At a rate obesity is going, it becomes more important to be conscious on what to eat. However, with so many choices, it's incredibly difficult to keep up with the diet plans, much more pick the best one. A health and wellness coach tries to keep things simpler and more effective.
In her July 9, 2015, article in Huffington Post, coach Lori Pollan introduces a brand-new concept called the Wheel of Healthy Eating.
She began her article by stating that most diets are actually focused on what should not be included. For example, a vegan diet means removing meats and their by-products such as eggs. Gluten-free, on the other hand, is avoiding any product with gluten. A low-fat diet may eliminate food with high amounts of fat.
The problem with this setup is a person might only feel deprived or denied of certain types of food. That may result to food binging later or a diet that's lacking an essential nutrient.
Further, she noted that regardless of how much calories a person eats, it remains consistent on a daily basis.
Rather, it's best to know how much of the good stuff a person should eat. A good way is to make a visual out of it. In her article, she divided a plate into various categories, namely, leafy greens, vegetables, fruits, legumes and pulses, whole grains, lean protein, nuts and seeds, and water.
As to why she picked these classifications, she enumerated their benefits at the bottom of the article. For instance, leafy greens are dense in nutrients but contain very low calories. A good combination of vegetables and fruits, on the other hand, increase satiety. Lean protein can boost fullness at the same time help build muscles, which burn more calories than fat. By adding more whole grains in the diet, a person may become less dependent on carbs.
Based on the division, a person can then score how much of each of the category he or she eats consistently and plot it. In the end, a person can look at the amount of each of the categories and compare the shaded, which stands for the healthy food, and white space, which represents the bad stuff. He or she can adjust his or her diet accordingly.
To know more about the Wheel of Healthy Eating, you can visit here.