Powerful Daily Habits: Ditch Your Scales & Cook from Scratch

1. Ditch Your Scales

The secret that no one wants to tell you about losing weight and regaining your happiness is simple. Ditch your scales, and vow never to weigh yourself again! 

This might seem like a crazy thing to do. After all, how can you judge your progress and keep yourself in check if you don’t have a tool to measure with? The answer lies in your relationship with food. When you weigh yourself regularly, you are doing all of the following things:

• Placing your happiness, motivations and sense of control on how much you weigh
• Judging and evaluating your self-worth on that magical number
• Focusing on the smaller, unimportant details when you need to be looking at the bigger picture instead I can almost hear you protest when you read that list, but allow me to break it down.

Your physical weight doesn’t matter. What does matter is how you feel, how much harmful body fat you are carrying, how you feel in your clothes, and how much energy you have - not some arbitrary figure on a weighing device. You see, your weight varies wildly at different points during the day or even the month depending on your hydration, your muscle mass, how much you have eaten, whether you are ovulating, menstruating and so on. It isn’t an accurate reflection of your inner health or whether you need to lose weight. When you read the number on a scale you automatically judge yourself and how ‘good’ you have been that particular week; ‘am I a success or a failure today?’ Whilst your intentions are great, you are inadvertently trapping yourself into a cycle of yo-yo dieting, guilt and self-loathing, when instead you should be making healthy lifestyle choices that will help you gradually regulate your weight in order to keep it off long-term. So, look at the bigger picture. Ditch the scales and use how you are feeling as your guide instead of how much you weigh. Do you feel comfortable in your body? Are you healthy? How are your energy levels? All these things matter far more than a number!

2. Cook from Scratch

Get back to basics. Cook from scratch more often so you can gain 100% control over what you are putting into your body.

We just don’t know the full extent of the many nasties pumped into processed foods; from the fats and sugars to the additives, preservatives, GMO ingredients, environmentally damaging ingredients and chemicals. The only sure way to avoid all of this is to prepare our food ourselves. Don’t worry - you don’t have to be a gourmet chef or conjure up complicated and time-consuming recipes. Nor does it matter if you barely know how to fry an onion. All that matters is your desire to nourish yourself with the highest quality nutrition and a willingness to learn new skills. There are some amazing websites out there that will teach you to make your favorite meals using only natural and wholesome ingredients. Why not look up a recipe for your favorite meal and give it a try?