It’s all over but the crying.
I’m referring to Halloween and the loads of little chocolate bars that possibly found their way down your throat.
Today is a new day.Whether you’re a parent or not, it’s likely that you were effected by this goolish holiday. You either handed out treats or inspected pillow cases of them or both.
Temptation on every front.
Guess what? I say GIVE IN.
Say what??
Yep, I say on occasion, give in. PLAN to cheat.
Having a ‘cheat’ meal is a necessary part of a healthy and balanced nutritional plan.
I’m all about lifestyle and making ‘livable’ choices. Do you really think its realistic to plan your life never enjoying your favourite treats?
There are many benefits to planning a cheat meal.First of all, let’s talk about psychological benefits.
Simply knowing that you have a cheat meal planned, even if it’s seven days away, makes it possible to face the day. I know that for some of you, eating clean is a bit of a stretch. Trust me, the longer you eat clean, the easier it gets. But in the beginning it’s tough. Just knowing that a treat is around the corner helps you ‘stay the course’. Nutritional compliance is a ‘doable’ goal when you have a planned cheat meal. Emphasis on the ‘planned’. Make your cheat worth it. By the way, try not to eat the kitchen sink. You can easily sabotage a week’s worth of clean eating with 24 hours of binging. Be reasonable and keep your fat loss goals in mind. But certainly enjoy your favorite foods ‘guilt free’
.Secondly, there’s actual physiological benefits to a cheat meal as well.
Keep in mind that your body is a magical machine bent on survival. It’s teaming with hormones designed to ensure you live in times of feast AND famine. Trouble is, there’s no famine. (That’s actually a GOOD thing, but where fat loss is concerned it makes it a little tougher to lose fat.)
When you ‘go on a diet’ your body notices and delivers hormones that slow down metabolic functions so to be ‘more efficient’. Thus, the stall or ‘plateau’ of most diet plans.
There’s a hormone called leptin that decreases when calories are low. When leptin levels go below a certain level, fat loss stops in your bodies effort to survive the famine. When leptin levels are stable, your body is cool with burning fat for fuel.
So, what’s one of the best ways to fool your body into burning fat?
Keep leptin levels stable. This is where a cheat meal comes in. By periodically increasing calories, you bump up leptin levels and fool your body into becoming a fat burning machine again, even on non-cheat days.And more good news? Studies show that high carb foods are best for an increase in leptin levels. Keep fat intake moderate and eat carbs, carbs, carbs.
No joke.
Use strategic cheating to boost your fat loss. Then get back into clean eating.
Your head will thank you for the mental break, your body will thank you by giving up fat stores.
Win-win.
Want to give your body a helping hand where leptin levels are concerned?
Check this out and you’ll see that along with strategic cheating, there’s more help on the way.