What Does Eating Healthy Mean to You? – Getting Healthy in the New Year!

One of the most famous New Year’s resolutions is Getting Healthy in the New Year! What does that actually mean? Being healthy or getting healthy can mean different things to different people. I want to share my goals and how I plan to get there as well as some of my blogger friends’ goals. I hope this post makes you reflect on your goals. Furthermore, I hope you can walk away with some actionable items on what you have to do to accomplish your goals. Remembers that goals with no action plans are just wishes:)

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Getting Healthy In the New Year -Roadmap for Me!

Eating healthy to me boils down to:

• Eating fresh food, minimize processed food
• Avoid preservatives and artificial colorants
• Cooking from scratch
• Eating with the seasons (means more local produce)
• Balanced nutrition

I want to bring myself to a point where my lifestyle and eating habits are balanced enough where I don’t have to count calories or macros. Counting calories or macros are excellent tools to recognize where food is working against our health. Sometimes processed food is filled with additional carbohydrates or fat that we weren’t even aware. However, if I manage to eat healthy most of the time, then I can avoid living in a status of stress counting every calorie.

I also want to focus on my fitness. Having 2 children and spending my day driving around town for their playdates and activities makes for a somewhat sedentary lifestyle. Some days I feel like a ran a marathon, but I look at my steps and I’m barely at 8k steps and I start walking around my house to get to 10k. This year I’ll try to accomplish 10k steps a day no matter what and work out 5-6 times a week even if it is for half an hour a day.

I really do believe that if one eats healthy and exercises then weight won’t be a problem. This is also one of the reasons I’m fascinated with Mediterranean Lifestyle. The food is mostly healthy (ok, ok, we are allowed to eat baklava occasionally) – fresh fish, chicken and meat in small quantities accompanied by abundant quantities of fresh, seasonal fruits and vegetables. Add to that, that in most Mediterranean cities people walk a lot, that makes exercise effortless. I remember when I lived in Albania, I spent about 1-2 hrs a day walking to University, city center, meeting with friends at Blloku for coffee and back home. That was quite a walk around town:)

My Blogger Friends Views on Getting Healthy In The New Year

1. Moderation

My friend Vicky from www.leaveittomema.com says: It’s all about moderation and staying active. It is also about having support, people that can help you along the way. I have a Facebook Group for people looking to eat healthy/lose weight, a total no judgement zone and we will be posting healthy recipes (I call them Healthy Guilty Pleasures – I take someone’s Guilty Pleasure and give them a recipe for a healthier version), weekly fitness challenges, etc.

2. Clean Eating

My friend Trina from www.redneckrhapsody.com says: After two trips to Israel, I did begin to eat cleaner last year, implemented yoga from home and intermittent fasting. Lost 23lbs. and felt tons better. Clean eating to me is nuts, seeds, fruits & veggies. Fresh or frozen. Very little sugar or carbs unless they were natural. Beef only 2-4 times a month, virtually no pork, chicken or fish a couple of times a wk. 

3. Keep to the Outer Edges of Store Perimeter

My friend Gina says: Eating healthy to me means staying with foods on the outer edges of the grocery store as much as possible. Trying to stay away from premixed and boxed when possible

4. Be More Active

My friend Jennie says: I need to start moving more. Since starting classes and blogging full-time I haven’t been as mobile as I like. I need to charge my Fitbit again and start trying to reach 10k daily. I also need to start walking outside again, ESPECIALLY with our oldest. He’s starting to get a little fluffy due to not being in sports and being out of school for a whole month due to the hurricane.

I like to do Acai bowls or egg white oats for breakfast. My current favorite breakfast is ½ c rice, 4 egg whites, 1 egg, and 1 spicy black bean burger, with a splash of soy sauce. It keeps me full for a long time…

5. Essential Oils & Shakes

My friend Sheila says: I use DoTerra Essential oils and make shakes with their protein blend that contains Grapefruit, Lemon, Peppermint, Ginger, and Cinnamon oils to promote healthy metabolism. I usually blend up fruit, spinach, nut milk and the blend for breakfast. I try to stay away from carbs and cook meals with meat and vegetables. My husband loves cheesy casseroles but I eat a different meal when I cook those for him. I got an instapot for Christmas and I am excited to get started testing healthy recipes in it!

6. Explore Different Cuisines

My friend Trish from www.verveview.com says: Well, we’ve just greeted another new year. The time when thoughts turn to how to be better versions of ourselves – probably because it’s only a week since, as far as food goes, we’ve just been the worst possible version of ourselves!
So, yes, I have been thinking about how I can eat differently this year.

We do eat a healthy diet, and I love vegetables so never have a problem adding more. Though I am probably a bit too fond of ice cream and chocolate.

But this year is going to be less about eating more healthily for me, and more about exploring different tastes and cuisines. I love being adventurous with food, but I also need a soft food diet as my jaw tends to dislocate with anything too chewy – so my focus this year is an adventurous, healthy, soft food diet on a budget.

Trish is a very talented writer and she has allowed me to use one of her poems with you:). Enjoy it! You can also check the post where her poem is originally posted here.

Happy New Year to everyone reading this post. Feel free to share your goals and resolutions for the New Year in comments and any successful tips on how to achieve being healthy:).