High Value Eating – Best Diet for Physical and Mental Health

WHEN when it comes to food and eating, it is easy to be distracted by what our diet can physically do for us.

We are so used to concentrating on macros, calories, grams and pounds that we forget the emotional side of eating. We are trained to view ’emotional eating’ as something negative if it is not necessarily so.

Food is fuel, but it’s so much more. And even though you may have physical goals, it is always a good idea to balance them with a way of eating that takes into account your mental health.

Especially now.

Therefore in my book Good food, bad diet, I introduce readers to the concept of “High Value Eating”.

Here’s what the concept does (and does not do).

High value eating is a way of eating that physically nourishes your body, while acknowledging and normalizing that emotional nourishment is also a healthy part of eating.

High-value food shows us how food can contribute to our lives and our health, without restriction – which makes the diet culture regular for many of us.

High value food does not divide food into numbers and tolerates innocence and shame. It never gives moral labels like ‘good’ or ‘clean’ to what we eat. All these things are unnecessary for the health and general well-being.

High-value eating recognizes that while some foods may not be the most nutritious, these foods provide us with joy and should not be excluded from our diet. I’m not talking about ‘cheat days’ here; it is more a daily assessment of the balance you need. This means that you base most of your meals on an abundance of plants, fiber and protein, but it also means that you sometimes have to eat pizza or burgers, if that is what you are craving at the time.

This content is imported from {embed-name}. You can find the same content in a different format, or you can find more information on their website.

So, how do you implement high value food into your life – and for your physical and mental benefits? Here’s how.

Be a pencil, not an eraser.

We are so used to ‘erasing’ – to taking food out of our diet unnecessarily.

It limits our intake of nutrients and the variety of foods we eat, but it also does not make sense.

All that is needed is a diet guru to tell us that gluten is ‘toxic’, and it goes out of our diet! But unless we have a legal medical condition, most of us do not have to stop eating gluten, dairy, wheat, sugar or any other common suspect. Be a pencil and add the food back into your diet.

Eat whole or minimally processed foods if possible.

This is a given: Buy the best food you can afford, and process the majority of it whole or minimal. There is a place in everyone’s diet for ultra-processed foods, but it should not be the mainstay of what you eat.

Understand your lifestyle.

Many of us try to distort our lifestyle to fit a diet, but it is frustrating and does not last long. Rather, choose an eating pattern that suits how you live.

Be intentional.

If you want a brownie, do not torture yourself back and forth about whether you want to eat it.

Eat it – then go on. Pay attention to the overall quality of your diet, as well as what you crave, and how you feel about what you eat.

You need to understand that there is no ‘bad’ food, and that nothing terrible will happen to you if you occasionally drop the salad and eat foods that are less physically nutritious.

Eat for you, not for everyone else.

Everyone you know may be on a diet plan that sounds good, but if it does not work with your lifestyle, preferences, or goals, then it is not worth it. Do not jump on the mud truck: do what works for you.

This content is created and maintained by a third party and imported into this site to help users provide their email addresses. You may find more information about this and similar content on piano.io