How to develop lifestyle habits for losing weight and keeping it off!

Brenda Braslow, MS, RDN, LDN, CDCES - Registered Dietitian Nutritionist and Certified Diabetes Care and Education Specialist (CDCES)

Is it time to troubleshoot your lifestyle habits for losing weight? Learn some expert tips and habits for both losing weight and sustaining your new health strategies.

Reset habits for losing weight

Isn't it interesting that we are usually better at solving other people's problems or observing their habits without even considering our own? Pretty true in the healthy lifestyle arena, as well.

So, it is quite common to ask friends for advice or seek help from a counselor when we need to hit the healthy-habit reset button. A good friend or counselor can see our issues from the outside and point things out to help us move in a healthier direction, even brainstorming habits for losing weight.

As for maintaining a healthy lifestyle, it is also quite smart and effective to evaluate your habits. Some of them may not be helping you meet your health goals. Tracking calories with an app like MyNetDiary is an effective and objective method for losing, maintaining, or gaining weight and provides a great opportunity to observe your daily habits.

Check in with your habits so you can meet your goals for losing weight and living a healthy lifestyle

Watch your behaviors and habits as if you were another person. Take it all in and give yourself advice as if you were a friend. Pretend you are a fly on the wall, observing everything without judgment. Remember, the fly on the wall is not judgmental; it simply observes. To see things more clearly, look at your behaviors as an outsider without blame or opinion.

How to use your food tracker data to reset eating and exercise behaviors

1. Find a quiet space to review your food log. Reflect on the "when," "where", "why", and "how" of your eating and exercise habits.
2. As a casual, fly-on-the-wall observer, pick out a lifestyle behavior that is not working for your healthy lifestyle goal. Break it down into smaller components to recognize patterns and connections. Think about how you might break specific lifestyle patterns. For example, is there an environmental cue or trigger that causes you to eat more than you need or to skip exercise? Troubleshoot, thinking about the different possibilities, and try out other options until you are successful. Remember, life is not perfect, and your situation may also change. You may need to try different strategies and switch gears as the need arises.

Solutions to common healthy-habit-sabotaging scenarios

1. During her afternoon work break, Jenny finds herself wandering back to the break room where she socializes and snacks with co-workers. It has become a social ritual. Everyone brings in snacks, candies, and especially high-calorie foods they want to get out of the home. She finds herself eating a lot of calories with no room in her daily calorie budget.

Strategies to break Jenny's habit and help her calorie budget:

• Bring a healthy snack, and take it to the break room to nosh on while socializing.
• Skip break and work through it. (Probably not sustainable for overall health and happiness).
• Ask co-workers to go for a walk around the building during a break for a healthy way to socialize.
• Jenny loves yoga and stretching. She could ask co-workers to join her for a mini yoga or stretching session using a YouTube video during break time.
• Ask others if they might be into bringing healthier snacks in portion-controlled serving sizes to create a healthier atmosphere for all.

Jenny might pick one strategy and see how it works for her. If it doesn't work or her situation changes, no worries, move on to another plan.

2. Steve really enjoys walking in the evening as a way to exercise, unwind, and connect with nature. He makes a plan to walk for 30 minutes after dinner on Monday through Thursday. It works for the summer, but by fall, he realizes he is hooked on an interesting TV show after dinner and notices his walking plan backsliding. It is time to switch gears.

Possible encouragements to keep Steve walking, an exercise he truly enjoys:

• Record the program, and watch it after he walks.
• Stream the live program so he can listen to it while walking.
• Change his time for walking to the afternoon break or before dinner.
• Ask a friend to join him in walking for motivation, accountability, and socialization.

3. Reflecting on her habits, Yolanda realizes she is grocery shopping on Mondays after work, when it is very crowded. She is pretty hungry and tired. She figures out that she often buys foods that don't work best for her health.

Specific ways for Yolanda to change her grocery habits and support a healthier lifestyle:

• She could have a snack before going to the grocery, so her appetite is not driving her impulse buying. She could also take five minutes to relax in the car before heading into the store.
• She could switch her shopping day to Sunday mornings after breakfast when the store is less crowded so she can relax and be more in control.
• She could plan to get more organized and make a grocery list that builds healthy meals. She may even try the easy shopping list feature on the MyNetDiary app on her smartphone to see how that works for her. She will do her best to stick to the list to avoid food marketing in the store.

Yes, calorie and exercise tracking are important for balancing calories to meet your health goals. Why not take it a step further by observing your habits and solving some issues you struggle with in order to make your plan more smooth, effective, and sustainable? Hitting the reset button on lifestyle habits to lose weight and keep it off could be your easiest adjustment with "trim"endous rewards.

Still new to MyNetDiary? Learn more today by downloading the app for FREE.

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