Matt’s 3 Steps to Develop Healthy Eating Habits

Ask anyone who knows anything about fitness: Your body is built in the kitchen just as much as in the gym. You need to eat clean, plain and simple.

Easy, right? Hell no.

Ask anyone who’s tried to change their eating habits; it’s hard. Things like cravings and wavering willpower always get in your face. I’ve struggled with it personally, believe me.

Can eating healthy become a habit? Yes.

I created a three-step process to help you gain stronger control over your diet, which I used and found a lot of success with.

How long does it take to create a healthy habit? The answer is: it depends. According to the literature, challenging habits take longer to stick. (Think of making walking a habit versus doing sit-ups.) And eating poorly can be pretty addictive, which makes eating cleaner a challenging habit to implement.

But you can create a healthy habit without much sweat if you take it slow. Check out the three steps I designed to make healthy eating a habit.

Step 1: Day 1 to Day 30 – Create The Short-Term Habit First

Enjoy a cheat meal every three days.

In this first step, I gave myself a short-term goal, which allowed me to eat anything (within reason) every third dinner. This mindset made it easier not to fall off the wagon between my cheat meals since they were so close together (every 72 hours).

Eating poorly one out of every 12 meals (on a four-meal-a-day routine) was much cleaner than I had been doing before, but I still felt like I had frequent chances to pig out.

Here’s what ended up happening:

As I got close to the 30th day, my cravings started disappearing, and I would experience stomach issues whenever I had my cheat meal. Sounds awful, but it was great. Why? Because those awful foods suddenly became less appealing, and that was already a victory.

Step 2: Days 31-60 – Gut Microbiome Change

Enjoy a cheat meal every five days. But you’ll find things are changing. 

At this point, I was mentally ready to go longer between cheat meals because my gut biome was changing, and I wasn’t craving or enjoying the junk as much anymore. My cheat meals were becoming cleaner and the portion sizes smaller. This is what felt natural to me as the process continued.

Eating clean 19 out of every 20 meals started to affect my portion sizes. Less than eight weeks previously, the crap food and larger portions hadn’t bothered me (just my awful blood work), and now they were becoming less tolerable. Again, this was a huge mental victory.

Step 3: Day 61 to …. Forever – The Long-Term Habit Stage

Enjoy a cheat meal every seven days.

This is when your new style of eating becomes comfortable, not a chore or a matter of willpower.; it naturally feels right. 

At this point, I knew I was forming a long-term habit.

I was also down nearly 20 pounds, a total body fat reduction. And by Day 120, I had lost eight inches on my waist.

While you’ll find yourself not pigging out nearly as much and making healthier choices overall, the opportunity for a cheat meal every week allows you to be social.

Go out with your family, friends, significant other, or whomever, and don’t sweat eating perfectly clean. By now, you’ll know what’s in bounds and what will cause digestive problems.

Here’s what I suggest:

• Order steaks with no oils used for cooking
• Eat your sandwiches with no bread or bun
• Use lower-carb condiments

Final Thoughts

Give this three-step process a try to make healthy eating a habit for you. It will transform your body and mind toward healthier eating with a reduction in cravings for junk that will increase your waistline and shorten your life.

I also want to point out that this is just a taste of the information I have in my nutrition manual. If you find this information effective, wait until you explore the full manual and see what else I have in store. You can thank me later.

Stay tuned for the next blog entry for more life-changing information. I’ll talk to you guys soon.