Thought for Food

Keeping track of what I’m eating has opened the lid on a number of habits I have. I often don’t notice how often I eat or what it is I’m eating. This is especially influenced by my current state.

Attention to Food

One of the biggest benefits I’ve experienced is an increased awareness of what I eat and when. I’ve tried to make meals a bit more structured, but I haven’t quite addressed my other problem, snacking.

The amount of snacking I’ve done throughout the day is surprising. There was a day this past week where most of my calorie intake was from snacks throughout the day. Not even all of my meals combined that day added up.

Recognizing a behavior is the first step to taking action to adjust it. I know that most of my snacking is done at work. It’s easy to grab a treat a co-worker brought in and take my mind off a stressful day for even a minute or two. A helpful fix to this can be removing the ease of which I can get up and grab a snack.

I solved the possibility of going to the vending machine by not bringing my wallet to work unless needed. Though coming up with a solution for easily available snacks is still beyond me. If you have any ideas, let me know!

Mood Inspires Food

It’s funny how simple it seems that how we feel really impacts our diet, and then our diet impacts how we feel. During days of stress, I’ve found myself eating whatever junk I can get my hands on. While days that I feel accomplished or gratified, I can easily grab a healthier bite.

It makes me wonder, if eating better foods, we can trick ourselves that we’re in a better mood than we are. That might have to be an experiment during this trial. I’d love to set up a hack for myself to get back on track after a tough day.

Tools of the Trade

My Fitness Pal is a pretty commonly referenced app when people decide to start tracking their eating habits. I’ve enjoyed it so far. It’s simple to use, but there’s a lot of work that goes into early set up.

Each food item has to be searched in a massive database, and finding the right dish that coincides with what you ate can be a bit of a puzzle. Especially if you have a broad range of foods in a meal.

I’m interested to try out some other apps or practices for tracking this info. If you have any recommendations, let me know if the comments, and I’ll give it a try!