How to Improve Your Eating Habits?

Food is a determining factor in our health. You have probably heard the phrase “We are what we eat” and this is very true. Our eating habits determine how we look and feel, so we can say that some habits are good and others not so much.

If you are looking for ways to improve your eating habits, keep reading, because we will be giving you some tips to identify your bad habits, then replace them, and then reinforce these new habits in your life.

You can always make a change in your life. If you are concerned about your diet, you should learn as much as possible about the subject and go to a specialist who will guide you through the process.

The first thing we need to know is what we mean when we talk about habits. Habits are conscious and repetitive behaviors that lead to selecting, consuming or using certain foods or diets. These habits begin at home, that is, in the family, which is why it is very important to create good eating habits for children from a young age.

Phases to improve your eating habits

Now, to improve your eating habits we propose three phases, the first has to do with reflection, for this it is necessary to identify all our eating habits, both those that you can consider good, as well as those that you consider bad. We invite you to make a list, for example: high consumption of coffee (can be harmful) or I include fruits and vegetables in my meals (it is considered something positive)

Once you have the list and reflect on what you are doing daily to feed yourself, we will move on to substitution, this means that we will replace one habit with another, for example: Reduce the number of cups of coffee per day or drink tea instead of coffee.

This way, you will gradually incorporate new, healthier habits into your life. At this point, reinforcement is needed, and it is about enforcing these new healthy habits to the letter.

Below we will break down these phases so that you can know what to do in each one:

1. Reflection

✅ Make a list of your eating habits: You should keep a food diary for at least a week. In it you will write down everything you eat, the times and, in addition, we will add a very important factor: you must specify how you felt at the time of the meal, whether you were stressed, tired, happy or whether you were hungry or not.

Reflection will allow you to identify your eating habits, so that you can then make changes by being fully aware of each of the things you are doing.

✅ Identify habits: You should highlight those habits that you need to change or replace with others that will help you in the process of improving your eating habits. Habits do not only refer to food, but also to practices, for example: Skipping meals or eating at odd hours. It is necessary to identify these factors in order to evaluate what we are doing that may be affecting our health.

We mention some of the factors that may be affecting your habits:

Eat very fast
Eating when you are not hungry
Skipping meals
Eating at odd hours

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✅ Evaluate unhealthy habits: Those habits that you identified previously, you must now evaluate them to determine the factors that may trigger these habits.

For example: eating at odd hours (because I wake up late and I don't have time). There we are already identifying a factor: waking up late. This is what is triggering the bad habit of eating at odd hours. This means that to change it you must wake up a little earlier so that you have time to eat or make yourself breakfast to go.

Remember that once you make the adjustment in your habits you should congratulate yourself for the things you do well, it is always good and satisfying to celebrate your achievements no matter how small they are, this will make you feel motivated to go for more.

✅ Find the “trigger” factors: Remember that we had previously told you that one of the things that was important to write down is the feeling or mood that you have when performing a certain habit, for example: having a snack at work (during the snack I feel stressed) There may be a trigger factor there and you identify it as stress.

These notes will help you understand the environmental triggers or particular mood that drives you to have certain habits.

Reflect: Is there anything I can do to avoid this trigger or situation?

If we go back to the trigger of waking up late and for this reason you do not eat on time in the morning, this is a trigger that can be changed just by waking up earlier, but perhaps there are situations that are beyond our control, for example: a work meeting, where you get anxiety related to stress and it makes you want to eat.

You can't avoid the work meeting, but in these circumstances you might want to assess the situation and suggest healthier alternatives. You can eat to calm your anxiety, but it would be best to bring healthy snacks and drinks.

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2. Replacement

Replacing unhealthy habits with new healthy habits: If you have identified that you are creating a bad habit, because you are tired, distressed or in any other mood, you should replace it with some other activity that distracts you and helps you not have to eat without being hungry.

Another factor that you can correct to help you in the process of changing habits is meal planning, because within this scheme you do not have the opportunity to improvise or eat something that is not contemplated there. Which means that these will only be healthy and well-balanced meals.

3. Reinforcement

✅ Reinforce new healthy habits: Habits can take a long time, they are not adopted overnight. When you fall back into an unhealthy habit, you should ask yourself: Why am I doing it? When did I start doing it? How can I change this habit?

Remember that changing the habits you have been doing for years will not be easy, you should congratulate yourself for the small progress and not be so hard on yourself. Keep going, put into practice all these steps to improve your eating habits.