We’ve passed January on the calendar already. (Can you believe it?!?)
And, with the Super Bowl, Valentine’s Day, and just the general weariness of winter, it can be difficult to stick to those health goals you loudly proclaimed just over a month ago.
The good news is that making a few changes to your food habits can be even better for your body than a rigorous diet and exercise regime. Really; it might just be that simple to stick to your health resolutions in 2016.
Here’s what you should start… or stop… doing as quickly as you possibly can.
• STOP Starving Yourself – No really, if you are hungry, and you have access to food, you need to eat that food… even if you really don’t feel like it. The longer you wait between meals and snacks, the harder it is for your body to ration existing energy supplies and burn off that excess fat. Starving yourself is not a healthy way to lose weight – ever.
• START Drinking More Water – This should be a no-brainer, even if you don’t believe that water fits into the food habits category. Except, there are still too many people that ignore the health benefits of water. In case you’ve forgotten, your body needs water for everything. Yep, everything.
Your body can’t transform fat cells into energy without water. It can’t flush the toxins from your system without water. Nothing good comes from choosing beverages that aren’t water for most of the day.
• STOP Eating While Doing Something Else (Almost Anything Else) – Remember when mealtimes meant something? You know, before cell phones and tablets and the compulsion to just put that order in quickly before Amazon changes its pricing… those days? Families used to sit at the dinner table and talk to each other (or at least, they attempted to do that). That’s right, just conversation and food.
Now, we eat mindlessly at our desks, while watching television, and while double-checking the specs on a new cell phone. Sadly, this mindless eating leads to all kinds of problems… namely around the waistline.
• STOP Eating Really Quickly – We know you only have a few minutes to shovel that burrito into your mouth before you get to your next meeting, or before you need to defrost the car to get out of the parking lot. But, eating really fast when you still down to a meal is dangerous. Your brain needs 20 minutes to register that it’s had enough food; if you pile in a few cheeseburgers and fries during that time, you’re likely to have eaten past the point of satiation.
• START Adding Mad Dog to All Your Meals – We’re not just saying that because we make Mad Dog hot sauces. Adding super hot sauces to all your meals is one of the best food habits you can possibly develop… if you have the tolerance.
Capsaicin (the really hot stuff), is an incredible regulator. It triggers your satiation levels sooner in the game and suppresses cravings. It increases your metabolism and promotes faster burning of fat and newly-newly consumed calories. And, it makes you feel good about what you’re eating (whether you need it to taste better, or you’re more concerned about over-indulging in those chicken wings).
Now, we know it’s difficult to make all these changes to your food habits at once, but we suggest adding a new one to your regime every week. You’ll soon find that you’re in better shape than you thought you were. And, you’ll appreciate that once we get to June, right?