The days are shorter, the holidays and football season is upon us and its easier to hide in
oversized sweaters and bulky clothing. It’s cold out, motivation starts to lack, meals are heartier. This is comfort season, baby! Halloween candy sticks around for months, holiday parties and events cause astray from the gym and our own health goals seem to fizzle. But it doesn’t have to be like this. You can enjoy each season of life without sacrificing everything you’ve worked so hard for in the months prior. Here are a few things that always seem to help stay on track during some of the tougher months of the year:
Education and Awareness
Learning about how certain types of food impact how we feel. It’s kind of like when
you see how something is made and how much $h!t goes into it and it kind of turns you off from eating it? It can kind of deter you from over indulging just knowing what the effects of certain things have on your body. It’s simple- crappy foods make you feel, well, crappy. And it can cause chronic inflammation through your body.
The three big ones:
Sugar- makes the joints feel sticky, high highs and low lows (crashes) due to the big blood sugar spike making us feel super energetic and then crashing down making us feel lethargic and gross shortly after
Alcohol- we all know that feeling of waking up after a night out of drinking one too many drinks.
They don’t call it cocktail flu for nothing
Processed foods (seen much so at parties or outings)- causes major systemic inflammation.
Our gut has a huge connection to our brain and the food we eat seems to reflect our behavior, our mental clarity, and our ability to handle stress. The more we eat it, the more we are kind of stuck in this little cycle of not being able to make good decisions for ourselves.
Planning
How do we battle point 1? Planning! If you know you have an event coming up that you want to enjoy, plan for it. This means staying on track for the week, making sure most meals eating are home cooked, and activity is kept high. If you know you have trouble on the weekends, plan one weekend day to enjoy and plan and prepare food for the next day to get back on track.
Prioritize your workouts
it’s definitely more challenging to want to go to the gym after work when it is cold and dark. Perhaps considering morning workouts, as it is still cold and dark, but motivation may be higher as you have not exhausted your mental battery yet as the day is so young. If this is not an option, make sure you change into your workout clothes after work and go straight there. The stop at home can deter you from going back out again.
Making heartier meals healthier
Every unhealthy meal CAN be made healthier in some way or another. Swapping high fat meats out for leaner, whole dairy products for non-fat or half fat, adding more vegetables to a meal, cutting half the amounts of butter or oil can all make a dramatic decrease in calories to some of your favorite meals.
Acknowledgment
Acknowledging that motivation may be lower during this season and that’s okay. There’s a
difference between acknowledgement in not wanting to do certain things that you know are
good for you, and actually giving in to not doing it. Sometimes its going to be a forced effort and you may not be perfect, but doing something is ALWAYS better than doing nothing.
While we will all have our own ebbs and flows through each season, it is important to note that we will feel our best when we treat our body, mind, and souls the best. Sometimes we just have to suck it up and do it, because in the end we know we will feel better and thank ourselves for it later.
Remember…if you are persistent, you will get it. If you are consistent, you will keep it.
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