Making Healthy Decisions

Why do we make bad food decisions?

We all make unhealthy decisions from time to time, quite often in relation to food. Sometimes we wonder why we act against our better judgement, perhaps that doughnut just looked too good to pass up or we were tired and so it was harder to exercise self control.

There could be more than one reason for such decisions and this great article over on Mark’s Daily Apple is full of suggestions as to why it may be so difficult to stop making those decisions that we know we will regret.

Did you know that there is a term for acting against your better judgement? The term is akrasia. I certainly practiced akrasia quite often in regard to food decisions in the past. I am pleasantly surprised that it is now so much easier to exercise my better judgement when it comes to making food decisions.

I think that one of the reasons for my making healthier food decisions is that my cravings are really a thing of the past. I will occasionally still get a craving such as this past weekend when I was away from home and after a long day of work outdoors, without a good lunch, I was in a small supermarket and saw my favorite small cheesecake (Glenillen may be familiar to my Irish readers). I briefly considered buying the cheesecake and only eating the fruit fromage topping however I didn’t entertain the idea for long, walked away from the fridge and quickly left the temptation behind.

How can we change?

It helped that I knew there was the makings of a really good salad with goats cheese when I got back to the house where I was staying and so I was able to make the healthy decision. This brings me to the second reason that I can now make healthier and easier decisions – ensuring that I have good food choices available to me.

I am more conscious of planning my road trips now, I always try to ensure that I have some tinned wild fish and some nuts in the car. I usually pack some eggs, some ground almond and flax-seed so that I can make yummy pancakes for the mornings and if there’s some good bacon to go along with the pancakes that’s even better.

Are you finding that you are still having difficulty making healthy food choices? What changes have you made? Drop us a line and let us in the comments…