In my last post, I wrote about one of the main problems with the majority of those meal plans you can buy on the interwebs. In case you missed it, the bottom line was the lack of attention to habit (re)work and expectations of those who believe the meal plan easily cures nutrition woes.
But is there a way to work on meal planning for yourself that also helps with habit (re)formation and gaining traction in your goals?
Yes, indeedy.
Let me share with you an example stepwise process of how we can become empowered and more skilled to venture into meal planning and habit rework together, on our own time and in our own way.
Observe to identify.
Take a week to observe, log, and note your food intake patterns and habits (or lack thereof) around eating sessions. Assess “enhancement areas” (I like to use positive lingo vs. nasty tone) where you can easily and realistically make some upgrades to the meal or the ways in which you approach a meal. Alternatively, choose a type of meal that you know is…excuse my language… a shit show. For example, breakfast is all over the place in composition (often poor quality foods), excessive (way too many calories for what you need), or bird-like (way too few calories that leads to Snack Monster Madness later).
Set the intention and create the action plan.
This part really isn’t so much about the meal and foods themselves, as it is the act (habit formation!) of DOING a plan. Meaning, I’m not telling you here how to make your meals more healthy or this or that nutrition stuff. I’m suggesting you first put your time into the Systems Design piece of the meal planning activity itself. You are figuring out HOW to change your lifestyle so that you can put time into planning meals. Make sense? Along the way and as a part of the process, you will gradually improve your nutrition quality.
For example: “Before I head out for my exercise on Sunday morning, I will commit to spending 30 minutes to write out my breakfast plan for Monday through Friday.”
Notice this doesn’t say anything about what’s in those breakfasts. Rather, we are designing Sunday morning to create the habit of meal planning. A bonus is the approach of habit stacking whereby you link habits together. And when trying to create a new habit, it’s helpful to link that new wanna-have and need habit to the already-got habit. In this example, we do the thing we need (meal plan) before doing the thing we want (exercise).
Break the barriers, make it easy.
Borrowed from James Clear’s book, “Atomic Habits,” is the “make it obvious” step. We get stuff accomplished more easily when it’s right in front of our eyeballs calling out “HEY, YOU!!!” So for this step, you figure out how to change up your surroundings, or the things (and people) that need to be situated in order for you to more easily honor your intention and action plan.
From the example above, we could make sure we’ve got our writing tools available to make the plan (unless you’re doing this on a smartphone, then have the phone charged and ready), recipes available, and anything else that might get in the way set aside. If you know you get lured into Sunday morning TV or get on the train to Internet Browsing Rabbit Holes, then you have to make a decision to NOT do those things until after your list is made.
You keep the barriers and time suckers away from the task at hand. And remember to connect your brain/thoughts to WHY you want to do the task at hand. Go beyond the short-term to connect to longer term outcomes - give your brain reasons why this task is oh so beautiful and don’t let stuff get in the way of it.
Practice, reflect, assess, and correct for next time.
As you get into the groove, it’s important to reflect on how it’s going. Assess, reassess, and correct to make your habit more second nature. Tie the habit to the outcome(s) of what you are aiming for. AHA - notice that your meal quality has improved? You are spending less money on junky foods? You aren’t panic eating? Etc, etc. Or, if you realize Sunday morning is not the best time for the task, then shift to another time but use similar strategies as already mentioned. You gotta fine-tune this process and stay with it until you’ve got a routine.
Celebrate the wins, no matter the level of impact. And hang in there.
A lot of us are way too hard on ourselves or we expect miracles with the snap of our fingers. Dudes, you gotta celebrate the baby steps and you gotta keep going. And going. And repeating, And fine-tuning.
There is no perfect, but you can experience amazing progress in this little part of your health journey. Which really is a big deal.
Let me know how you do!
Peace,
Dina