{"id":7373,"date":"2024-03-01T06:28:00","date_gmt":"2024-02-29T19:28:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/onthecoastpublications.com.au\/onthecoastover55\/?p=7373"},"modified":"2024-02-01T23:29:17","modified_gmt":"2024-02-01T12:29:17","slug":"unlocking-healthy-habits-dietitians-guide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/onthecoastpublications.com.au\/onthecoastover55\/unlocking-healthy-habits-dietitians-guide\/","title":{"rendered":"Unlocking Healthy Habits: A Dietitian’s Guide to Sustainable Changes"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Carin Clegg, Accredited Practising Dietitian<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

With your New Year\u2019s renewed energy, January is a great time to start planning and start up or start back at those healthy habits. Being healthy, eating well and staying fit is something we all continue to work on so we can have enough strength and energy to live life to the fullest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A habit is something we do regularly, almost without thinking. Changing habits and making a new habit stick is actually quite hard.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As Dietitians, we work with people to change one of the most complex habits of all \u2013 our eating. We eat multiple times a day every day of our lives in various locations, with different people. Our eating is not only one habit, but many habits which have been created and interwoven in our lifestyle through each day, week, month and year of our lives. So, our eating habits can be the most difficult thing to change and help is almost always needed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Habit changing is a journey. Which is why all the quick fixes, diet books, pills and shakes do not work long term as there are often a great myriad of issues to address when it comes to eating habits and how to change them. As Dietitians we work with you each step of the way and use some of the following strategies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Awareness<\/strong>
The first thing to do is to become more aware of your habits. Keeping a diary can be an eye opener. The next thing to do is to reflect on your diary and learn more about why you do what you do. There are often lots of reasons why you make one food choice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In many cases, I believe the incredible power of marketing over the last few generations has played a big role in why we want to eat certain foods at certain times. And this is why so many discretionary foods are so available in our community and are placed on a pedestal over fresh healthy nutritious foods in our minds. For example, if it is a beach day ‘it is an ice\u2013cream day’. Instead you could just drink some iced water and get the same result \u2013 feeling cool.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Perhaps you have some limiting beliefs. Or you put labels on yourself: \u2018I am not a breakfast person\u2019, \u2018I love chocolate.\u2019 Again, there are often reasons for believing these and replacing these thoughts with more helpful thoughts is required: \u2018I can retrain my body to feel hungry for breakfast again so I do not overeat at night\u2019 \u2018 I enjoy eating chocolate, but I can also enjoy nutritious foods that my body needs.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Planning<\/strong>
We make over 200 subconscious decisions every day about what we eat. If most of these decisions were not automatic, that would be an incredibly exhausting amount of brain power needed. This is why it can be so difficult to cook dinner if you do not already know what you are going to cook. This is why those meal planning and preparation delivery companies like Hello Fresh are so popular these days. The planning required to make an action and start a new habit can be the biggest thing that stops us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Just sitting down and thinking about how you will implement your new habit, making a checklist of what you need to do, visualising how it will play out and troubleshoot how you will overcome those barriers can make the biggest difference.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One example is getting up earlier to have breakfast or getting that walk in. You may need to get your breakfast or walking clothes ready the night before. Plan your bedtime routine to be earlier, work on your bedtime routine to feel relaxed enough to fall asleep easily and allow yourself time to get used to this routine. Set your alarm earlier and figure out how to get out of bed. You could put some music on, do some stretching, think about what you are going to achieve that day, who are you looking forward to seeing, say something that motivates you like ‘it is time to start my day and I will make it a great one’.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Get inspired and supported by others
<\/strong>Whatever you do want to achieve, doing it with people who are supportive is a great way to start, start back or continue your healthy habits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Enlisting the help of professionals such as dietitians, exercise professionals, wellness coaches or psychologists, will also ensure you get the results you desire, through assessment, education, accountability, and motivation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So whatever your health and lifestyle goals are, they are absolutely achievable by taking the right steps forward.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Carin Clegg<\/strong> is the Director of Bright Diets, is a Paediatric Dietitian and Fitness Professional with an interest in sustainability. Carin wants everyone to be clever about their eating to feel happy, healthy and vibrant! Reach out at 0413 77 44 11, on our website www.brightdiets.com.au<\/a> or on the socials.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Carin Clegg, Accredited Practising Dietitian With your New Year\u2019s renewed energy, January is a great time to start planning and start up or start back at those healthy habits.…","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7375,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","episode_type":"audio","audio_file":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","filesize_raw":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[75,91],"series":[115],"class_list":["post-7373","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-health-wellbeing","tag-article","tag-carin-clegg","series-coffee-with-a-coastie"],"episode_featured_image":"https:\/\/onthecoastpublications.com.au\/onthecoastover55\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2024\/02\/old-new-habits-concept.jpg","episode_player_image":"https:\/\/onthecoastpublications.com.au\/onthecoastover55\/wp-content\/plugins\/seriously-simple-podcasting\/assets\/images\/no-album-art.png","download_link":"","player_link":"","audio_player":false,"episode_data":{"playerMode":"dark","subscribeUrls":{"apple_podcasts":{"key":"apple_podcasts","url":"","label":"Apple Podcasts","class":"apple_podcasts","icon":"apple-podcasts.png"},"stitcher":{"key":"stitcher","url":"","label":"Stitcher","class":"stitcher","icon":"stitcher.png"},"google_podcasts":{"key":"google_podcasts","url":"","label":"Google Podcasts","class":"google_podcasts","icon":"google-podcasts.png"},"spotify":{"key":"spotify","url":"","label":"Spotify","class":"spotify","icon":"spotify.png"}},"rssFeedUrl":"https:\/\/onthecoastpublications.com.au\/onthecoastover55\/feed\/podcast\/coffee-with-a-coastie","embedCode":"

Unlocking Healthy Habits: A Dietitian’s Guide to Sustainable Changes<\/a><\/blockquote>