The "Diet Scare"
When many of us hear about going on a diet, we think about depriving ourselves of the foods we like. That in itself may be a major discouragement. However, it is not as bad as we may think if we have the required knowledge. Understanding how our body responds to the food we eat will help us adjust without the big scare.
Go Natural
Remember that going natural is the key to solving many problems, spanning beyond good health and weight loss. We have mostly moved away from eating foods in their natural form and towards processed and unnatural foods. This results in a significant dietary problem: we are eating an unbalanced amount of nutrients. Consequently, we wreck our bodily systems, ultimately desensitising our taste buds towards the flavour in natural foods.
Sugar naturally occurs in fruits and other foods. So, when we eat foods in their natural form that contain sugar, we get a balanced amount of nutrients. However, when we extract sugar in a concentrated form, we risk intaking too much of it in a single meal.
It's Never Just "A Spoonful of Sugar"
One single can of coke contains 39 grams, about ten teaspoons, of sugar. This is often more than the required daily amount of sugar for one person. Yet some people drink several cans per day in the place of water. This is a significant aid to obesity, as seen in the post How We Gain Weight.
Drink Water Instead!
We should be drinking water to quench our thirst, not overpacking our bodies with sugar. Even fruit juices from natural food sources may be packed with sugar and, consequently, should be consumed in moderation or avoided, depending on our level of physical activity.
Beware of Processed Foods
We may consume other processed foods such as white rice, white bread and baked products that contain enriched or white flour. We remove fibre and other nutrients from these products and consume them in an unbalanced state.
The Importance of Fibre
Fibre is needed for the proper functioning of our digestive system. It also aids the flow of food through our alimentary canal, thus preventing constipation. We do not only risk becoming constipated but also risk consuming too many carbohydrates in our meals. Without the presence of fibre, carbohydrates are absorbed into our system in an untimely manner. The consequence of this could be the unhealthy spiking of our blood sugar levels and a higher risk of diabetes.
The Dangers of MSG
We also extract or artificially produce MSG (Monosodium Glutamate) to put into our meals in a concentrated form. This makes the food tastier, which encourages us to eat more, even after we are filled. As a result, we are likely to consume more and become overweight.
Artificial foods and flavours desensitise our tastebuds!
When we eat these extracted and concentrated foods, as opposed to eating them in their natural forms, we desensitise our tastebuds. This means that we lose our appreciation for naturally tasting and nutritious foods. For example, increased sugar intake means we can no longer taste the sweetness in fruits. This leads to juicing the fruits and adding sugar to satisfy our cravings. The result is then the consumption of too much sugar.
We then end up at a point where we need to simply retrain or train our taste buds to enjoy what is natural by gently fading out unnatural foods out of our diet. Doing this is a major step towards health and weight loss. We soon realise that we will start eating less and give our system the ability to function normally by burning fat.
We need to change our diet.
As we should have seen in the section How We Gain Weight, having less starch and sugar in our system allows our body to break down fats for energy. When we pamper our body with too much sugar and starch, we do not let it do the necessary work to break down fats. Eating lots of fatty foods with this increased sugar and starch does not do much to help us to lose weight because the body will use the sugar for energy and store the fats. So we can lose weight by eating a combination of protein, fats and vegetables in the absence of sugar and starch.
Again, we are unique. If we have an illness such as diabetes, we will need to monitor our blood sugar levels to know what nutrient proportions are best for us. Also, if we are vegetarian, we may adjust our protein according to what we eat. Not all of us can live without meat. Even some “vegetarians” struggle to totally remove meat from their diet and eat it occasionally to prevent illnesses.
Vegetables are a must!
Even if we are not vegetarian, we should eat vegetables to help with our weight loss. Vegetables and fruits, especially green vegetables, contain vital nutrients, such as potassium, that we need daily for the function of our body. Potassium helps release energy from the starch stored in our body. Sometimes, when we are craving sugar, we really need potassium as opposed to something sweet. Potassium is present in ripe bananas, avocadoes, and green vegetables such as kale. We should eat a mixture of green and cooked vegetables to get a balanced amount of nutrients. This is because the raw vegetables have nutrients that the cooked ones do not, and vice versa.
