Tis the season to treat yourself. I’m never one to promote deprivation. In fact, I’m often one to promote indulgence. However, I do think there are ways to mindfully indulge. There’s a lot of strategies to be mindful and limit your overconsumption during the holidays, but the following are my 3 favorites.
3 Strategies to Allow a Little More Flexibility to Indulge Mindfully
Intermittent Fasting
Some may consider this a form of deprivation because it is restricting your eating window. However, many people I work with (including myself) find this to be such a helpful, simple strategy to limit the endless consumption.
(Because I love the science behind the mechanisms: there’s research to show how our bodies evolved to eat according to the circadian window. When the sun rises and sets certain hormones and other mechanisms are believed to be poised to be most optimal from this evolution.)
In general, this method works because by excluding certain times to eat some of us are able to cut out a few hundred calories. By setting boundaries you’ll save yourself from grazing or splurging in your calories.
Limit Your Sugary Beverages
This includes alcohol, hot chocolates, lattes, juices, etc. though they may not seem as filling, beverages can contain a ton of empty calories and a ton of sugar that spikes your insulin and causes a sugar crash convincing your body that you’re hungry again.
Alcohol is known to have “empty calories” because there is no nutritive component to alcohol, but these other sugary beverages are sneaky with how much calories they contain. Obviously treat yourself occasionally or build these into your caloric budget, but sugar is addicting so it’s best to try to not make the sugary beverages a habit.
Load Up on Protein and Fiber Beforehand
I don’t always know if this method particularly works because I tend to still eat just as much if my eyes are bigger than my stomach. But like a pregame, the idea here is that if you fill up on low calorie but filling foods you’ll be less inclined to eat more food.
By filling up on highly nutritious food before you go out hopefully you’ll be able to be more moderate with the less nutritious options and not gorge and binge.
Indulge in Moderation
These strategies should help you to curb some over indulgence, but the bottom line from me: enjoy your holidays. Try a little of everything, but try to not go overboard. If you catch me overindulging on Christmas Day, yes you did. But you’ll notice I’m not trying to indulge the full 2 weeks of winter break. Try and enjoy it all, but you also don’t need to over indulge just because it’s the holidays.