Treat Yourself Without Compromising Your Weight Loss Efforts
One of the biggest mistakes people make when trying to lose weight is that they attempt to give up their favorite foods completely. However, by depriving themselves in this way, it often has the opposite effect and instead of eating healthier, they begin to crave the foods they can’t have which results in binging. In this article I’m going to be explaining why you don’t need to give up your favorite foods when trying to lose weight and outlining how to strike a healthy balance between treats and clean eating.
Why Eating Your Favorite Foods Supports Your Fat Loss Efforts
As discussed above, the concept of forbidden foods increases your desire for these foods and leads to a mindset where you start to resent your healthy eating habits because they’re preventing you from eating the foods you like. Ultimately, this combination of resentment and desire leads to you breaking your healthy eating habits, excessively binging on your favorite foods and undoing all the progress you’ve made as a result of eating healthy.
By allowing yourself to eat your favorite foods in moderation, you remove the forbidden element and instead of resenting your healthy eating habits, you’ll start to embrace them. As a result, you’ll enjoy your favorite foods when you do get to eat them but you’ll also appreciate the fact that consuming them in moderation is helping you lose weight and this will make you much less likely to binge.
How To Effectively Balance Healthy Eating Habits & Your Favorite Foods
The best way to get a good balance between healthy eating and your favorite foods is to apply an 80/20 rule where you eat healthy 80% of the time and allow yourself to eat whatever you want 20% of the time. When spread across the week, this means you can have four meals per week where you can eat anything you want.
However, this doesn’t mean you have to eat foods you don’t like the rest of the time and if you get a little creative, you can come up with healthy variations of your favorite treats that are low in calories and can be eaten at any time during the week. For example, if you’re a fan of burgers, there are plenty of healthy and natural burger recipes out there which are just as good for you as lean meats. Alternatively, chocolate covered fruits are a great substitute for candy bars which contain fewer calories and take just minutes to prepare.
Summary
As with many health and fitness goals, balance is the key when it comes to weight loss. While clean eating is crucial if you want to drop the pounds, this still doesn’t mean you have to deprive yourself completely. So if you’ve tried and failed to give up your favorite foods in the past, start following the advice in this article and enjoy the foods you like without letting them sabotage your fat loss efforts.
