Healthy Eating Habits

I want to give you some tips how to create healthy eating habits or just to improve the way you already eat.

A lot of people start struggling with a healthy diet when they have to work a lot or when they are always on the go. They struggle when they can’t eat at home, but also when they didn’t plan well for the coming week. But today I want to talk about eating habits in general.

Create a structure!

The first and most important thing, when you struggle with eating, is to have a structure. You don’t have to plan every meal exactly but you should have a structure like eating breakfast, lunch and dinner for example. You also can include two snacks between those three meals but you don’t have to. That depends on your personal daily routine and how you feel comfortable with it.

Don’t skip meals!

To my mind breakfast is the most important meal of the day. I know a lot of people who struggle with having constantly a real breakfast. Especially when you work or go to school/university your body and brain needs energy in the morning to function. Skipping meals also often leads to binge eating because you get cravings after restricting your body. This correlates with your blood sugar level. You want to hold your blood sugar level constant over the day because it’s healthier than having highs and lows all the time, prevents binge eating and unwanted weight gain. You should provide your body constantly with energy during the day. This means you should eat every 3-4 for hours.

Be prepared!

So it is important to have always enough healthy food choices at home. When you do not even buy all the unhealthy stuff you cannot eat them. Try to make a weekly meal plan. Maybe prepare your meals, if you don’t have enough time to cook, so that you have always something to eat at home.Make sure that you don’t have to starve and maybe go for a faster & unhealthier option than cooking a healthy meal.

Special tip of mine: Don’t go food shopping when you’re hungry. When I do grocery shopping while I am hungry I buy way too much food and things I usually would never eat. Like for example highly processed foods.

Take your time!

That is the most important point when we come to actually eating. Sit down. It doesn’t matter if you like eating at the table or on the floor, outside or inside. But sit down, relax and enjoy an atmosphere that’s fine for you. Try to avoid eating in a hurry or stressful situation. When we eat in a hurry we often forget to chew and swallow more air what leads to bloating and digestion problems. The same thing happens when you don’t chew long enough. Then your digestion can’t work proper and you maybe feel bloated or you get stomach aches.

I made the experience that a lot of people don’t know how it feels when they are full and constantly overeat. When you slow down and start listening to your body this will help you to notice when you are actually full but not stuffed! And then you stop eating. After a meal we should feel good & energized and not stuffed & tired . You should eat your last meal two hours before you go to bed. In the evening your digestion system slows down and it doesn’t feel good to go to bed with a full stomach.

Drink enough water during the day!

It is really important to stay hydrated all the time. But don’t drink huge amounts of water right after a meal. That confuses your gastric juices. I drink 1L of water in the morning before I have breakfast and then another 1-1.5 L during the day. Try to drink a big glass of water 1 hour before your meals. When your stomach is well hydrated it can digest food better.

I always take a bottle of water and a little snack (like a banana or an apple) with me, when I am leaving the house. That can prevent you from starving or eating junk food when you get hungry and there is no healthy vegan option available.

What I can highly recommend to you is listening to your body. I give you all these tips because of the experiences I made. But you have to feel good with your eating habits. So listen to what your body says and not what your mind is trying to tell you. Some people struggle more with finding healthy eating habits for them than others. Eat when your hungry, chose whole plant based foods and stop when your full.

This is all I wanted to give you on your way today! Comment if you liked it!