Healthy eating habits aren’t necessarily restricted only to what you eat. How much you eat is as important, if not more so. Under normal conditions, you need to take in as many calories as your body needs daily. If you consume more, you will gain weight, while the opposite leads to weight loss.
Keeping this balance in place requires you to be aware of how much you eat. Certain foods have higher caloric values than others, meaning that you need to keep track of how much of each you consume in order to keep your daily caloric intake on the same level.
Free Report: Why You Can't Shift Your Belly FatWhat You Eat or How Much You Eat?
Preventing yourself from eating more than you need may be tricky, especially if you’re not used to it. We often keep eating even though we’re past that point where our hunger is quenched. When you start limiting your portions, you may feel like you haven’t eaten enough. But that’s because your body needs time to process the food in order to let your brain know it has had enough, which usually takes about 15 to 20 minutes.
One solution to this problem is to eat slowly. The Department of Human Nutrition of the University of Otago recommends that you chew your food longer, and make an effort to pause between bites.
Moderation Isn’t a Sacrifice…It’s a Compromise
Most people think that a healthy diet means they can’t have a cheeseburger or a piece of cake for the rest of their life. This is simply not true. You can have all the foods that you enjoy, but you also need to pay attention to how much of them you eat and how often you eat them.
This is where moderation comes in.
Moderation is a powerful tool, which can really help you achieve your fitness goals and keep your weight at a desired level. People generally tend to see moderation as some kind of harsh sacrifice that completely changes the way they enjoy their favorite foods, but that isn’t the case. On the contrary, introducing moderation to your diet usually leads to greater enjoyment of your favorite snacks or treats.
Moderation is the opposite of deprivation and goes a long way to promote sustaining healthy lifestyle habit changes that leads to permanent weight loss.
In a way, you can use moderation as an award for following your weight loss program, or achieving a certain fitness goal on schedule. That tasty food you indulge in once in a while can become a motivator that will help you maintain a clear course towards the body you desire.
You Can Eat Your Favorite Foods
Moderation allows you to enjoy your favorite foods that would be considered unhealthy, without them influencing your weight or health.
For example, cheesecake will be bad for you if you eat one or two or more slices every single day. But if you eat a ½ a slice once every 2 weeks, or only on special occasions, you can still enjoy a cheesecake without the usual repercussions you would otherwise have to deal with. Love fried chicken? Sure, you can have a piece on occasion, but not every day, that’s moderation.
Other ways to moderate not so healthy food is with portion control, include:
- ½ a cup of mashed potatoes instead of 1 or 2 cup
- ½ a biscuit instead of 2 with dinner
- 1 sugary cocktail instead of 3
- 1 slice of pizza instead of half the pie
Why Can’t You Shift Your Belly Fat?
Are you frustrated because you feel like you’ve been doing everything right, but you’re still not able to banish belly fat? Maybe you’re watching how much you eat and you’re exercising regulalry but the change in diet and exercise isn’t making your midsection smaller. That’s the bad news. The good news is that it’s possible to lose belly fat even though you’re not having success right now. To learn more, download my free report, Why You Can’t Shift Your Belly Fat and stop the harmful effects of this excess fat.
