It’s high time to change our eating habits as youth! Haven’t we heard this just enough? As much as it sounds cliché, we know how much fast food, high-calorie sweets, sugary drinks, and more we consume on an average day. This is the prime reason why obesity is one of the biggest concerns around the globe, especially in the demographic age of 40.0% in 20 to 39 years, 44.8% among 40 to 59 years, and 42.8% among 60 and older. It is caused by this bad eating habit, and even in most industrialized countries, one out of every three children and adults are overweight or obese.
If you are moving towards obesity or are concerned, there is no other option than just to alter your eating habits. To begin with, choose a healthy lifestyle. It is critical to comprehend and learn about some of the worst food offenders to find healthier alternatives that might be substituted.
One such alternative is portion control. It is one of the keys to permanently improving your eating habits. If you start reducing your portions, you can expect to lose weight as portion control is not only a weight loss trick but a way of life. It may not be easy at first, especially if you want to be consistent with portion control in all of your meals. However, you would begin to notice results within a few weeks, which is tremendously rewarding. Of course, it would assist if you ate smaller portions of higher-calorie meals regularly to lose weight permanently. Here are four ways to keep your portion sizes in check whether you’re eating at home or out.
Load Up On Colorful Veggies
It is the most fundamental method of portion control. Increasing your vegetable intake will help you lose weight and enhance your overall nutritional health. Furthermore, you do not have to sacrifice your bowel movements, skin health, or hair health when losing weight.
Vegetables should account for about half of your plate. The more colors on your plate, the more antioxidant flavonoid and polyphenol you’ll consume. Make sure to incorporate them into your mid-meal snacks as well. Instead of vapors and mayo, it might be as easy as veggie sticks with hummus, guacamole, or hung curd dip. In your fitness journey, starting small will get you a long way.
Eat Before You Are Too Hungry
Overeating is driven by a lack of discipline on the part of the individual. It’s usually a good idea to be diligent about meal times and, in general, about sticking to a plan. Our biological clock, the circadian rhythm, functions best when you have a strategy in place. We are generally hungry at the same time every day, but we do not eat on time due to work meetings or other obligations.
We are probably starving when we notice we are hungry and sit down to eat. Low blood sugar and dehydration will have us licking the platter clean in no time resulting in overeating before realizing what went wrong. After that, the guilt component then sets in, urging the body to accumulate even more fat, creating a vicious cycle that must be shattered with time. The best approach to dealing with this is eating before becoming really hungry.
Instead of eating after a lunchtime meeting, eat before you get there. If you don’t know how to read your body’s signals, start keeping track of your mealtimes. Another easy but effective technique to reduce larger portion sizes is eating slowly and taking a long time to finish a meal.
Say no to plastic
Not just for environmental concerns, but eating out from containers can be misleading. You end up eating more than you should from these containers because they look smaller than they are. Eating straight out of packaging can also lead to you spiraling and you can end up bingeing.
Portion control can take some getting used to and requires an incredible amount of self-control and discipline. If you’re just starting out and want that extra support to help you meet your fitness goals, reach out to us at Diet Rite System.
Don’t Eat From The Box
If you are someone that eats straight from the packet, bag, or box, you are likely overeating at snack time. It’s especially true when you’re munching while watching TV or working. Cornell University Research backs our claim that “People ate 50% more when given no visual signals on portion sizes.” If you can’t live without your favorite chips or cookies, split the contents into five to ten tiny serving sizes ahead of time. This way, when you’re hungry or bored and eat straight from a bag or box, you won’t finish the entire piece.
Take A Tour Of Your Buffet
If you are forced to eat buffet meals as part of your job and find portion management the most difficult problem, we have simple yet effective advice for you. Before you start putting food on your plate, take a lap and look over everything your buffet has to offer. According to Cornell University research, “People generally load two-thirds of their plate with the first three delicacies they meet at a buffet.” So, regardless of how nutritious or harmful these foods are, you can stroll to the final meal option in the buffet. It will help you consciously choose the foods you prefer and avoid items you don’t like or want to avoid.
Conclusion
Portion control is not only a food choice; it is a mindfulness practice. You need to be equipped with the pearl of Indian food wisdom, whereby you should avoid eating without any distraction. Start by eating without your phone or TV in front. The prime benefit of the same is that if you eat with a concentration on your food, you will check what you are eating and how much you eat.
This will allow you to start keeping a check on your plate and finish the meal at a good pace taking time to relish what you are consuming. If you are looking for more health tips and tricks to track what you eat and maintain your weight, visit us at the Diet Rite System. We have one of the best meal tracker and weight tracker memberships where an individual will be available
Join us and many others on our collective weight loss journey and learn how to make our diet healthier.