Why?
Eat healthy!

In a previous post (Daily Fundamentals), I promoted the daily practice of healthy eating fundamentals: the what + the where + the when + the how.  In this post, I want to discuss the ‘WHY’ of healthy eating.

Having an over-riding,  good-quality ‘WHY’ provides motivation, and keeps you focused on achieving health.

When I go through the diets of my clients — to find out what they are eating — I ask them why they have chosen to eat a particular food or meal. To this question, I get many different answers. Unfortunately, a lot of the time the answer is not: “for my health”.

You cannot expect to be healthy, if in most cases, ‘health’ is not your top priority when eating.

I ask, “why did you have that for breakfast?”

“What about lunch?”

“And dinner?”

Generally, I get answers like:

01—Because it’s easy, convenient, on-special, cost effective, or what the rest of the household was eating

02—Because I like it, wanted it, was hungry, was out socialising, like cooking, liked the look of the recipe, thought I should use it up (as I’d already bought it), think I’m intolerant to ‘such-and-such’, think ‘such-and-such’ is bad for me

Clearly, they’re not getting the answers correct (the decisions they’re making aren’t supporting their health), otherwise they wouldn’t have come to see me!

It’s important that I get my clients asking the right question.

Note: Sometimes I do get answers like, “Because I think it’s good for me”, or “Because you’re supposed to eat it”. But very rarely will I get: “Because I know it’s good for me”¹. While the difference between these statements sounds minor, the former can have a negative impact on your health.

If you’re consistently selecting your next feed based on:

01— the opinion of your friends

02— the opinion of your taste-buds

03— the latest fad diet

04— how pretty the food looks in a recipe book

05— how convenient the food is

06— what the food costs

07— how you are feeling in the moment i.e tired, hungry, or stressed

08— any other reason (excuse!) you’d care to think of…

Then getting healthy, or maintaining your health is not your number one priority. Generally speaking, you don’t get healthy by being lucky.

If you want to be healthy, then health should feature at the top of your daily dietary ‘to-do list’. Then, every decision you make about what you eat & drink can be fed through this filter. And the results will trickle down every. single. day.

Obviously this is not always possible, realistic, or much fun. However, it is the things you do on a regular basis that will begin to shape your health — whether for the good or for the bad.