What prevents us from sticking to a healthy diet?
Who does not know that eating that cookie or bag of chips is not good for one's health?
It is not the lack of knowledge that lures us to unhealthy habits but rather our stress-laden life and food cravings.
Many factors play a role in cravings but chief ones among those are a nutritional deficiency, hunger, unhealthy gut flora, emotional upset, inadequate sleep and high amount of stress
Here are the five simple strategies to cut food cravings.
1) Eat nutritionally balanced meals: Good nutrition is of the utmost importance when we are trying to control our cravings.
High fiber carbs ( whole grains, veggies, fruits, beans)keep food in our stomach longer and regulate blood sugar level. These measures help to reduce cravings. Eating more healthy fats like nuts and full-fat dairy can also help reduce cravings for unhealthy carbohydrates like white bread and sugary cereal
2)Eat healthy snacks in between meals
( eg. nuts, berries celery with hummus) Hunger is the potent stimulator of cravings. Empty stomach weakens the will power. The best strategy is to eat some healthy snacks in between meals and not let hunger dictate what we eat.
3) Carve out some time to relax - In long term weight and health management is stress management. Chronic stress causes hormonal imbalance and makes us crave more sweet and high carb foods. No wonder stressed is desserts spelled backward!!
Deep breathing, meditation, reading a book, nature walk are all powerful stress-relieving remedies.
4) Maintain healthy gut flora- Out gut microbes are our' second brain' and play a very important role in our food preferences. Eating too much of fast foods and processed foods changes the gut flora that makes us crave unhealthier food. On the other hand food high in prebiotics and probiotics ( fiber-rich food, fermented products, yogurt) maintains healthy gut flora and help to reduce cravings.
5) Get 7-8 hrs of sleep- Inadequate sleep increases one of our gut hormone- Ghrelin. Medical studies have shown that high-level of Ghrelin can make us crave high-calorie dense food. So make sleep high priority when you are trying to lose weight.
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