Good News: Tools to Help You Develop Healthy Eating Habits – By jan ashby
When it comes time for you to make a change to your diet, you may wonder where to begin, as there are so many things to consider when trying to obtain the proper nutrients everyday.
If you are a vegan, you have to be careful to find enough sources of protein. More on this later >> will provide 3 resources for you).
Sometimes it can feel a bit daunting to get enough fruit in your Daily Diet – yet you can start in the a.m. with a glass of orange juice, or a smoothie – I have a wonderful group of Fruit Smoothie recipes on my Pinterest board. 
Heck, I even have a few at this site. So the point is, you can have say a breakfast smoothie w/ 2-3 fruits in it – and you’ve got a great start to your day !
Developing Healthy Eating Habits: Good Tool to Track Yr Goals
The tips in this article are merely a starting point. I suggest you do a food journal to help you track things – like, at the outset, how many fruits you managed to eat (do this for at least a week or two, until you get into an improved state of mind with respect to your “Healthy Eating” routine).
Also, I suggest to you to make some firm goals – there’s a wonderful tool you can use, and I describe it thoroughly in my Healthy Eating Habits post .
For true healthy eating habits, you should try to consume many fruits and vegetables each day. The USDA recommended daily allowance of fruits and veggies combined is 9-13 servings a day.
Perhaps you can use the tomatoes from your garden to make a pasta sauce, or use them on a pizza
Eat roasted beets when you have a sugar craving because it is healthier than eating a dessert – yet it can be just as sweet. Beets contain many natural sugars, and they concentrate when they are cooked down. I L♥ve to put beets in my salad – try it, for your health’s sake!
NOTE: Your body can break down sugar from a beet easier than from a dessert.
If you are on a vegetarian or vegan diet, you need to find plenty of ways to incorporate protein into your diet. Protein is an important building block for muscle development, and it is too easy for vegetarians to lose muscle mass from reducing their meat consumption – therefore : 
(SEE the 3 Protein Resources at the End of this Article)
Be a Risk Taker: Try to Put New Foods in Your Diet
When trying to have a healthy diet, add new healthy foods. Try something that you have never had before. You may be missing out on something that you really would enjoy. There are a lot of fruits and vegetables that people never try. You can start introducing new foods into your diet slowly. You should try something new once a week.
Make sure you are getting plenty of vitamin D in your diet. Vitamin D deficiencies have been linked to diabetes, high blood pressure, chronic pain, depression, cancer and a number of other illnesses. Foods rich in vitamin D include milk, cod liver oil, fish and liver. If none of these foods appeal to you, try taking a supplement to get your daily dose, instead.
Build a healthy meal by combining a variety of food sources. That is what smoothies do, and you can certainly get creative.. There’s no RULE that says meat has got to be the centerpiece of a meal. Try tortellini salads, cold pasta salads, eggplant with a nice sauce, or do more stir-fries with a variety of fresh vegetables in them. You can use fresh herbs – or even get one of those concentrated herbal pastes.
(I do this frequently – I’ll buy the concentrated Dill paste every month, and add it to my Salmon and Fish entrees) .. Avoid canned stuff, and opt for Fresh & Frozen veggies and fruits !
Healthy Eating Habits: Put in The Work and Use a Food Journal
Building healthy eating habits is vital to a sustainable plan for healthy nutrition. The overall effectiveness of a healthy diet, hinges entirely on whether or not the dieter can stick to it. Diet alterations that are easy to develop and maintain are preferable to a more extreme approach – which can result in failure & dissapointment .
I suggest you “start small” – use the Goal Setting tool I mentioned, for using the Buddy System within goal-buddy will greatly assist when you begin to struggle.
Listen to what it can do :
As you have surmised, when it comes to changing your routine/diet, there are some essential things to consider. This is a very individual process. The more time you put into organizing your goals and researching new foods/fruits/vegetables, the better outcome you will achieve – no doubt !
Have patience in your approach, and don’t be too hard on yourself – do the work, find friends online to support you, and you’ll ultimately start seeing results.
Don’t be afraid to ask questions or leave comments – Jan
RESOURCES: Healthy Snacks Board (my Pinterest) or Easy Pasta salad recipes
Vegan Sources of Protein How Much Protein Do We Need?
➡ Remember: Fantastic Goal Setting Site: Goal-Buddy.com
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