Like many people, I love to eat. This shouldn’t be surprising since we eat three full meals every day plus some snacks sprinkled in between. But, as many people can agree, it’s hard to resist the urge to eat when I’m bored or to stop eating a meal even though I know I am full.
To try to combat these urges to overeat, I have put together a set of five simple tips that have worked for me to easily adopt in your day-to-day life.
1. Drink Water Before Every Meal.
This first tip is very simple to follow: drink a full glass of water or drink a cup of tea immediately after waking up. When you sleep at night, you lose water through two ways: 1) breathing out water vapor and 2) sweating. So, when you wake up, it is important to drink water to replenish the water loss.
Drinking water also makes you feel fuller before you eat breakfast, so you won’t eat as much during your first meal of the day. Likewise, if you drink water before every meal, you can trick your body into thinking it is fuller before you actually begin eating.
2. Eat Your Veggies First!
In general, your plate should have a balance of protein, carbs, and vegetables. To make sure that I eat the healthiest thing on my plate (veggies) before I start feeling full, I always eat my vegetables first. This way, when I am full and if there is still food on my plate, I will only have protein and carbs left behind, which are generally more caloric and less healthy.
3. Eat Slowly.
I know, it’s hard to resist the urge to eat quickly if you are in a rush or you have not eaten for a long time. While in the short run wolfing down food can feel very satisfying, it has some complications in the long run. First, if you are eating quickly, then you most likely have not chewed your food as much. Additionally, the stomach may fill up faster than it can handle if you eat quickly. As a result, you may experience indigestion and reflux.
More importantly, it takes about 20 minutes after you have eaten enough food before your brain recognizes that you are full. If you eat too fast, you risk overeating. So, relax and eat in small bites; your stomach will thank you later.
4. Count Calories Before You Snack.
Eating excess calories is much easier than working off those calories. This is not our fault since we were evolutionarily designed to be better at conserving rather than burning calories. However, this means that we should be more careful about what we eat rather than focus solely on working out more.
Generally, a ten-minute jog will burn 100 calories. If you feel tempted to eat a 500-calorie cupcake, then you would have to be jogging for almost an hour to counteract those additional calories. I want the laziest ways to avoid overeating, and refraining from a snack will be much easier than eating the snack and later trying to exercise and burn off the calories.
5. Try Not to Multitask.
In a world where we constantly alternate between working, texting, and going on Facebook, it seems to make sense to multitask while we eat. Before you go on Netflix and start eating your meal, you may want to consider that people who eat while distracted with another task tend to consume 10% more calories than their non-distracted counterparts.
Quite simply, if you are not as aware of how much you have eaten, you will be more likely to overeat. So, make sure to carve out some time for just you and your food.
With not too much effort, you will be able to adopt these simple tips into your lifestyle. Thanks for reading, and happy eating!