Tracking Your Food: The Right Way To Do It

By Russell Boudreaux


When you begin a diet one of the most often heard pieces of advice is to keep a food log in which you write down every thing you eat during the day. Keeping a food journal helps you identify the foods you are eating as well as the foods you aren't eating. For example, after maintaining a food log for a few days, you might see that you are not taking in very many vegetables but that you are consuming lots of sugar and bad carbohydrates. When you write every little thing down you'll be able to see which parts of your diet must change as well as have a lot easier time figuring out what kind and how long of a workout you need to do to shrink your waist line and burn the most calories.

But what if you write every little thing down but no pounds drop off of you? There is a great way and a sluggish approach to track the food you eat. A food journal is a lot more than just a simple list of the foods you eat during a day. Other varieties of important information are going to need to be written down too. Here are a number of the suggestions that can enable you to become a lot more successful at food tracking.

Be as precise as possible whenever you write down what you take in. You have to do more than simply write down "salad" into your food journal. Write down every one of the ingredients in the salad and also the type of dressing you used. You also need to note down the amount of of the foods you are eating. "Cereal" is just not good, but "one cup Shredded Wheat" can be. Remember the more you eat of something the more calories you eat so it is very important that you list quantities so that you know exactly how much of everything you're eating and how many calories you need to burn.

Write down what time it is when you eat. This will allow you to figure out what times of day you feel the most hungry, when you usually reach for snacks and then you can figure out how to deal with those times. You'll observe, for example, that even though you eat lunch at the identical time every day, you also--without fail--start to snack as little as an hour later, every day. This will also enable you to identify the times when you start to eat simply to give yourself something to do. This is critical simply because, once they are identified, you can find alternative ways to fill those moments than with unhealthy foods.



Record your mood whenever you eat. This makes it possible to figure out when you use meals to help soothe emotional issues. It will also identify the foodstuffs you select when you are in certain moods. Lots of us will reach naturally for junk food when we feel upset or angry and we are more likely to pick out healthy options when we feel happy or content. When you pay attention to how you eat while in your different moods and mental states, you will be able to keep similar but healthier alternatives around for when you need those snacks--you might also start talking to someone who can help you figure out why you try to cure your moods with food.




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