Thursday, November 14, 2013

Tracking Your Meals: The Way To Do It

By Michael Hicks


When you go on a diet one of the first things that you will learn is that it is important to record what you eat during the day. Tracking all of the meals you consume may help you figure out which foods you will be eating as well as which foods you are not eating enough of. For example, when you keep a food journal for a few days you might notice that even if you eat lots of fruit, you almost never eat any vegetables. Having it all written down may help you determine the aspects of your diet that need to change as well as how much exercise you need to get to make sure that you burn enough calories to keep your waistline in check.

But what happens if you write almost everything down but no weight drop off of you? You can track your food the right way or the incorrect way. A food record is more than just a straightforward list of the foods you eat during a day. Other varieties of important information will certainly need to be written down also. Here are some of the elements you need to do to be more productive at food tracking.

Be as distinct as you can get whenever you write down the things you eat. You need to do more than just write down "salad" into your food record. The correct way to do it is to record all of the ingredients in the salad as well as the kind of dressing that is used. You need to include the quantity of the food you consume. "Cereal" will not be sufficient although "one cup Fiber One cereal" is acceptable. Don't forget that the more of something you take in, the more calories you are going to ingest so you need to list out the measurements of what you eat so that you will know just how many calories you take in and will need to burn.

Write down precisely what time of day it is when you eat. This helps you determine when you feel the most hungry, when you are susceptible to snack and what you can do about it. After a day or two you might notice that, even though you eat lunch at the same time each day, you still feel hungry an hour or so later. This will also help you identify the occasions when you start to eat simply to give yourself something to do. This is very important because, once they are revealed, you can find alternative ways to fill those moments than with unhealthy foods.



What type of mood are you in when you eat? Write it down! This helps you determine when you use food to help soothe emotional issues. It also makes it possible to see plainly which foods you tend to choose when you find yourself in certain moods. Lots of us will reach intuitively for processed food when we feel upset or angry and we are more likely to select healthy options when we feel happy or content. Paying attention to what you reach for when you are upset just might help you stock similar but healthier items in your house for when you need a snack-you could also begin talking to someone to figure out why you cure moods with food (if that is something that you actually do).




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