How to Eat Healthy when you are Just Too Busy

Life gets busy, in fact scratch that, life IS busy! So how do you lose weight and eat healthy food when time is against you?

When you lead a busy life, it is ridiculously hard to put yourself first, I get that. But if you don’t put your health first, who will?

You are so busy focusing on what needs to be achieved next, that you forget to put your health at the top of the list of things to focus on. Your health is suffering because of this.

How to eat healthy when you are just too busy!

You need to make a conscious decision to put your health first, you need to put your own oxygen mask on before attempting to help everyone else around you. But how do we do this, when there is no time?

You need to build in healthy habits, and yes, habits take time. However, habits are how you change long term. You need to consciously make an effort every day to value your health. This may be in the form of self talk, positive thinking, deep breathing, eating well, or exercising.

Have you considered Meal Planning?

Meal planning is something that can positively impact on every single persons health. How do we know that? Because everybody needs to eat and the food that everybody eats significantly impacts their health.

Planning your meals for the week can seriously increase the amount of healthy food you are consuming which over all will impact on your health and wellbeing.

You’re a busy mom and/or wife and after a long day at work or caring for your family, the last thing you want to think about is ‘what’s for dinner?’. By meal planning, this takes the thinking part out of ‘what’s for dinner?’

It allows you to create dinner without the dread of having to think about what to cook with the ingredients you have in the fridge. I feel like I am much more ‘at peace’ with my food choices when I know exactly what I am cooking and that I have all of the ingredients on hand.

Grab our free printable meal planning sheet here:

 

RELATED POST: 40 Quick Dinner Ideas

Meal Planning Saves You Money!

Meal planning allows you to save a significant amount of money. You may be spending anywhere between $100-$200 a week on take out that you grab on the way home from work because you are in a tired state and could not possibly think about what to cook when you get home – trust me, I get it.

Going around the drive thru feels a much easier option as it requires zero thinking and zero planning. However, when you know exactly what you are having for dinner that night and you will drive right on past those take outs and head home to cook. This is very empowering.

Meal planning will also save you money at the grocery store because you no longer are buying random items of food, here there and everywhere. I often wonder to myself ‘why did I buy 2 loaves of bread and 2 bags of dried pasta’ as I am stacking in the cupboard next to my 100 other bags of pasta.

What was I planning on doing with my freezer full of bread and my cupboard full of bags of pasta? Now, instead of wasting money on products that just sit in the cupboard, I buy only the ingredients I actually need and I save a lot of money this way.

I simply look at my meal plan for the week and then work out from there the shopping list. With the Earth Larder Shopping Lists, it takes all the thinking out of it for you. Each week I choose my meals I would like to make, then it automatically makes me a shopping list that I then tick off the items I already have.

Another trick I have now started doing is importing that list into my local supermarkets online store and ordering online. This way I save even more money because I only buy what I need, not things that look yummy as I walk up and down the lanes.

Meal Planning Saves Stress, yes!

The world we live in is full of stress, we need to reduce this in any way possible. Don’t you have enough stress in your life already? Meal planning is a great way to reduce stress. You spend one day a week thinking about what you will eat over the week and then that is it.

You no longer need to stress about what is for dinner while you are driving home from work at 6:30pm or while your kids are running around yelling that they are hungry.

Meal planning makes life simple and organised. Who doesn’t like simple and organised?

Meal Planning Saves Time and Effort

Meal prepping is a great time saver. I used to believe that going around a drive thru was the quickest option, however the drive thru is often very long and you end up sitting there for 20+ minutes anyway (because let’s face it, nobody wants to walk in to get the meal!)… but 20+ minutes in the kitchen and I could have made a very simple, yet healthy meal!

Using a prep day is a great way to save time throughout your week. You need to decide on a day in your week that you are the least busy on.

This is a Sunday for me, although if your working shifts or are busy on a Sunday you may choose another day. Set yourself roughly 2-3 hours, which feels like a lot of time however it means that throughout the week you have to do zero planning.

What does the Meal Prep Day look like?

The meals are the centre of your decisions for your prep day, so you first must decide on your meals for the week. You can do this by manually adding your own meals to a board or spreadsheet.

I found that this did take me some time to sort (allow longer time) because I liked to spend time searching the internet for a healthy new menu to try each week.

However, Earth Larder allows you to cut this searching right out! It gives you a set menu for the week (either a keto diet or a healthy diet) and then you can change as many meals on this as you like.

These menu’s change each week, giving variety. It has its own search option that has many recipes that you can search and add – if you are like me and like to explore new options.

Once your meals are decided on, you need to work out the ingredients you need according to your menu. Again, this is made very simple by Earth Larder, which provides you with a list of ingredients automatically. Then you can just go through and tick off any of the ingredients that you already have at your house.

Meal plan Shopping time!

Deep breath – it is not as bad as you think. You have your ingredient list, and these are the only items you will get (I know you can do it!). For tips and tricks around food shopping check out this post around buying and storing food. 

Meal Prep at it’s Finest

When you return home, it is time to prepare your meals as much as possible.

Some people like to cook and store their foods in the fridge for the week during this time, or if you are like me, you may prefer to just prepare your meals and then cook on the day you are eating them. You simply need to work out what works best for you and your situation.

Wash and chop your veggies, storing them in sealed containers. Salads are SO fast to throw together when it is all prepped.

Precut your meat, and you may even want to precook some meals.

If you are interested in exploring Earth Larder further (which I highly recommend) then you can trial it for free here.