Staying home can often be seen as daunting, especially while trying to eat clean and get lean. Kick your cravings to the curb by following 5 basic tips.
While all the trips back and forth to the kitchen may count as a cardio session, feeding into temptation definitely isn’t helping your weight-loss goals.
Say goodbye to cravings with these 5 tips:
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Time your meals:
Scheduling your meals can be highly beneficial, ensuring that your nutrition is never neglected. Allocating times to each meal ensures that your body has metabolised all the nutrients from the previous meal; meaning that it is running as efficiently as possible. Ideally, meals should be spaced 2-3 hours apart. Using this method may curb cravings, as the body knows exactly when to expect its next meal.
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Meal prep:
Following a diet requires adequate preparation. Avoid temptation by prepping your meals, at least one day in advance. Portion and place each balanced meal into a container, to be stored in the fridge. This ensures that you have no reason to browse around the fridge shelves and kitchen cupboards; looking for something to snack on.
Meal replacement shakes are a convenient way of getting in your daily nutrients, whilst restricting your calories. Satisfy your cravings with your favourite flavoured shake.
Have a look at these Primal Diet Protein mouth-watering flavours:
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Keep busy:
Boredom is one of the leading contributors to unhealthy eating habits. Studies such as ‘Eaten up by boredom: consuming food to escape awareness of the bored self‘, describe the link between boredom levels and eating habits. This study concluded that individuals who have high boredom levels, tend to eat more throughout the day. Keep you mind and body bust throughout the day; knock off a few chores or research a new training technique – keeping busy and productive may delay the onset of cravings.
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Keep well hydrated:
Thirst is often confused for hunger. This is because both thirst and hunger sensations are controlled by the hypothalamus in the human brain. Test your cravings by drinking a tall glass of water, as you feel tempted to stray away from diet. Give it 5 minutes, and see how you feel. Chances are that your body wasn’t craving a guilty pleasure, but some liquids to rehydrate cells. Drinking a minimum of 2 litres, spread evenly throughout the duration of the day, may avoid you mistaking your thirst for hunger.
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Reduce your anxiety levels:
Stress and anxiety are common causes of developing unhealthy eating habits. Not only does increased anxiety levels cause you to seek comfort from food; increased cortisol levels (the main stress hormone) leads to muscle breakdown. Practice breathing techniques, listen to soothing music, take a walk, try meditating; these are excellent ways to regulate stress levels. Another way to ease stress levels is exercise – even more reason to try a home workout.
Don’t have any gym equipment at home? No problem – read this article on how resistance bands are becoming a global trend, perfect for home workouts.