Following a new diet is hard, but that leads to a question: Why is it so hard? Fast food, a busy lifestyle, and food industry marketing are some things that come to mind. Internal motivation and external motivation play a role in whether or not you stay on track, so we will differentiate between the two types of motivation to better understand the real reasons behind the tactics. Even so, there’s many reasons to eat healthy, but do those reasons apply to you? Will power alone may not cut it. Here are 12 ways to find motivation to eat healthy.
1. Find 5 to 10 Reasons to Eat Healthy
Want to lose weight? Fit in your clothes? Lower your blood pressure? Feel better?
There’s numerous reasons why you are likely seeking to eat healthy, whether that’s regarding your physical appearance, mental health, or for other health reasons. However, it’s important to clearly identify your goals and write them down. Prioritize your most important objective, then build out secondary goals that support your objective. For example, if your priority is lowering blood pressure, identify positive results that you’d want to target in addition to lowering your blood pressure. Perhaps in addition to blood pressure, you’d like to lower your cholesterol levels, get off your blood pressure medications, prevent heart disease, live a longer life to see your grandchildren, lose weight, and have more energy in daily life.
Next, understand these reasons to eat healthy as how they relate to motivation. When you truly understand what your reasons are and the motivation behind those reasons, finding other tactics to eat well will be much easier.
Internal Motivation (Intrinsic Motivation)
Internal motivation is everything as it relates to how you feel about your reasons to eat healthy. This type of motivation is less common than external motivation, yet it likely exists within your chosen reasons nonetheless.
For example, you know that you want to improve your blood pressure as recommended by your physician and live a longer life, but is that all? You might be a driven person who thrives on constant self-improvement. You always seek to become better at your job and in your work, so this is a good reason to become better at your eating habits. Physiologically, you seek to live and survive, and high blood pressure is a threat to your survival. Psychologically, you want to be able to spend fruitful time with your grandchildren. You also may desire more energy in daily life because lately you’re having difficulty focusing on work or making it through the day.
External Motivation (Extrinsic Motivation)
External motivation is everything outside of you that gives you motivation to eat healthy. Does someone standing next to you in a crowd know that you have high blood pressure? Probably not, unless they have already judged you or drawn that assumption on their own. That doesn’t mean that blood pressure numbers aren’t an external motivation. You might fear some things externally, such as what your doctor will say at the next visit or what your close ones might think about those numbers. There may be the incentive motivation to saving money from having to pay for medications and one less task to think about in your day. You can also learn from your secondary reasons to eat healthy that you desire to lose weight because you want to have a healthier or leaner appearance.
2. Stay Present and Motivated to Eat Healthy
In this extrinsic and intrinsic motivation, you’re actively seeking an understanding of how eating healthy makes you feel or look. Pay close attention to how your body reacts when you follow a nutritious diet. Notice how you have increased your energy levels, how your skin is glowing, that your clothes fit better, or your blood pressure numbers are improving. Staying present in the moment and recognizing these benefits can give you the motivation to eat healthy because you’re now recognizing the beneficial effects. What’s more, you will discover more reasons to eat healthy because you can recognize the full list of positive results (which may surprise you).
3. Don’t Ignore Your Cravings
This doesn’t mean to cave into your cravings and purchase that cake. Rather, you should find healthier alternatives to satiate the cravings instead. For example, if you have a sweet tooth, you can mix up this spinach berry smoothie and add some stevia to it, or try this chocolate avocado ice cream. Be warned, though, that avocado ice cream is high in calories, but it will give you vitamins and minerals that you’d never see in that milkshake. There are several internal and external motivations in this tactic, including the enjoyment of food and the satisfaction felt from sustaining your body with nutritious and delicious recipes.
4. Get Internal Motivation Through Exercise
Exercise can really help your mental health and inspire you to stay on track because exercise releases endorphins which make you feel good. Play your favorite sport or take a relaxing walk to reflect on your goals and accomplishments. Plus, if you know you exercised, you’ll feel resistant to the thought of giving up. Still not finding the motivation to eat healthy on the days that you exercise? Refer back to number 3 about not ignoring your cravings. Physical activity may make you feel hungry, so it’s necessary to have a backup plan to counteract your food cravings.
