we make our changes into habits? How do we make those changes stick?

Turns out it’s easier than you might think!

Here’s what I did. I started small. Very small.

One tablespoon of Apple Cider Vinegar small. Every morning, one tbsp of Apple cider Vinegar in a glass of water before I did anything else related to food.

That was it, just the one thing. And I kept doing it until it became second nature. I didn’t need to think about it. It was just a habit.

Habits

The take away here is not the vinegar. Although if you want to try, it’s a great way to start the day!

It was the habits. The lifestyle and nutritional habits that were the key to my change.

The first thing to do is start small. Instead of focusing on willpower for large scale changes, focus on small scale changes of habit. So small, and so easy, that we almost don’t notice the change:

• Starting the day with a glass of water
• Adding one new vegetable to the shopping list
• Swapping out one unhealthy snack for a healthier option

Essentially, we want to make it easy. Because if it’s a change that’s easy to fit into our lifestyle, it will become a habit and not rely on willpower.

This is how James Clear, author of Atomic Habits puts it. “The central idea is to create an environment where doing the right thing is as easy as possible. Much of the battle of building better habits comes down to finding ways to reduce the friction associated with our good habits.”

Microsteps

But how can small habits lead to big change? The idea is that creating and sustaining change is a bit like exercising a muscle – you can build and strengthen it.
This brings us to Microsteps. This is a concept created and championed by Adrianna Huffington (of the Huffington Post and Thrive Global). Microsteps are small habits that build on each other, and over time can create significant change.

As each microstep becomes a habit, we get one step closer to sustainable lifestyle change.

For me, that tablespoon of Apple cider vinegar was something I could build on. That one little step made me feel significantly better so I was motivated to keep it up. It turned out that starting my day on the right foot nutritionally speaking was the habit I could build upon. it allowed me to become intentional about the food I ate next. And then I was able to look at the way I ended the day with food as well.

This one microstep of starting the day with a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar was the habit on which I could build my nutritional lifestyle on. Something that small was the first step in a greater journey.

7 Steps to Healthy Eating for Wellbeing

That brings us back to the beginning! 7 Habits to Healthy Eating for Wellbeing. Food and nutrition is just one of the important elements better health and better mood. But it is certainly a foundation on which a healthy lifestyle relies on.  Before searching for the specific functional foods (magic bullet superfoods 😉 ) have a look at your nutritional foundation. Once eating well becomes a habit, making  further changes will become a lot more attainable.

Consider this ‘microsteps to habits’ approach when reading the 7 Steps to Healthy Eating for Wellbeing. Instead of changing everything all at once, select one thing per step. Or maybe even just start with the first step. Remember the principles of microsteps, and refer back to this post as needed.

*** Sneak Peak!*** 

The 7 Habits to Healthy Eating For Wellbeing is going to be a mini course! And for a limited time, it will be free. Check out the sneak peak video below. Download the guide to get notified when this free training becomes available!

Needs some help?

Need a little help with you microsteps? Do you feel you would like to make some changes, but not sure where to start?  Or would you like to learn more about how I work with people who want to decrease their stress and improve their mental wellbeing through food, exercise, and lifestyle habits?

Yes?

Check out The Wellbeing Roadmap, the 50-minute free (yep, free!) conversation between you and me. As an Integrative Nutrition Health Coach I help people create stronger nutrition and lifestyle habits.