We all know how difficult it is to eat healthy, consistent meals throughout the week. When most people have busy schedules, it makes it that much easier to take a trip to the nearest fast-food restaurant from where you live.
It seems like our bodies are driving us to eat unhealthy food, and that self-control seems impossible to muster. What if there was a way to trick your brain and body into eating healthy foods without having to think about it? The trick is implementing behavioral psychology. There are four straightforward methods to break those eating cravings and fast-track yourself into a healthy eating lifestyle.
It won’t require an insane amount of self-control, and it won’t break the bank by buying a dieting program that you probably won’t finish. Here are four ways to change your eating habits and lifestyle right now!
1.The most straightforward way is using smaller plates. This tip may seem insignificant, but culturally and environmentally, societies prime people to take bigger-sized meals through the size of plates.
When our brains see food in a large container, we automatically register in our minds to attempt to finish the meal even well beyond when our stomachs are full. So by simply buying smaller plates, we solve the issue of overeating. Smaller plates mean small portions, fewer calories, and a higher chance of resisting the urge to keep eating.
2. Next is using a little bit of self-control to eat good, healthy food FIRST! So whenever an urge comes to eat cake, ice cream, chips, or drink soda, tell yourself that you’ll commit to eating some healthy food FIRST. Then if you still have cravings, you can eat unhealthy foods.
If you try this, you’ll notice that after eating healthy foods immediately, the urges may subside. There will be times where you won’t even be hungry anymore to eat the bad, unhealthy foods. In other words, immediately eating good food after your urges buys your brain and body some time to help you get full so that you don’t have to bear the temptation of maintaining self-control. You won’t be perfect at this every time, but it’ll be much easier to turn to good food when you’re hungry than bad food over time. Thus it will be much easier to satisfy those cravings as well!
3. This tip goes along with the previous. To eat healthy foods FIRST after craving bad foods, you need to make sure that you’ve removed the temptation in your environment from eating bad foods. That means clearing away all of those unhealthy foods in the fridge and pantry and filling them with healthy foods like fruit, veggies, and plant-based meals.
You can’t control your external environment of fast-food restaurants, but you can certainly maintain the food atmosphere where you live. You can add an extra incentive that when you eat healthy foods at home, you can treat yourself to some dessert every once in a while at a restaurant. Over time, you won’t be craving those bad foods as much because you’ve made it significantly harder for yourself to obtain them. When you make it harder to eat bad food, for example, it takes more time and effort to reach it; you give yourself a much better chance of mastering your cravings.
4. Finally, enforce a pattern and lifestyle by eating regularly. Most people wait until they’re starving until they eat, then they end up eating bad foods. Some people eat at varying times, which makes it easier also to eat bad foods.
The trick to conquering this pitfall is making a schedule to go to the grocery store, cook the food, and apply meal plans based on the week. You won’t face overwhelming temptation when you drive by a fast-food restaurant or when that coworker brings those doughnuts to work. The more hungry you are, the more likely you will make bad decisions. By eating at timed intervals, you won’t get as hungry, and overall, you’ll be consuming fewer calories.
