Create a Healthier Lifestyle

The sure-fire way to lose weight and keep it off, and improve your general health, is to adopt a healthy lifestyle over the long term. A lifestyle that promotes healthy habits, including keeping your home organized, planning meals a week at a time, shopping smarter, and getting more—and better—sleep can help you stay focused on your weight-loss goals and keep you motivated to reach them.

Organize Your Home.
Whether you’re cooking a healthy homemade meal, working out in your living room, or squeezing more fitness in by speed-cleaning your house, what happens at home affects your commitment to losing weight. A disorganized home can interfere with achieving your goals, and it can lead to getting poor-quality sleep, succumbing to emotional eating, and skipping workouts. By keeping your home organized, you’ll be better able to stay focused, maintain a positive outlook, and improve your mental and physical well-being. Assess the mess in your home by going through every room and decide what needs to be dealt with or trashed, and then figure out a way to keep it organized permanently.

Shop Healthy.
It’s a common misconception that eating healthy costs more money. While some healthy foods can be pricey, the reality is that when you stop buying junk foods and replace them with high-quality nutritious foods, your grocery dollars will go farther (and you’ll ultimately save on those doctor bills, too). Help cut costs by creating a weekly meal plan of the breakfast, lunch, and dinner recipes, as well as snacks, you’d like to make, and then tally up the ingredients you’ll need and prepare a shopping list. Stick to your list when you grocery shop.

Cook Meals in Advance.
If a busy schedule is keeping you from cooking most of your meals at home, knowing that there is already something healthy in the fridge or freezer that you can simply reheat will keep you from resorting to fast food or other unhealthy dining options. To help take the stress out of the kitchen, cook a few meals in advance each week to serve midweek or later. Soups, casseroles, and stews made with lean protein and plenty of vegetables, as well as recipes made with brown rice and whole-wheat pasta, are just a few examples of dishes that can be made ahead and refrigerated or frozen.

Make Mealtime Matter.
You might be surprised to learn that taking the time to savor your meals can actually aid your weight-loss. When you sit down to enjoy what you’re eating, thinking about every bite, you’ll feel more satisfied and eat less. Furthermore, studies suggest that eating nutritious meals at an actual dining table is good not only for your physical health but also for your mental health, and that goes for both adults and children.

Eat Healthy Snacks, Wherever You Are.
Regular midmorning and midafternoon snacking can seem like a challenge, particularly when you’re on the go. But with some planning and preparation, you can put together a healthy assortment of snacks to help curb your hunger and prevent cravings—wherever you are. Invest in an inexpensive, lightweight, reusable lunch bag that you can stock with small zip-seal bags When you’re hungry, reach for healthy choices instead of munching on sugary, salty, high-fat, empty-calorie snacks. Strategic snacking helps prevent the swings in blood sugar that can cause cravings that lead to overeating.

Make Exercise a Priority.
Regular exercise can help keep your metabolism revved so you lose weight faster. In addition, exercise can also help prevent the onset of diseases. Even the smallest movements add up and will improve your weight-loss results.

Get More Quality Sleep.
You can never be truly healthy if you don’t get enough quality sleep. Recent studies show that people who sleep less tend to weigh more. So shut down the electronics and TV earlier and get a good night’s rest!

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Habits to Better Nutrition

1. Drink water. Drink a glass in the morning before eating. Add lemon juice for an extra boost. Keep a water bottle close by as you go about your day. A glass of water before meals can also help keep your family from overeating. Opt for water rather than juice, milk or soda most of time.

2. Have a plan. Having a plan takes out the stress caused by last minute meal decisions. Without a plan you are more likely to reach unhealthy quick options or grab fast food on the way home. A planned meal will almost always be more nutritious, not to mention that it will also save you money. Plan a week, two weeks or even a month ahead. Make a list of your family’s favorite foods for breakfast, lunch, snack time or dinner as a reference and then fill in the calendar. Buy the groceries and do the prep. Don’t worry if you can’t always follow it to a tee. Life happens and things come up, but have a plan and do what you can to stick to it.

3. Keep a well stocked pantry. Another time you will be more likely to crave and eat something less than nutritious is when you find your cupboards bare. Keeping the basic items that you use often readily available will help meal preparations to go more smoothly and successfully. You’ll open the fridge or the pantry and see options and options are good to have.

4. Stock up on a variety of fruits and vegetables. We could all use more fruits and veggies in our diet, but if they’re not in our kitchens and in our fridge, we don’t even have the option. Fresh fruit is easy to have at every breakfast and make great snacks (or even desserts). In order to eat several servings of vegetables each day you need to make sure they are served with lunch, dinner and in between (or you can consider drinking ShakeologyÒ that has over 9 servings of fruits and vegetables in one glass and be done – safe for kids too!). If your kids wander in looking for something to eat before dinner is actually ready, a plate of fresh veggies set out can curb their hunger and assure that they still have an appetite come dinner time.

5. Limit treats. First I have to admit that I have a sweet tooth. But I also recognize that there is way too much sugar in the standard American diet. Perhaps just choose one or two days a week for treats to have something to look forward to, which makes it easier to say “no” at other times during the week. Be adventurous and try sugar substitutes (like honey, truvia or stevia).

6. Cook in bulk. One of the hardest parts of healthier habits is that they take time. When you take the time out of your busy day to prepare a nutritious dinner, really make it count. Make extra to have enough for dinner, for lunch the next day and then two more meals worth in the freezer to eat in another week or two.

7. Choose real food. As easy as it is to grab a freezer meal or pour something out of a box or a can, these options are anything but nutritious. They are usually highly processed and include an abundance of sugars, sodium, bad fats and empty carbs.

8. Enjoy your food. Take time to sit down and enjoy the food you eat. Taste the flavors and thoroughly chew. This will aid your digestion and can be valuable time to visit with your family or reflect on your day.

Don’t let the fact that leading a healthy lifestyle can be challenging. It does make a difference and it is worth the extra effort.

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