By Pat Sheils, B.S. Health and Human Performance

I don’t have to tell you what the hardest part of any fitness journey is, you most likely already know. It will always be the nutrition that makes or breaks anything you are doing in the gym. You’ve heard the phrase “you can’t outwork a bad diet” right? (I actually was going to try and not say that, but it kinda has to be said. Sorry about that.) But it is true, you simply can’t outwork being lazy with your food selection. So what can I say that would be new to you? What can possibly make this worth it for you to read and gain something from? Well the answer lies in the fact that by the end of this you will realize that yes, you can keep eating your favorite foods and still make the progress you are looking for. 

Now, for this to all make sense, we need to understand how important it is to have our metabolism working for us the right way. (Refer to my recent blog about metabolism and what that means for you). To quickly summarize; we need to be taking in adequate calories already if we want to make any weight control plan work. All diets are based off of the assumption that a person is eating the actual amount of calories that they need, aka our “Basal Metabolic Rate.”

After that is figured out and we know we’re not under eating to begin with, we make the hardest decisions that we will be faced with… Which foods to say goodbye to until I am in supermodel shape. This is usually followed by one last binge of said foods and a candlelight vigil held in memory of them until they can be eaten again…

So what can you do differently this time? Well, for starters we aren’t going to give up your favorite foods. That is the goal here. We want to keep something that you enjoy to be able to make the journey that much more fun and sustainable for you. I have found that when it comes to nutrition, people get really freaked out because they just don’t know what to do. I’ll give an example: My favorite food is pizza. Always have loved it, and always will. But even when trying to lose a few pounds, I will still eat pizza. How? I make it myself. There are a huge number of healthy pizza recipes out there. All you have to do is find the one you like, make the recipe, and enjoy your food. That’s the secret to this article: MAKE YOUR OWN FOOD! : )

When it comes to diet and exercise, the biggest downfall comes from the seemingly unconscious need to eat out at your favorite restaurant in order to maintain your sanity. This is because the food is prepared in such a way that keeps you coming back for more. 

Have you ever wondered why the food is so much better at the restaurant than when you try to make the same food at home? Sure, the chef skill will have a bit to do with that, but the biggest reason is some of the ingredients that they use. Most food that we get from eating out is going to have considerably more fat, sugar and sodium to it for two reasons: 1) it makes the food taste much better and 2) the combination of those three ingredients are what the brain craves the most. This is a downfall for most dieters because the excess fat, sugar, and sodium is exactly what we don’t need when trying to control bodyweight. When you make meals at home and can control what goes into them, then you will find that its going to contain considerably less of those items, while still being the dish that you want. 

This is why I always advocate to my clients that the best way to start a diet is to start making your own food at home. It doesn’t matter what you were eating before, if you aren’t ordering it and are instead making it, it is going to be that much better for you. Start cutting out all the added stuff that makes ordering out so addicting and start replicating that food at home. With the amount of kitchen gadgets and recipes at our disposal these days, you can make nearly anything you’d like. This will allow you to have fun with your diet and make it easier to stick to, while also challenging you to expand what you can do in the kitchen as well!