Eating healthy isn’t really hard if you know what’s expected of you. It’s not always about cutting back on your calories and reducing your portions, or even about being the perfect weight for your age and height! Eating healthy means that you love yourself and your body, and you want to stay fit and healthy in the future. 

There is a difference between being on a diet and healthy eating that can often get confusing. While diets restrict you to limited quantities and types of food, eating healthy simply means you are being smart in your food habits. There isn’t much that you have to remember in order to become a healthy eater; just a few basic rules and concepts of eating the right food and living the right way. 

Here are some easy hacks that should be very easy to remember when you are trying to eat healthily. 

  • Water should be your number one drink to go to, any time of the day. Of course, there can be the occasional mugs of coffee and tea, fresh juice, smoothies, and detox drinks, but water has all the nutrients you need in a drink. Water keeps your body hydrated and helps in flushing out all the toxins out of your body; it lubricates your joints and helps you to keep active, especially if you exercise regularly. 

Although there isn’t really a universal limit or agreed quantity to drink water, the adult human body needs at least 6 to 8 glasses of water every day. 

  • Avoid all sugar. This means everything from not adding sugar to your tea/coffee, or drinking soda, or any kinds of carbonated drinks, or buying “fruit juices” from the supermarket, or desserts that have a lot of sugar in it. Even ingredients such as ketchup, BBQ sauce, pizza sauce, and pasta sauce, and even salad dressings might have sugar added to it. So, it is always better to avoid or limit anything that has even a trace of added sugar in it. 
  • Try Eating Everything Raw. Of course, this refers to things you can eat raw – such as fruits, salad, nuts, and seeds. Fresh fruits are better than drinking fruit juices and vegetables are better as raw salads, as opposed to mixed with salad ingredients and sauces. Nuts and seeds, too, are better to eat raw instead of salted and spiced. Whenever you buy fruits in juice form, salad dressings, salted nuts, and seeds will contain some traces of added sugar, sodium, preservatives or chemicals in them – harmful for you in the long run. 
  • Cut up on calories, not your portions. Eating healthy won’t leave you hungry or starving, because your main focus should be cutting back on calories. When you are Eating healthy, easily digestible food, you won’t have to reduce your portions too much. A large bowl of salad laden with vegetables and leafy greens won’t leave your hungry but contains fewer calories than a single slice of pizza. In the same way, when you include more protein in your meals, you’ll feel full quicker than with a plate full of white rice. 
  • Eat Healthy Fats and Oils. Not all oils are bad for you, and nor should you eliminate all kinds of fats from your meals. 

Cheese, for example, should be – in moderation – a part of your regular food habit, as they are a great source of calcium, phosphorus, vitamin B12, and selenium. Fatty fish such as trout, mackerel, salmon, herring and sardines too, are high-quality fats and also a great source of Omega-3 and protein. Other sources of healthy fats include avocadoes, nuts, whole eggs, full-fat yogurt, and dark chocolates. 

In the same way, not all oils are bad or fattening. Just like natural fats, the healthy oils that you can use in your cooking, baking, and meals are extra-virgin olive oil, coconut oil, walnut oil, sesame oil, grapeseed oil, flaxseed oil, peanut oil, canola oil, and avocado oil. These are the least processed oils available in the market, as opposed to soybean oil, palm oil, partially hydrogenated oils, and other vegetable oils. 

  • Always use natural seasonings. Eating healthy doesn’t mean that you have to make all your meals bland; you don’t have to live on boiled and grilled food with no taste. Healthy meals can be varied and delicious, but you should use natural seasonings instead of store-bought processed dressings and sauces. 

Himalayan sea salt, ground cinnamon, sage, peppermint, paprika, turmeric, basil leaves, cayenne pepper, ginger and garlic, fenugreek, rosemary, and thyme – these are the healthy herbs and spices that will make your food delicious and have individual health benefits. 

  • Choose whole foods, not processed ones. Whatever you are cooking, eating or baking, it is important that you avoid everything that’s refined and processed, and instead choose whole foods. Frozen meals need to be replaced with home-cooked meals, instant noodles, and ramen replaced with whole-wheat pasta and spaghetti, fruit juices should be replaced with fresh fruits and vegetables, deli meat replaced with fresh produce. 

Almost everything we can find in the supermarket isles are processed foods, but there are also natural, healthier substitutes for them that we can find and include in our meals. 

  • Use whole grain and brown food. If you want to include some carbs in your eating habit, be sure to make them whole grain and unprocessed food. Brown rice, brown flour, and brown pasta are better than white grains and foods. They are easily digested by our body and doesn’t negatively affect our metabolism too much. 

All you need to worry about is to include fresh and natural ingredients in your meals and eliminate everything that is processed, refined or artificial. The more natural we become in our food habits, the healthier we can live; the healthier we eat, the better lives we can live. Healthy eating doesn’t need to be something complicated or extravagant, but a natural way of living.