Jan
Going on 17 years of being a health coach has afforded me one truth I keep saying, and that is it is more complicated for people to lose weight today than it was 17 years ago. No, people are not lazier. Trust me, the price tag for nutritionists, trainers, etc., has risen quite well over the 17 years I have been in the space as well. Not many pay good $ to waste it away when they pay for a trainer or coach. They fail most of the time because of their overall lack of understanding of food.
See, the whole fitness space is full of so many different ways to go and find success it is often hard for most people to find a place to start. If they do not get similar results, they usually find another program to try. The gap for most people is education. Most people, yes, want it laid out for them, but they are usually also open to learning if it means they will be successful. People want to win more than coaches often give them credit. We fail to convey how processed food choices at the grocery store are not helping them out. Think for a minute. If people understood the food they are eating, the obesity rates would not be climbing year after year.
Working with primarily gen pop clients, I caught on early that most do not get portion sizes, and weighing food out is an entirely foreign concept when talking about food. When they buy things at the store, most assume that it is OK for them as it comes. Fruit is terrible and will make them fat, but 2 Oreos is OK, and a bottle of red wine a night is OK because it is suitable for heart health. That is the knowledge most people have, which is a huge problem and a root cause of most people failing when it comes to dieting efforts. They do not understand how much they are genuinely overeating. Look for an original 2 Reese’s peanut butter cup pack next time out. Bet all you see is “king-sized” or something like that. I still, for the life of my struggle to find a regular-sized bag of potato chips as well anymore.
Slowly over the years, the food industry has increased the total calories you might be eating at one sitting more than ever. Now that life is more automated than ever, the daily activities that we burn calories to do are decreasing for many. While working from home, you could be walking inside the store shopping, but your groceries are now delivered. The list goes on and on. Still, these 21st-century lifestyles, when combined with increasingly calorically dense food plaguing the marketplace, begin to see how hard it is to win anymore for most people when they look at food.
Cutting things in half worked a decade ago. That piece of advice no longer works because two became one, and now four becomes two if you think about Reese’s again. Insert where you, as a consumer, can help yourself in so many ways. You live in the Information Age where great minds are out there to learn from, and Google can give you all the rabbit holes to explore once you understand why the food you are consuming is slowly killing you. Excess calories with reduced daily activities begin chronic disease, metabolic dysfunction, and reduced longevity.
What can you do to win? First, you can begin to monitor your steps and aim for 10,000 a day. Help manage your blood glucose levels, helping to keep inflammation at bay, allowing your body to begin the healing process. The next thing you can do is begin to eat as close to nature as possible. Fruit will not make you fat, and in fact, the fruit will help replenish the vitamins and minerals that processed food leeches from your system to help you stay healthy and nurtured.
The internet is full of too many good recipes to say healthy food tastes terrible. At 41 this year, I recently began grilling as an interest which has been one of the more fantastic things I have taught myself these last few years. But my food tastes so much better, and I enjoy trying different things out. That is how you have to look at your food. You need to look at it as something you need to learn about, and that means taking some time weekly to think about what you need to win food-wise and what you will want to eat.
If you cook the food you like to eat, you will be less inclined to stop somewhere on the way home as well. I have found as well with clients successes and tips they share with me along the way that worked for them to pass onto others.
If you want a better, healthier future, you will have to learn some things, but your future self will thank you for it.
