Why We Need To Keep A Daily Food Log

A number of years back some research by the American Journal Of Preventive Medicine uncovered the shocking truth that people who followed a diet program while at the same time keeping a diet journal every single day were able to lose two times as much weight as fellow research subjects who tried out the diet regime but did not keep a log of what they dined on.

Since then the practice of keeping a food journal has become standard procedure for anybody considering going on a diet. People in the dieting and nutrition industry are promoting the idea wherever they can and it keeps working wherever people try it out. The added advantage is that it gives us an opportunity to also keep track of tha number of calories we are consuming and how close we are sticking to our weight loss aims.

A food diary is not an elaborate document. Just a straight record of what we put into our mouths. Nothing is left out. If we have days that we stick to our diet, the journal shows them. On days we are not good at dieting, the journal shows that, too. So all you need is a piece of paper and a pencil that you keep close by to where you prepare your food. So, making entries into the journal will upset your habitual eating processes at the time of eating, plus it will help you to remember the embarrassing shortcomings that we so often tend to block out.

If you eat under stress or your snacking is triggered at a certain time of day, your food journal will tell you. Looking back at your week of dieting will reveal any patterns of binge eating or situations we need to avoid if we want to keep on our diet.

It is not easy for most of us to have the truth about our eating habits brought out into the open. We are all prone to sweeping our weaknesses under the carpet where we can forget about them. But our diet diary will reveal our mistakes to us and this somehow seems to automatically change our eating habits a little bit.

So can keeping a record of what we eat help to restrain us from reaching for extra helpings of our main meal or dessert? We do not need to make "new year's resolutions"? Is it that simple? At least it is worth a try.

Of course, writing down what you eat does not mean you will be eating less. You might just find yourself eating a large helping of green vegetables and not a small helping with added potatoes. Or you might finish the meal with a piece of fruit instead of a pastry.

The main point here will be that whenever you have set your self a weight loss objective you will need to additionally come up with the decision to acquire a pocket book and a pencil to have in close proximity to where you prepare the meals. If you have a salad sandwich for the afternoon meal, the record will show that you had a couple of pieces of bread, a cut of pork, a slice of tomato, a lettuce leaf and some mayo. Easy.

So if you are thinking of going on a diet but are waiting for the right moment or are trying to drum up some motivation, why not give a diet journal a try. The thing is, you do not need to be actually on a diet. You can just try writing down what you eat as an experiment and see if it changes your attitude or your behavior.