It’s a scene only all too common these days. It’s your company’s holiday party and you are standing around with your colleagues in your best suit. Your hand is just reaching out for another one of those heavenly stuffed mushrooms that are being handed out by the waittresses when suddenly you realise that you have absolutely no idea how much you have eaten so far. And you think it’s alright, because you don’t feel anywhere near full.

Well, the reason could be that you have been eating while standing up for the past hour or so.

Eat, but first take a seat.

Research has shown that much extra food in consumed on the run and sitting down while eating helps you think about how much you are consuming.

Technorati Tags: health, fitness, portion control

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A few days before I was about to set out for college, my grandfather took me aside and gave me a piece of advice I have not forgotten to this day. He looked at me with his soft eyes and said slowly in his sombre voice “This is the first time you are going to be living on your own. No parents around to correct your follies and no elders to give you advice. So remember this: You now have to be your own policeman.”

As adults, this is advice we follow in most things: We care about where we invest our money, we make sure we drive our cars cautiously and we also follow good work ethics. But a common denominator for all these practices is the underlying immediate and often drastic consequences if we did not follow them. After all, who would want to become bankrupt, have one’s driver’s license suspended, or lose one’s job?

However, when it comes to our diets, the consequences are not so immediate. Most of the effects are internal and the ever so slight increase in our waistlines are simply attributed to increasing age. But it need not be so if we simply become our own policeman for our diet as well. Make up simple rules and adhere to them.

Here are some examples from real life:

1. I had a plump friend in college who had this rule about chocolates: He would never buy them for himself and only ate them if someone else bought them for him! With expenses being what they were in college and our monthly allowances hardly sufficient for food and college supplies, suffice it to say that he had a difficult time finding someone who could spare their money for his chocolates!
2. One of my friends always does this at a restaurant: he packs up half his main course and puts it away in a to-go bag. Only then does he even begin eating. Does he know something about restaurant portion sizes that we don’t? Not anymore, educated reader, because I can tell you that the average restaurant meal is almost 800-1200 calories (and that is not including the starter and dessert!)
3. I myself have a simple rule about cake - only if it is someone’s birthday. This immediately rules out the kind lady who brings to work her home-baked cakes that I wrote about in Quick Tip #3.

So, go ahead and make your own simple rules and more important: adhere to them.

Be your own policeman.
Because no one else will be.

Technorati Tags: health, fitness, calorie, portion control

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