Healthy Eating Habits that Fit People Live By
Do you ever wonder exactly what healthy, fit people do differently that keeps them looking and feeling their best? Were they just born with a natural affinity to stay fit? Or do they have a secret to their fitness success?
Many people ask these questions, yet the answers remain elusive. Which is why we went straight to the source: athletes, fitness professionals, and nutrition experts have shared their diet and lifestyle habits that help keep them in shape. Keep scrolling to learn the healthy eating habits that fit people live by!
1. Eat whole foods
This one is a no brainer, but an important one! Eating clean, whole, unprocessed foods is absolutely essential to staying fit and healthy. Whole, natural foods, such as bananas, steel-cut oatmeal, leafy greens, brown rice, etc., are what nutrition experts call low-density foods. This means they take up a lot of room in your stomach due to their high fiber content, which helps you to feel full despite their low calorie content. Conversely, high-density foods, such as french fries, candy, or ice cream, take up a small space in your stomach, leaving you hungry despite all of the calories. Thus, a healthy eating habit that fit people live by is creating a diet based on mostly low-density foods.
2. Become familiar with portion size
Do you know how food portions have changed in the last 20 years? Some of the changes in food portions might shock you: for example, compared to 20 years ago an average bagel has gone from 3 inches in diameter to 6 inches in diameter. That makes today’s average bagel 210 more calories! A healthy eating habit that fit people live by is becoming familiar with portion sizes and how much they actually need to be consuming. In the bagel example, this would mean understanding that it would be best to halve the bagel and save the other half for another day.
3. Stop eating after a certain time at night
Another healthy eating habit that fit people live by is shutting down the kitchen after dinner. This means no late night snacking with a bag of Doritos in front of the TV! While it may not seem like a few chips would have an effect on your waistline, studies have proven otherwise. Researchers at Brigham Young University asked 29 young men to avoid consuming calories between the hours of 7 PM to 6 AM for two weeks. During these two weeks the participants recorded every bite they consumed, and their weight, mood, and level of hunger at breakfast were monitored. There was a one-week break, and then for two more weeks the subjects were monitored as they returned to their usual way of life. The results? The average weight change was a loss of nearly 0.9 pounds during the two weeks of nighttime fasting and a gain of approximately 1.3 pounds during the control period.
4. Become an expert on nutrition
Becoming an expert on nutrition doesn’t imply that you need to get a degree in nutrition. Rather, this means that fit people have the habit of knowing their foods. Generally speaking, they know the amount of calories in all of their foods as well as the approximate protein, carbohydrate, and fat content.
New York Times best-selling author and celebrity fitness trainer Chalene Johnson suggests to “Invest as much time as you can in learning more about nutrition. Knowledge gives us confidence, knowledge changes our beliefs. When we change our beliefs we change our habits. So the more you become an expert on nutrition the more likely you’ll create healthy eating habits not because you’ve been told to but because you really want to.”
5. Use caution when dining out
Being cautious when dining at restaurants is an important yet often overlooked healthy eating habit that fit people live by. This isn’t simply avoiding the Big Mac and soda at McDonalds. Rather, this habit entails understanding that even healthy-sounding foods may have a higher calorie and fat content than you would expect.
Natalie Castro-Romero, MS, RD, says that “Restaurant food often contains far more sodium and fat than home-cooked food and the portions are much larger. That’s why it’s so important to have information about food when you’re eating out.”
6. Fill your home with healthy, whole foods
Creating healthy eating habits can be easy when you fill your home with healthy, whole foods. The key is to prepare your foods as soon as you get home from the grocery store. This means washing and prepping your fruits and veggies, and placing them in the refrigerator at eye-level so that you don’t forget about them. This way when you’re hungry and in a time crunch, you won’t skip over the healthy foods because you don’t have time to prepare them. It will already be done and ready to go!
7. Don’t use food to cope with feelings
We’ve all had those days when everything seems to be going wrong and happy hour seems so much happier when we can indulge in a few cocktails and appetizers. Or when you come home from a long day and unwind with a bag of chips while watching your favorite TV show and suddenly that bag of chips is empty. This is called emotional eating.
Emotional eating (or stress eating) is using food to make yourself feel better—eating to satisfy emotional needs, rather than to satisfy physical hunger. The reason your brain craves comfort foods during times of stress is because these foods release serotonin. Serotonin, or 5-hydroxytryptamine (5-HT), is a monoamine neurotransmitter that exhibits a calming effect as well as contributes to well-being and happiness.
Fit people are able to identify which situations, places, or feelings might trigger them to seek food for comfort and they figure out solutions to cope with the situation in a healthier way. For example, if they feel stressed they will head outside for a run or if they feel upset they will call up a friend instead of reaching for that pint of ice cream.
Do you know other healthy eating habits that fit people live by? If you do, leave us a comment below!
