Your diet is incredibly important to helping you lead a healthy lifestyle. Combined with physical activity, your diet helps you to maintain a healthy weight, reduce the risk of many diseases and make you feel healthier.
While some people struggle to maintain a balanced diet, slowly introducing small changes can be an excellent way of improving your eating habits.
We take a look at how you can maintain a balanced diet!
Eat More Fruits and Vegetables
Around half of your plate should comprise of vegetables at mealtimes. Fruit can be used as a side dish or dessert.
Try swapping out meat for mushrooms and peppers in some of your meals and snack on carrot sticks and slices of fruit.
Where possible, pick fresh fruit and veg over canned, as tinned fruit and veg are often high in sugar or salt as a preservative.
Switch to Whole Grains
Whole grain foods can provide more nutrients and energy than refined grains. Simple changes can be made to implement this, such as switching from white bread to whole grain.
This can be replicated in many other foods, such as changing from white rice to brown rice or choosing to incorporate rolled oats, bulgar, buckwheat and quinoa in meals.
Find Different Sources of Protein
Protein does not have to mean meat. There is a wide selection of nutritious proteins available that will give you plenty of energy as well as versatility in flavour!
If you eat meat, try switching the protein sources to things like beans, lentils, nuts and eggs in some of your meals.
Alternatively, if you can’t stand the thought of going without meat, then try selecting leaner cuts or white meats like chicken and turkey breast.
Drink More Water
Sugary drinks, such as soda, energy drinks and sweetened juices, are a huge contributor to unnecessary calories. Try to avoid these beverages and stick to water.
Try adding a squeeze of lemon, fresh herbs or slices of fruit to your water to add a bit of flavour if you don’t like drinking water plain.
Eat More Fish
Fish, in particular oily fish, is a great addition to a healthy balanced diet. It is an excellent source of protein and provides you with omega-3 and plenty of minerals.
Find Healthier Snacks
Fatty snacks like cakes, cookies, crisps, pizza and desserts are often high in calories but low in nutritional value.
You don’t have to cut these treats out of your life completely, but healthier alternatives should be found for everyday snacking. Prepare slices of fruit and veg in advance for a quick nibble when you want a snack. Swap out crisps for a small portion of nuts or seeds, so you still experience that satisfying crunch!
Reduce Portion Sizes
Often, our portion sizes are bigger than they should be. When you put together a meal, you should keep in mind the scale of your portions.
For example, a portion of carbohydrates should be the size of your fist, whereas a portion of meat should be about the size of the palm of your hand. Half of your plate should be made up of a range of vegetables.
If you struggle with portion sizes, then simply switching to a smaller plate rather than a full-size dinner plate can help to reduce the amount you are eating.
It is important to stop eating when you feel full, rather than pushing yourself to finish what is on your plate. If you have leftovers, save them for lunch for the following day.
Lifestyle Changes
Your lifestyle plays a big part in your diet and the food choices you may make. There are a few ways in which lifestyle changes can be made to help improve your diet.
Exercise
Exercise can help with our diets in many different ways. For one, exercising can help to boost our metabolism and burn some extra calories, meaning we can indulge occasionally without gaining excess weight.
Sometimes, people eat out of boredom, not because they are actually hungry. If you feel the need to snack, even though you’re not hungry, then try doing some exercise. It can give your body a boost of energy and make you feel happier.
Lastly, by getting into a good routine with exercise, you may find yourself choosing to find healthier food options. After putting in so much hard work while exercising, you may think again when faced with the option of cake versus fruit as a snacking option!
Stress
Stress can have a big effect on our diets. Sometimes, stress can make us overeat or make poor dietary choices.
Studies have shown that stress can cause us to increase our intake of foods high in fat and sugar and that high stress levels lead to weight gain.
Stress management is an important part of helping to maintain a balanced diet. Exercise and meditation can be important for reducing feelings of stress.
Another way of helping to reduce stress is the use of CBD Oil. CBD has grown in popularity in recent years as a method of stress management. Many studies have revealed how CBD oil can be effective at reducing stress, with one 2015 analysis describing it as “a potential treatment for anxiety disorders”.
By reducing stress and anxiety, you will be in a better position to make healthy food choices and have more time and energy to create balanced meals, rather than opting for quick snacks.
If you’d like to find out more about how CBD could help you make improvements to your lifestyle, then please browse our products for more information or get in touch with our team!
