Holiday Eating

Christmas Holidays. What’s one of the first things that pops in your head when you think of the Christmas holidays. I don’t know about you, but besides the obvious quality time spent with family, it’s good food, baked goods, and Christmas dinners.

There’s always the jokes about the 5-10lbs people gain over the holiday season. Some people simply adopt an attitude of ‘hey, it’s Christmas. I’ll get back on the wagon in the New Year.’

What about you? Do you have a strategy for finding the balance between your physique goals and the holidays? A way to balance out your fat-loss focused eating strategies with enjoying the holidays? The key to long term success is adopting a lifestyle mindset. That is, this is not a ‘diet’ that ends. You’re eating for a way of life and doing so means being able to incorporate holiday eating into your plan.

There’s no doubt that the holidays present a unique set of challenges what with all the delicious holiday baking that goes on in so many households. And I bet that a number of you go through the whole guilt trip set of feelings when you eat a little more than you should.

You not only feel guilty for allowing this to happen – you might even fear that these choices will undo all the hard work you’ve put into getting in shape. Sound familiar?

Let’s just put that one to rest right off the bat. Unless you really go to town, you’re simply not going to have to worry about doing much, if any, damage to your progress. Remember, we want to adopt a lifestyle approach and that means learning ways to enjoy the fun of holiday eating.

My most oft given advice when it comes to vacations, holiday eating, and all events similar is to first control the meals that you have control over. So, just because there’s a lot of freshly baked cookies in the house, doesn’t mean you have to have cookies to wash down every meal. Just because there’s a lot of Christmas food made doesn’t mean that you have to throw your whole day of eating out the window because you know that come dinner time, you’re going to be feasting.

Control the meals you have control over. Stick with your plan for the meals you can.

The second part of the advice I give is to simply control the portion sizes of the meals you can’t control. It’s that simple. As I wrote about in my Top 10 Not-So-Obvious Fat-Loss Mistakes free report, one of the most often made dieting mistakes is not respecting the fact that quantity trumps quality when it comes to calories. So, even if you’re enjoying some off-plan food, how much of it you eat will be the biggest determinant of the effect that off-plan eating has on you. Exercise portion control? Have a normal serving? You’ll be fine. Overeat more often than you should be? You’re going to experience a step or two back as a consequence.

Be mindful of how much you’re eating.

Go in with the intention to adhere to your plan for the majority of your meals. However, since it’s the holidays, make sure you also allow for both flexibility and forgiveness while also being realistic and the expectations you place upon yourself.

No matter how well you may have something planned – there is always the chance that something may happen to offset your plans. Over the holidays you have to have a plan. If that means factoring in and planning to have a few extra cheat meals, then so be it.

What about your results? Again, a few meals here and there aren’t going to do anything to negate the results of all your hard work. Especially if you’re paying attention to the size of your portions and how much you’re eating as I suggested above.

It’s the constant partaking in large quantities of holiday treats that’ll catch up to you. And you end up here only when you allow yourself to by ignoring the choices you are making and the impact it is having on you physically and emotionally.

Give yourself permission to enjoy yourself. When it’s well thought out and logical you’re less likely to overeat as when you feel as if you’re actually caving in and cheating and doing something forbidden.

Maybe your plan is to simply maintain over the holidays. If you typically put on a few pounds of fat over the holidays, then even this is a huge victory for you. Keep active with your workouts, spend most of the time eating what you’re supposed to be eating, and then factor in some extra off-plan food. Factor it in. Don’t try to be perfect or near perfect over the holidays, because it’s an unreasonable expectation and it doesn’t fit into looking at this as a lifestyle.

That said, I do firmly believe that even with the planned holiday eating, you can still continue on the course and continue to see some nice results over the holidays. Again, it all comes back to going in with a plan and making a commitment to yourself. Go in prepared.

Take responsibility for your actions! If you fail to plan, you plan to fail. If you go in without a plan, if you don’t exercise some degree of self control, if you don’t control the meals you have the control over, and you subsequently put on more holiday pounds than you should, then it’s your own fault and you’ve got no one to blame but yourself.

Merry Christmas