Working from home and nutrition!

This blog was originally written, with all rights applicable, by our own Noortje Berendsen.

working from home and nutrition

Eating tips for at home ??? Now that we are largely at home and have fewer commitments, it may be a good time to take a closer look at your diet. Here are 5 tips to get started right away. Tip 1: Eat with attention When you eat on autopilot, you often eat more. Perhaps this sounds familiar; when you need to eat quickly between your work or when you eat in front of the TV. It is therefore advisable to eat with attention. You can do this by taking each bite with awareness and also chewing on it a little more often as you usually would. Eating with attention has many positive effects. It gives your brain more time to realize that you are full, and when you eat with attention you also enjoy each bite more, making you feel satisfied faster. As a result, you end up eating less without still feeling “hungry. Tip 2: Portion size We are often used to large portions. Without realizing it, we then eat these (too) large portions. Try using smaller plates or bowls, this way you unconsciously eat a little less. One downside to this tip is that you may end up eating too little at once. Not only will this cause a loss of muscle tissue (which is exactly what you want to preserve!), but there is also a risk of vitamin and mineral deficiencies. It is also possible that if you start eating more again, the pounds will fly back on faster. So find that balance for yourself (see tip 4), eat enough but not too much or too little. Tip 3: Make sure you eat whole food By whole food we mean food that has been processed as little as possible, so vegetables and fruit, whole grain products, nuts, legumes, dairy (substitutes) and unprocessed lean meat and fish. If you make sure that at least 80% of your diet is full and varied, you automatically get enough proteins, carbohydrates, fats, minerals and vitamins. This tip also eliminates sugary products such as fruit juices, soft drinks and cookies from your diet. Tip 4: It’s all about balance Just like the rest of life, nutrition is also about balance. For example, it is impossible to just obsessively make healthy choices, but similarly, making structurally unhealthy choices is not a proper balance either. A good diet does not depend on one wrong choice; it depends on what you eat throughout the day. You are doing well if, at the end of the day, you have found a consistency in enjoying food and eating healthy so that you can be as happy and healthy as possible. Don’t be too hard on yourself while finding this balance. Try to take 80% whole foods and with that you can spend 20% on a piece of chocolate or a bowl of chips. If the foundation is right, then you have room to deviate from this once in a while. Therefore, enjoy yourself once in a while and try not to feel guilty afterwards; a year has 365 days and of all the days in the year, most days are “normal” days in which you can tighten the reins a little.

You also don’t get fat just from that one day when you eat a little too much than you really wanted to. You only get fat if you eat too much and exercise too little for the other 364 days of the year. Tip 5: Be patient And as a final tip, I want to give everyone, for whatever goal is being pursued, that your body needs some time to adjust. Ideally, of course, you would like to see results immediately if you are doing well with your diet and exercise, but unfortunately it does not work that way. Losing or gaining an average of half a kilo to one kilo per week is a realistic goal and very easy to maintain.