Welcome to our second day into Week 1 of The New Year’s Phase 1 Challenge.
Yesterday, we set ourselves up for the week by heading to the store to stock up on all of the real, whole foods that will nourish our bodies this week.
Today, we continue our journey to building a healthy diet by letting go of all of those foods that do not support our health – that is, the day has finally come to ditch industrial not-so-foods!
Today’s post is going to be short because this task is rather straight-forward. All I ask of you is that you remove the following from your house (or, at a minimum, from your easy access in your house) and to equip yourself with the knowledge you may need if you choose to have meals prepared by others.
Remember, an industrial not-so-food is any edible substance made up of the following industrially processed ingredients:
- Refined carbohydrate: wheat and corn being the top two
- Refined sweet sugars: remember, sugar is sugar is sugar. The marketing for “healthier” forms of sugar has a strong presence in our society. Don’t be fooled; sugar by any name is the same: a combination of simple sugars, glucose and fructose
- Polyunsaturated vegetable/seed oils: canola, sunflower, safflower, grapeseed, cottonseed, soybean, peanut, corn
- Industrial meat and dairy, coming from animals raised in poor conditions
- Chemical additives (flavorings, stabilizers, preservatives, etc.)
Now, looking at this list, there is bound to be some apprehension about what you will be letting go. I get it – this is the tough one. Sure, we can get excited about buying new groceries and look forward to the delicious meals to come. But actually letting go of the stuff we are so used to having in our lives – this is truly a difficult task.
This is okay though, because I know that you are capable of working through it. Remember, change happens through discomfort. The feeling means that you are heading somewhere new – somewhere better!
Here’s how:
1. Ditch the Industrial Not-So-Foods in your own kitchen:
- Ingredients
- Flour, sugar, and vegetable oil are three staples of the modern kitchen. It is your task, now, to move away from this by getting rid of all refined carbohydrates (flour), refines sugars, and vegetable/seed oils.
- Packaged Items
- Chips, cookies, granola bars, candy… any other edible item wrapped in packaging that contains industrial ingredients – it is time for them to go now.
A quick note here – this is going to work best if you go through your kitchen and throw these items out! If they are gone, out of your house, and you follow through with your intention to not buy them again, then they cannot make them into your food. This is how you make your life easier – you make the hard decision, now, to make your life easier in the future.
However, I understand that we don’t all rule as supreme leader over our households and that completely throwing out all industrial not-so-foods may make others unhappy. For this, I suggest the following:
- Make shelves for your cooking/eating options – shelves that are free of industrial not-so-foods and stocked with the goods (i.e. real, whole foods). Make these your easy access shelves, and make sure they contain options that you can quicky turn to if any willpower battles start up.
- Keep any industrial not-so-foods out of sight. Have those conversations with others in your house about getting unhealthy snacks out of sight and tucked away in cupboards.
2. Know your options for eating out:
Unfortunately, restaurants and other dining locations are full of industrial not-so-foods. Whether it’s added sugar to meals to make them more palatable or cheap oils used for cooking, it is a very difficult task to avoid all industrial not-so-foods in these establishments. To avoid this source of industrial not-so-foods:
- Avoid eating out as much as possible. Choose to prepare your own meals from scratch to avoid any of these leaking into your diet.
- Do your research – learn which restaurants are health conscious and which ones are not. Then, make sure that you are familiar with the menu before showing up and ordering – even health-conscious restaurants are going to use industrially processed ingredients in many of their meals.