Nutrition for the Real World

As American’s we’ve been trained by our past generation, and though social media on how to eat, diet, and be healthy. Unfortunately that information is severely dated, and incorrect. The idea that one nutritional guideline can apply to every human, and that we all respond similarly to everything is just absurd. We are all so very different in our diets, activity levels, goals, and genetics that we all need to figure out our bodies individually. This is one of the reasons people crash diet, and no diet seems to work as promised.

We over-eat while staying malnourished, under-hydrate while consuming a ton of different liquids per day, and our sodium levels are out of control. Is this our faults? Well, yes and no. We’ve been brainwashed/taught since birth about diet, and we’ve adapted things along the way. Portion sizes in the United States are often 3-4 times the size our body needs at one sitting. Especially when dining out! When dining out at any average chain restaurant we encounter portions that contain over 4000mg of sodium while weighing in excess of 1.5lbs. We’ve all heard our parents tell us to “clean up our plates,” but in these circumstance taking our food to go and getting a couple more meals out of it proves to be frugal and a lot healthier for your body and metabolism. The body’s metabolism is a very delicate process that can be disturbed without even thinking! If you eat once or twice a day, your body goes into a starvation mode that stores body fat, and decreases metabolism, while eating 5-6 times per day with smaller portions ignites our metabolism to work more efficiently resulting in less body fat and more daily energy.

A couple tricks you can use in your everyday life to feel healthier and to hold less body fat is to eliminate things that taste sweet, things that are white (milk, bread, rice, potatoes) and fruits/juices. Just by doing this as American’s most people will lose body fat, and feel better! These are small sacrifices with great results. Then if you choose to combine exercise, and supplementation your results will continue to advance. Remember the word diet doesn’t mean for a short period of time, we are always dieting one way or another all year long. So consider it your lifestyle and start to feel better about yourself starting now!