Do you always make New Year’s resolution and not even a month in you end up ditching them? You’re not alone.
Whatever the New Year’s resolution is, each year a lot of people around the world resolve to take better care of their health.
We often make blanket statements like ”this year I resolve to eat better” or “this year I resolve to get fit so I can be healthier.”
Unfortunately, such broad resolutions are difficult to keep. They’re not specific enough for you to follow through on.
If you’re looking for a diet New Year’s resolution you will want to keep, consider these seven resolutions.
1. Stop Drinking Soda and Sugary Drinks
The fact is, so many of us all around the world tend to drink our calories. Odds are, you already know sugar in excess can be hard on your health. It adds unnecessary weight and it affects blood sugar levels.
Resolve to eliminate soda and sugary drinks from your diet. Or, at the very least significantly reduce it. If you do that, you may eliminate several hundred calories a day from this one simple adjustment.
2. Eat Fruits and Vegetables With Every Meal And Snack
If you add a fruit or a vegetable to every meal and snack, you’re so much closer to meeting your daily requirements.
It’s really not as difficult as you might think. You can have fruits or veggies for your snacks. Add fruits like an apple or berries to your breakfast.
A smoothie can have as many as three servings of fruit or vegetables.
If you add greens to lunch and dinner and you’re well on your way to getting the nutrients your body needs each day.
3. Try a new fruit or vegetable each month
Scientists have found that people who eat a variety of fruits and vegetables are healthier.
Many people become stuck in a rut with their fruits and vegetables. When you introduce a new one to your diet each month, you’re broadening your nutritional horizons.
You will have more variety to choose from. You will look forward to your meals because there will be different exciting flavors in the mix for you to enjoy – never a dull meal.
4. Switch to whole grain bread
Swap your white bread for whole-grain bread, barley, and buckwheat instead. This is an easy change to make and it’ll add more healthy whole grains to your diet.
You can turn it up a notch, this whole-grain change and switch to steel cut oats and brown rice instead of instant oatmeal and white rice. These small changes make a big difference.
5. Eat fewer sweets
If you’re like many us who have a sweet tooth, you probably have several sugary snacks each day.
Resolve to cut back. That you can reign in by tracking how many sugary snacks you normally eat each day. Cut back to one snack each day or one sugary snack each week.
You can also cut back on the amount of sugar you take in your coffee or tea. If you’re used to having two sugars, use one instead until you gradually phase out to taking no sugar at all in your coffee or tea.
6. Drink a glass of green tea each day
Of course, there is no substitute for water- you need to drink your water. Adding Green tea to your line up of beverages each day has been shown to provide fantastic health benefits.
The good thing is, you can either have it hot or cold. If you can add green tea to your routine each day you’ll get a wallop of nutrients and antioxidants.
You don’t have to switch and stop drinking coffee. Just mix it up a bit. You can either drink it in the morning or have a glass in the afternoon.
If you’re sensitive to caffeine then it’s better to have it in the morning, don’t drink it in the evening. Green tea does have a small amount of caffeine.
7. Stop eating late in the evenings
People often make poor eating decisions in the late evenings. Instead of having unhealthy snacks drink a glass of water.
Another good idea is to find something interesting to do to distract yourself.
If you must eat due to hunger, then eat something high in fiber. Foods like whole-grain cereals, bananas, apples, pears or any kind of fruit for that matter you should readily have on hand.
Also, cut veggie sticks like carrots, cucumbers or celery should be prepared and kept in the fridge for those times. This way, you are more likely to make healthy choices.
Stick To Making Healthy Choices
Are you getting enough variety in your diet? Most people don’t. Our bodies are designed to thrive with a supply of a number of nutrients.
Superfoods are foods that contain an excellent amount of nutrients. They’re also probably foods that you don’t consume on a regular basis – if at all.
Here’s how to add more superfoods to your daily diet.
First of all, it’s important to understand what superfoods are. You can’t add them to your diet unless you’re aware of them.
Superfoods are foods that are jam-packed with tons of vitamins and antioxidants. Common superfoods include:
• Açaí
• Barley
• Beans
• Bok Choy
• Lentils
• Buckwheat
• Nuts and Seeds
• Sprouts
• Blueberries
• Broccoli
• Oats
• Oranges
• Pumpkin
• Salmon
• Soy
• Spinach
• Tea (green or black)
• Tomatoes
• Yogurt
As you’ll notice from looking at the foods listed above superfoods are primarily fruits and vegetables.
There are also other superfoods like whole grains, legumes and fish. Adding all of these foods to your daily diet can happen when you take these steps.
1: Create a menu plan for the upcoming week.
You should include recipes that contain superfoods. On top of that, add a fruit or vegetable to each and every meal.
Try to include one meal each week that contains fish or is vegetarian.
2: Snack on seeds, berries, and nuts
Seeds, nuts and berries singly or in combination does make a delicious snack. Also, you can add them to yogurt and have a superfood snack.
When you add berries, nuts as well as seeds to steel cut oats, for sure you will be treating yourself to a delicious superfood breakfast.
Step 3: Try to add one new superfood to your diet each week
You don’t have to eat all superfoods all the time. Variety is important – so that you are enthusiastic about your meals.
However, by adding them to your regular meals in addition to other fruits and vegetables, you’ll be giving your body everything it needs to stay strong and healthy.
Conclusion
As you’re looking forward to the New Year and contemplating resolutions, you need to be specific and intentional.
As a result, you’ll help yourself achieve success by setting specific goals designed to help you to lose weight and get healthier.
So, what goals have you set for your New Year’s diet resolution?
