6 eating habits everyone should learn

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

These simple steps will help you feel better and stay healthy.

1. Drink enough water

You need to drink water. This speeds up the metabolism. Blood plasma is 92–95% water, and the liquid helps the circulatory system to cope with its functions. With water, oxygen and glucose are supplied to the brain, which are necessary for nervous activity. Water removes metabolic products and toxins from the brain. But its lack can cause headaches, feelings of fatigue, problems with the digestive tract.

There is no universal rate of water consumption. Focus on two indicators:

• Feeling thirsty. If you have it, you need to drink it.
• Urine color. It should be colorless or light yellow, otherwise you don't drink enough.

How to develop a habit

The main life hack: water should always be at hand. Otherwise, you will be too lazy to get up every time to drink, and you will do it less often than you really want. Place a bottle of water on your desk and sip every time you feel thirsty. Always carry the smaller container with you in your bag and do not forget to refill.

In addition, there are various applications that allow you to keep track of the amount you drink. Their main disadvantage is target performance. In an effort to reach "normal", you can drink when you don't feel like drinking, or hastily pour liquid into yourself late at night to achieve your goal. But if you love numbers and gamification, you can try it.

2. Eat more vegetables and fruits

Plant foods are good for the prevention of cardiovascular disease and certain types of cancer. The fiber they contain helps the digestive tract work better and reduces the risk of non-communicable diseases.

We know about the benefits of vegetables and fruits since childhood, but it is not always possible to eat them in sufficient quantities. Moreover, recent studies indicate the norm of 500-800 g per day, which is a lot.

How to develop a habit

Here, the same as with water: if you want to eat more vegetables, make them more accessible. To make the plan come true, you have to think about why vegetables are an infrequent guest on your table.

Perhaps you would love to eat cabbage salad every day, but you are too lazy to chop it with a knife. Then your choice is a food processor with a shredder. He will grind the head of cabbage in a matter of seconds, and all that remains is to rinse the bowl and knives with water, even a sponge is not needed.

Or, over and over again, you buy a vegetable that you do not like, because you are guided by information from the outside, and not by your own feelings. Let's say celery is really healthy, but if you hate it, then it will settle like a dead weight in the vegetable drawer.

Wash the fruits and immediately put them on the table - this is more likely that your hand will reach for them by itself. Prepare vegetables for consumption as well. Cucumber sticks, carrot sticks, small pieces of cabbage will be quickly eaten if they are in plain sight.

Finally, just make sure there is an herbal supplement in every meal you eat. It can be annoying at first, but gradually you will get used to it.

3. Keep a food diary

People tend to be delusional about the amount eaten. We tend to underestimate the amount of food, even if we know that we will be double-checked. Therefore, it is highly likely that you yourself are not aware of your eating habits.

A diary will help you understand how things really are, and learn a lot about yourself. For example, you think that you are eating enough vegetables, but in reality, you are limited to two cucumbers a day.

How to develop a habit

Write down what you ate, how much and how much, right after a meal, or even before it, if you can refrain from supplementation. Choose a convenient way to record information: in a paper notebook, a document in the cloud, or a calorie counting app.

By the way, about the latter. If you like accuracy in everything, you can also find out how many calories you consume. The results will be approximate, since you cannot tell how much nutrients will be absorbed from a particular food. But this information can already be used to correct eating behavior. True, all food will have to be weighed: in the matter of calculating calories, everything is already too approximate to estimate the portion size by eye.

4. Eat less sugar

Modern man consumes too much sugar, because it can be found almost everywhere. It is found not only in soda or baked goods, but also in ketchup, instant porridge, and sausage.

The incidence of type 2 diabetes, liver failure, tooth decay, obesity and other unpleasant things are associated with excessive sugar consumption. So it is simply necessary to control its amount in the diet.

How to develop a habit

Start small: When thirsty, drink water, not juice or soda. By eliminating these drinks, you will already reduce your sugar intake. Switch to unsweetened teas and coffees.

Limit your dessert consumption - make it meaningful. Instead, add a serving of complex carbohydrates in the form of cereals to the diet. This will make it easier to tolerate avoiding sugar.

Finally, cook more yourself. Manufacturers sin by adding sugar to products where you would never expect to see it. So you can resist this only by getting up to the stove yourself.

5. Pay attention to the composition and calorie content of food

Reading is helpful, especially when it comes to product labels. For example, you might find out that your favorite “healthy” granola bar is half sugar and outperforms chocolate in calories. Such an entertaining reading will give you many discoveries.

How to develop a habit

Learning labels takes time. Therefore, plan your trips to the store so that you have these free minutes. Be sure to eat before shopping, otherwise the rumbling belly can drown out the voice of reason. And of course, do not take your fellow travelers with you, who will stand and moan while you “dig there for so long”.

6. Regularly eat dairy products

One serving of fermented milk a day can help you lose weight and reduce your risk of type 2 diabetes by 18%. However, it is better to choose options without sugar: they are healthier.

How to develop a habit

If you find a product that you like, there will be no problem building a habit. But, as a rule, our knowledge about sour milk is limited to kefir and sweet yogurt. Not everyone likes the first, the second often contains too much sugar. But there is a choice.

To begin with, try everything that shops offer, such as fermented baked milk, kefir, Snezhok, acidobifilin, varenets, natural yogurt. Among them, you will surely find what you like. If there is no product for your taste, try combinations. For example, make a kefir-based smoothie.