5. Try New Recipes and Food
Similar to number 2, don’t ignore your cravings, you should experiment with new recipes that meet your expectations. If you want a reason to eat healthy, you should find food and recipes that incorporate fruits or vegetables along with your favorite flavors and spices. Crockpot recipes, for example, have an endless list of recipes that utilize whole food and are easily prepared. Whatever it is, trying new recipes will shake things up and keep you interested. This type of external motivation is incentive motivation, as you should look forward to eating and not just chomping it down for health’s sake.
6. Educate Yourself About Food
There is an extensive list of food and their associated benefits. Research is also constantly being conducted about various diets and potential health affects related to food. You should have an internal motivation to learn. Where there’s a desire to educate yourself is the knowledge to arm yourself with the motivation to eat healthy. Can you really say no to fruits and vegetables with anticancer or blood pressure lowering benefits? Maybe you can say “no” with that knowledge, but it will be harder to do as you progress on your healthy eating journey.
7. Create a Meal Plan That’s Easy to Follow
Decide ahead of time on what your meals will be for the week. Write your meals down and plan on cooking your meals or purchase a meal plan through a food delivery service. If meals are not being delivered, prepare your meals ahead of time and portion them out into Tupperware containers where you can quickly grab, go, and heat up in a microwave. A busy lifestyle can become an external motivation to stop eating healthy – opposite of your goals. That’s why it’s important for your meals to be easy to prepare and cook.
8. Relish Leftover Dishes
Go all out and cook big on the days that you have time. Leftover dishes taste far better on the following day, providing external motivation to want to eat leftover food. Plus, it will be easier to put together a lunch for work or eat for dinner the following day. If it’s too much food, freeze your homemade leftovers and treat them as if they were frozen dinners.
9. Listen to Music or a Podcast for Internal Motivation
Music has been shown to have all sorts of psychological benefits, and certain types of music may inspire more than others. Choose songs that empower you or relax you, taking you back to number one: being present. We sometimes get too far ahead of ourselves rather than being in the moment. This isn’t a race, and time isn’t going to move any faster. Music can help with that. If you prefer, find a podcast or YouTube channel about nutrition and healthy eating that you enjoy listening to. Turn your attention to the podcast to stay motivated to eat healthy or to bypass negative thoughts.
10. Find Support From Others
There’s many ways to find support, and unfortunately, that support may not always be available from friends and family. Even so, there are hundreds of support groups across the internet, both paid and free. Seek out diet groups on social media, connect, and talk on a daily basis. Some groups may even share great recipe ideas that inspire you to cook. Need more? Hire a life coach that specializes in nutrition and lifestyle changes. If you believe that your unhealthy eating habits run deeper, seek professional help from a therapist that might be able to guide you. Getting support from others can help to remind you of intrinsic motivations that got you going in the first place. Group and individual support will be extrinsic motivations because they can help you stay consistent and accountable.
11. Practice Mindful Eating
It’s all too easy to cram food into your mouth on the go. People that practice mindful eating are more likely to eat in moderation and enjoy their food. It’s important to slow down, chew thoroughly, and savor the taste. A busy lifestyle can severely impact mindful eating, so if necessary, turn to numbers 7 and 8 which exemplify planned meals and easy preparation. Wake up a bit earlier if you have to for breakfast and be sure to take your full lunch time at work. Don’t pay attention to some guidance out there that says that you can’t eat too closely before bedtime. If that’s the best time to practice mindful eating and to keep motivation to eat healthy, then do it. The point is, savor and enjoy every bite!
12. Reward Yourself to Maintain the Motivation to Eat Healthy
If you’ve had a good week, rewarding yourself is the ultimate extrinsic motivation for staying on track. This is especially true for finding motivation to eat healthy after an extended period. It’s a reminder of how you accomplished your diet or nutrition goals. That doesn’t mean to go out and eat everything, either. Instead, do an activity that you would enjoy, like going to an event or settling down with a book or videogame. Investing into an activity that you enjoy is also investing into yourself.
Finding Motivation to Eat Healthy Uses More Than One Tactic
Don’t expect one tactic to give you the motivation to eat healthy. You’ll need many tactics. Combine exercise and music together while staying present. Be present when you reward yourself, or reward yourself with nutritious food substitutes to replace your fast food cravings. Listen to music or a podcast while you’re cooking a new recipe. Whatever the case is, constantly reevaluate to see what works and what doesn’t. Understand the internal and extrinsic motivations behind your eating habits and recognize what you can do better next time if you slip up. Whatever the case is, don’t give up!
Leave a Reply