The modern world has given us all kinds of incredible things. For example, modern plumbing, an internet full of cat videos, home delivery food, and various social media channels that keep us in touch with friends around the world.
The modern world is pretty awesome except for one problem: given access to all this technology and science, people tend to start behaving in ways that aren’t particularly great for their health in the long run.
Cheap takeaways and easy access to processed foods mean our diets are high in sugar and salt, and less of the nutrients we need to keep our bodies functioning. Our use of cars, computers and televisions means we spend more time in a chair and inactive in ways our bodies were not designed for. We get a lot of energy food in the form of kilojoules, and we tend to burn very little of it in our daily lives.
This isn’t a call to start a diet right away and hit the gym every week. Being healthier doesn’t mean radically transforming the way you live your life. Nor is it a criticism of the internet, which wants you to spend less time in front of the screen. Modern technology is great and the internet is great. You can have an iPhone and a Netflix account and still live a healthy life.
But if you are interested in living a healthier life in this special part of the 21st century, it should be an active choice on your part. Based on the most common statistics and myths, we’ve put together some basic principles for living. All five aim to tackle the core problem: modern technology may mean we eat poorly and move less, and living healthier may mean doing something to combat it.
If you want to start shifting your focus to living a happier and healthier life for the rest of your life, here are five principles to keep you on the right track.
1) Eat more fruits and vegetables
Current dietary recommendations suggest eating 2 servings of natural and organic fruit and 5-6 servings of vegetables each day. This advice hasn’t changed since elementary school. But statistics show that most of us don’t eat enough naturally grown, unadulterated organic fruits and vegetables. In fact, there are pretty good odds that you’ll have a hard time naming what “one serving” of vegetables actually looks like, let alone consuming enough to meet your daily needs. Current statistics show that only 7% of adults and 4% of children in developed countries eat the recommended 5 servings of vegetables each day. shows.
Dietitians will also show you these statistics. This means that the first step towards a healthy life is to increase the consumption of herbal substances. Look for ways to eat more fresh fruit and whole vegetables. Note that fried fruit chips don’t count.
It’s also useful to take a few moments to really understand what a serving of fruit and vegetables looks like.
2) Eat fewer optional foods
Food-on-demand is the polite name dietitians use for energy-dense and nutrient-poor foods. They are called optional because these foods are not essential for a healthy diet. However, it can be enjoyable to eat thanks to the high concentration of sugar or salt in its ingredients.
For those of us who are not dietitians, these foods have very different names: biscuits; Cakes; crisps; hamburgers; ice cream; bacon; chocolate and soft drink. Basically, everything you start imagining when you hear “fast food” or “junk food” or “what I eat after a delicious meal” and a whole lot of food that you didn’t think was a pile of food.
Also drinks. Wines, beers, ciders, and spirits are packed with kilojoules that come with little dietary benefit.
For most people, optional foods are not necessary. If you choose to include some, limit it to one optional serving of food per day. About 2 scoops of ice cream or 2 biscuits OR ½ small chocolate bar or a single glass of wine or 12 chips from local takeaway or 1/3 of your Standard meat pie.
You don’t need to remove them from your life, but you should consider reducing them. Most of us eat more discretionary foods than we should, with optional foods accounting for an average of 35% of our daily food intake. In fact, according to health studies, with just our average daily consumption of chocolate, we quickly take in the kilojoules per day devoted to optional foods.
3) Eat smaller portions.
The portions of our meals have gotten bigger over the past few decades. This means that even when we make smart choices about food, we often turn this around by eating too much. You can find yourself consuming your daily kilojoules in a single meal by going to your local restaurant or with a single takeaway. Check out the kilojoules information on takeaway menus (including online menus) to help you choose the healthier option.
On top of that, people aren’t very good at setting limits on what we eat. If we are given a plateful of food, we assume that it must all be eaten in one sitting, regardless of how much food there is. If we’re given a larger-than-normal portion, it’s better to eat it than to waste it, right? No. We instinctively tend to eat, especially when we’re distracted watching a movie or chatting with friends, so we’re not always aware of how much goes into our bodies. Paying attention to what you eat is a big part of eating healthy, but focusing on how much is just as important.
Serve your food on smaller plates and focus on starters instead of ordering a larger main course when dining out. If you’re going to your local takeaway, be careful when ordering food – skipping the fries and ordering a diet drink may not seem like the healthiest choice, but it can make a big difference in the number of kilojoules you consume. The average daily energy intake for an adult is 8700kJ, so Check how many kilojoules you should aim for using the kilojoules per day calculator.
4) Drink less sugar
You won’t be surprised to learn that soft drinks are pretty bad for you. Their flavor usually comes from sugar and a range of artificial sweeteners, which means they give you huge amounts of kilojoules and very little else.
It may surprise you even more to learn that sports drinks, juices, and flavored milk can be as high as kilojoules, making them similarly problematic as your thirst quencher.
5) Sit less, move more
This is not about exercise. And no, we’re not trying to fool you. This principle isn’t really about hitting the gym or going for a run, unless that’s your thing. But the human body is meant to burn energy: we consume that energy through food and drink, and this energy is spent on things like keeping us alive, keeping our balance and moving us.
The thing is, before cars and trains, escalators, automatic washing machines and ride-on mowers, we got around a lot more. From commuting to work in the morning to cooking to climbing a flight of stairs, many modern technologies have been created to take the effort out of getting things done, and this lack of movement also means you don’t burn as much energy as humans. before some modern conveniences. Combine that with the arrival of more energy, courtesy of the changes we make in our diet, and the excess energy turning into fat.