How To Nutrition

How To Nutrition For Beginners

Nutrition can be a very confusing subject as there is endless information out there covering it.  And much of it is contradictory.  

We’ve all seen over the decades that eggs are good, bad, good again, bad again, and so on and so forth and the cycle continues.  Same with red meat or dairy or whatever else.  

Research is endless as it should be but a tremendous amount of research is very bad and biased unfortunately.

Fortunately though there is a general consensus from credible sources that can guide us in our nutrition journey.  It is more about what NOT to consume rather than what to eat.  

And it is pretty commonsensical to be honest.  We are all aware of the bad stuff vs the good stuff.  Most of us realize that candy and soda pop in excess isn’t great for us.  And most of us are aware that vegetables are good for us.  We’ve been taught this truth since we were children.  “Don’t eat anymore candy, it's going to rot your teeth!”  Fact.  It will.  

It’s also very much about over consuming vs just consuming.  Almost anything in excess is going to have some negative consequences.  And this holds very true for food intake.  Too much of any food (good or bad) in excess will likely lead to consuming too many calories which will result in weight gain.

Ideally we want to stay away from the bad stuff in particular.  Bad stuff that is worse in excess than good stuff in excess is:

SUGAR

Candy, chocolate, pastries

Soda Pop

Fruit Juices

Fast Food (mcdonalds, burger king, taco bell, etc.)

Pasta (spaghetti, lasagna, etc.)

Pizza

Processed Food

Bread

Tortillas

Deserts (ice cream, frozen yogurt, etc.)

General consensus is to minimize your intake of this stuff.  For example, a slice of pizza isn’t the worst thing out there for you but consuming an entire pizza in one sitting is definitely excess.  

Eating a cup of ice cream isn’t horrific but eating the entire pint is excess.  

And even if you have a terribly rough day and do eat half the pint of ice cream this isn’t going to kill you of course, but if that becomes a habit and you regularly eat that much ice cream it will add up and likely lead to fat or weight gain.

So the goal is to consistently minimize this stuff.  There is no need to ever completely eliminate any of this stuff (unless you have a legit allergy) as keeping intake of it to a minimum won’t cause any harm.  To this day I still treat myself to mcdonalds fries every few months or so (I LOVE THEM – guilty pleasure) or some froyo or a little dark chocolate.

A healthy lifestyle is a life in balance.  And having your nutrition balanced means you are not eating anything in excess.  Excess calories = weight gain.  Excess sugars = fat gain/diabetes/cavities/etc.).  Excess alcohol = bad decisions.

Even the good stuff, in excess, will cause problems.  Excess sleep = back issues/lethargy.  Excess exercise = injury.  Excess work = burnout.

The idea is to keep your nutrition in balance just as you would your life.  There is no need to completely deprive yourself of anything in particular, just to minimize and keep in check.

For a more in depth and deeper dive into nutrition for beginners take a look at our all encompassing 3 month beginner program at BeginnerBody.com.