Consuming a well-rounded diet profoundly influences not just your physical well-being but also your mental health and connection to food.
We frequently hear this, don’t we? From both friends and health specialists. “It’s essential to have a well-rounded diet! A balanced diet is the ideal method to achieve your optimal weight and enhance your health!” But why is this truly vital, and what exactly does a balanced diet entail?
To effectively prioritize something daily, it’s crucial to grasp the reasoning behind it. If not, those convenient options and longstanding dietary habits appear much more appealing and simpler to follow.
In this section, we’ll clarify why adhering to a balanced diet is critical and how you can embark on this journey today.
What Makes a Balanced Diet Essential?
From enhanced health results to a more positive perspective on food, a balanced diet influences it all. Let’s explore four of the most notable advantages you can expect from maintaining a balanced diet.
1. Supplies Your Body with Necessary Nutrition
On a fundamental, anatomical level, our bodies flourish and exist based on the food we provide them. This is precisely where the concept of nourishment originates. By consuming balanced meals, the food we give our bodies is filled with the essential nutrients required to keep us energized and healthy. It sustains us!
This enables us to build muscle, utilize energy, stay focused, fend off illness, and much more. Who wouldn’t want that?
2. Mitigates Cravings Due to Dietary Restrictions
When we follow a balanced diet, we ensure we’re getting all the crucial elements our bodies require. This encompasses all the macronutrients present in our food. On a basic level, consider proteins, carbs, and fats, but we will delve deeper into that later. Alternatively, when we fail to adhere to a balanced diet, we frequently miss out on one or more of these essential macronutrients.
This can be either intentional or unintentional. If unintentional, it often stems from habits or preferences! Perhaps you’re not particularly fond of various protein sources, or you overlook adding fats to your meals because they were rarely included in your upbringing. When it’s intentional, it’s typically because we believe we should exclude certain nutrients due to dieting or food guidelines.
In both cases, lacking essential components of a balanced diet eventually manifests as cravings and a sense of loss of control. We desire food items so intensely that it can frequently lead to overeating or binge-eating. Over time, this can result in a detrimental relationship with food as well.
By adhering to a balanced diet, you can stave off those intense cravings and foster a general equilibrium with your food.
3. A Balanced Diet Regulates Blood Sugar Levels
Blood sugar is a term we encounter quite frequently in the health and wellness arena. It plays a role in numerous aspects!
Nonetheless, it is still quite common to experience unstable blood sugar levels that spike and plummet uncontrollably. Why is this unacceptable? Well, primarily because it leads to elevated blood sugar readings during your annual medical check-up, which is unpleasant for anyone. It can also leave you feeling extremely hungry, shaky, irritable, and cause some cognitive fog. This generally occurs when we neglect to eat a balanced diet.
When blood sugar levels are stable and controlled, we benefit from sustained energy, regulated hunger, and no more elevated blood sugar during doctor visits!
4. Ensures You Feel Full and Satisfied
Are you familiar with that ‘insatiable hunger’ sensation? Where it seems like no matter what you eat, you’re never quite full? This can often be a consequence of consuming unbalanced meals.
Your body craves balanced meals, and thus, it feels wonderful when you provide them! This means you genuinely feel full and satisfied after each meal. Anatomically, you perceive physical fullness, and mentally, you feel gratified with what you’ve consumed.
No more feeling perpetually unsatisfied!
How to Maintain a Balanced Diet
Now that we understand the significance of a balanced diet, how can we achieve this?
The simplest method to follow a balanced diet is by adhering to the Foundational Five framework. It encompasses all the crucial macronutrients we discussed and simplifies your approach. To maintain a balanced diet, strive to prioritize and incorporate the following five elements in your meals: protein, starchy and sugary carbs, non-starchy carbs (vegetables), fat, and flavor.
By doing so, you’ll gain all those fantastic benefits we’ve discussed! However, does this imply that every meal from now on needs to be entirely Foundational Five? No, it does not. That wouldn’t be balanced either. Here, I’m using the term balance concerning your relationship with food.
If you attempt to rigidly adhere to the Foundational Five, it may feel as if you’re only prioritizing nourishment while disregarding enjoyment, when in reality both aspects are essential! Use the Foundational Five as a guideline for your meals, but always remember that this isn’t meant to serve as a strict food rule.
Find Comfort and End Your Nutritional Struggles Permanently
If you find yourself persistently battling to eat the “correct” foods or remain “on course,” you’re not alone. With the overflow of nutritional information and varying opinions available, it can get quite confusing and overwhelming.
Here at Nutrition Stripped, we always aim to equip you with the resources needed to nourish your body physically and enjoy balanced meals, while also ensuring that you engage in this process with ease and joy. If you feel stressed about food or overwhelmed and in pursuit of support, I’m here to assist.
Do You Wish to Achieve Greater Balance in Your Food Choices?
Then discover your balanced eating type!
Take this brief and complimentary 45-second quiz to uncover your balanced eating archetype and understand what your specific type requires to maintain harmony in your nourishment. This way, you can finally free yourself from the obsession with food and dieting, sustain a balanced weight, and foster a positive relationship with food and your body.
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originally published 7/22/22