Food is the one thing
that has given people the hardest time when it comes to living a healthy
lifestyle. This goes for myself as well.
When I decided in high
school that I wanted to get bigger, faster, and stronger I was on the edge of
dieting. No sugar, super low carb, only grilled and seared meats. It was not
fun but that’s what I thought I needed to do.
Come to find out I
wasn’t eating enough calories and I had no micronutrients to keep my energy and
health at an upper level.
Now fast forward a few
years to my fist few semesters in college where I ate whatever I wanted
whenever I wanted. I wasn’t tracking what I was eating so there was no limit to
the amount I ate and I still wasn’t balanced on a micronutrient level.
This trap happens to a
majority of people I work with. There is no structure when it comes to food,
and let’s face it, with all the food we have available to us we need to have
structure.
This is why tracking is
such an important aspect to our everyday lives.
REASON #1: It Is Easy
Tracking your food has
never been easier with all the apps out there at your disposal.
My Fitness Pal and Fat
Secret are the ones I am most familiar with but I cannot stress enough how easy
it is.
You just type in the
food and it does all the calculations, adding, and displaying for you. The
hardest part for you will have is weighing things out on a food scale, which
takes no more than 30 seconds.
I have seen many clients
who will not be able to track food for 1-2 weeks. This shows me that they are
not yet committed enough towards their health goals to take this step.
This is no problem to
me, I make it known that once they are ready to make the commitment to
themselves then I am willing and able to help as much as they may need.
REASON #2: Shows You What You
Need Less/More Of
The food tracking will
give you direct feedback on all your micro and macronutrients.
Carbs, fats, proteins,
fiber, sugar, sodium, cholesterol and so many more. Although you may not know what
these numbers should look like the app will give you a baseline for each of
them.
You can also discuss
with a dietitian or nutritionist to find some good levels for each.
On a general level you
will see how much of each you are getting. If you go back to one of my recent
posts about the steps to do before dieting, you can use those tips to steer you
in the right direction.
Being able to see these
numbers on a readable scale is something people haven’t seen before and it
makes things real to them.
I have seen many times
where people have no idea that they are eating only 40-50 grams of protein a
day but are knocking back 70-80 grams of sugar.
THIS IS WHY WE TRACK
REASON #3: You Are Creating
Waves
You will be surprised at
how many other things follow from just tracking your food.
You will see your food
begin to clean up over time, you might see more consistency with your exercise,
you will feel better because your food choices are better.
All these things follow
from this simple first step. Also you already know what you are doing when it
comes to tracking food so if you go to a coach or trainer on this topic you
have some data to present to them off the bat.
Everything involving
health and wellness is progressive meaning that things go up the ladder as time
goes on. Many people I work with find small things to change for the better
every few months.
After 6 months go by so
many things have been changed for the better and it is seamless compared to
changing everything all at once. This all adds into living a health
lifestyle.
Reason #4: It Keeps You Honest
The food that is listed
on your daily breakdown does not lie. If you ate a whole bag of chips but only
listed that you ate 10 chips then you know your daily breakdown is wrong.
It is kind of like when
you were young playing sports and they had you do sprints. If you didn’t touch
the line the coach would yell, “You’re only cheating yourself”
There has never been a
client of mine who has lied on their food diary and not come clean about it.
There is no reason to lie.
If you eat a tub of ice
cream; track it, see what the numbers are, be okay with it, and move on. There
is no reason to lie or to dwell on something you ate.
It will also show you
the things you may have not been realizing. Maybe adding in extra peanut butter
to your lunch every day didn’t seem like much but in reality it added more fat
and calories than you were expecting.
Not saying this is good
or bad I am saying that it is better to know than to be left in the dark.
Situations such as the one above happen all the time. Adding small things every
day or every week can add up quick. If you are tracking your food you will find
it quick, if you are not then you may not even realize it for months.
REASON #5: You Can Use It To
Your Advantage
Yes I know that I have
been talking about all the advantages of tracking your food but now let’s use
it this food tracking to your full advantage.
You know what your food
trends are, where you are getting your food sources from, what times of the day
your are eating the most. You have all this information and data.
So use this data! Use it
towards your goals.
If you want to gain some
strength then start adding in a few more high quality calories a few hours
before your workouts to benefit from some extra energy.
Or maybe you want to
shed some pounds, try cutting back on some calories throughout the week.
The best part about
using this information is that if things aren’t working the way you want then
go back to your road map and dig deep to figure out why.
I worked with a woman
who was trying to lose some weight and hadn’t seen any results in a few weeks
but had been cutting calories for that time. I told her to look at here data
and analyze it. She realized that the calories she was cutting were from fat
and protein sources. I told her to switch those sources back into her diet and
cut the same amount of calories out from just carb sources and lone behold here
results were crazy.
If she wasn’t a
consistent food tracker then this would have been left uncovered and here
results would not have been as good as they were.
The bottom line is that tracking your food is something that will become a habit if you do it enough. It will only benefit you on your journey to the healthiest lifestyle so take the step and start tracking some damn food!
JNHealthandFitness@aol.com
