One of the most powerful things that you can do to ensure success in creating a healthy lifestyle is to keep a food and exercise journal and analyze it! RIGHT NOW get out a notepad and pen or open up a new document on your computer and write or record everything you’ve eaten and drank so far today, and go back the best you can and do the same thing for yesterday.
Include the approximate times that you ate; and include little snacks like a handful of nuts or a piece of candy from the dish at the office, the glass of wine with dinner, everything you can remember.
If you are still reading this and didn’t stop to start writing everything down give yourself permission to just do it and get it done. This blog post will still be here in 5 minutes, I promise!
Great job! Ideally you will want to finish recording your meals for today and also write everything down tomorrow too. Three days will give you a better snapshot of your averages.
If you like computer programs/apps I invite you to use my wellness center CLICK HERE to Register.
TIP: Set a reminder on your calendar to come back to this blogpost in two days after you have your completed diary, and if you didn’t do it then just add the 3rd day before you continue!
When you have your 3 day food diary please add any exercise that you did on each day, what it was, and how long you exercised.
I don’t want you to write down what you usually eat or what days you usually exercise. You want to base your analysis on what you are actually doing. Don’t worry about what you’ve written and whether or not it matches what you “usually” do! No one else is going to see it! Don’t be overly critical of yourself. It’s important to realize that changing habits is a process.
Now that you have your 3-day food and exercise diary look at it and think about balance.
Do you have meals at regular times each day?
Are there meals that you’ve skipped?
Even without reading every line you will be able to tell if your day has balance just by looking at how many things are written for each meal. When working with clients, especially those that are really busy and work during the day I often see food diaries that like this:
If your diary resembles this sample then it looks like you are starting each day trying to “be good” by not eating very much for breakfast and lunch but end you up eating A LOT at the end of the day because, well, you’re hungry! (Look at how much food is below the dotted line, which is after 4pm!)
You may not eat anything all day and rely on coffee and/or diet sodas for ‘energy’ and then you actually end up being exhausted at the end of the day.
Answer these questions about Balance:
1. On a scale of 1 to 10 (1= no balance, 10= great balance) how do you rate the balance in your diet?
2. What meal is the least balanced?
3. Do you skip meals? If so, which one(s) usually is skipped?
I encourage you to continue with a Food & Exercise Journal for 31 days and each day look back at the previous day and analyze for Balance. You will notice that this self-reflection and analysis will begin to inspire you to create a few little changes every day.
Health & Bliss to You,
Susie