7 Strategies to Put The Fork Down And Eat Less

genConnect.com

By JJ Virgin

Dashboard dining, TV dinners, movie munching - let's face it, we are becoming a society of mindless eaters which can wreak havoc on our waistlines. The good news is that you can build simple eating behavior strategies into your lifestyle that can help you easily eat 20% without even noticing the loss (except on the scale that is.)

Remember, too much healthy food is still unhealthy. Calories do count, of course where they come from counts most so while I am telling you to shrink your plate and slow it down, I am always going to emphasize loading up with non starchy veggies.

Strategy #1: Learn from the French Women: stop eating when you are no longer hungry RATHER than continuing to eat until you are full. And since it takes 20 minutes or more for us to register being full anyway it is easy to overeat if we are racing through our meals.

Strategy #2: Dine with slowpokes and pace your eating to theirs. I am a notoriously fast eater and this strategy along with reminder myself to CHEW and put my fork down during bites has helped slow me down tremendously.

Strategy #3: Shrink your plate. Turns out our dinner plates have been getting bigger (yep supersizing is happening on the home front too.) So shift over to the salad plates and soup bowls. My only exception is for salad greens and steamed veggies - load up on these!

Strategy #4: Serve the right amount of food (live by my balanced plate of clean lean protein, healthy fats, a rainbow of non starchy veggies and a small amount of high fiber, low glycemic starchy carbs) and then pack up the rest BEFORE you start eating. The only additional food that should be at the table are (you guessed it) non starchy veggies.

Strategy #5: Drink up, between meals. Quite often we are mistaking hunger for thirst so crank up the pure spring water and green tea between meals. Carry a safe drinking bottle with you so you can track your amounts because what you measure you can improve.

Click here to read strategies 6 & 7

Be proactive with your eating strategies, it's much less painful than having to fix the damage that mindless eating can wreak after the fact.

©2011 JJ Virgin & Associates, Inc.

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About the Author:

JJ Virgin is the premiere voice of scientific reason in the world of nutrition and wellness. She is one of the nation's foremost celebrity nutrition experts, public speaker and media personality. Her 25 years in the health and fitness industry, the past 10 in holistic nutrition and functional medicine, have earned JJ recognition as the go-to weight loss expert who can unlock the door to life-long weight management through her sensible, no-fail approach to nutrition and fitness. JJ's book Six Weeks to Sleeveless and Sexy was published in May 2010 from Simon & Schuster and she is the costar of the new TLC primetime reality seriesFreaky Eaters premiering September 2010.

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