EP73 Mindset Monday - Why a food diary doesn't work!

This is the Empowered athlete podcast Mindset Monday. 10 minutes with Kari Schneider to learn new mindset tactics and tricks to optimize your performance in sport, business and life.

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Hello? Hello. Okay, it's Mindset Monday. We are late on today because I was in the gym all morning. My schedule is a little bit different because I'm going to a wedding at.

The end of this week, so traveling.

And and I brought my daughter to university last weekend, so and over the Monday as well, so I'm a little off of my schedule. And then also next weekend is a long weekend and I'll be coming back from bc, so I won't be on next weekend. So I'm very, very happy to be on today. Hello, Claudia. So today we are talking about a food diary versus a food plan. I'm going to tell you when it comes to your mind and how your brain works, why one works and why the other doesn't. So you've probably heard about making a food diary or a food journal and how this can be beneficial for reaching your goals. And I've had many a client over the years do a food journal and it's fantastic for getting a really good understanding of what you're eating. If you don't really have an awareness, you're kind of grazing along the way or you're overeating at certain times.

A food journal can really identify when your trouble areas are.

Is it when you're low blood sugar.

Coming home from work? That 4pm Time for me is like snack central and I really want to devour a whole bunch of things, so I have to have some trail mix or a snack planned out at that time.

And a food journal or a food.

Diary helps you understand when those times are for you. The other thing it does is that we become uncomfortably aware of what we're actually consuming. And when I say that, what I mean is that there's so many things that we will consume that we are doing so while distracted. So we don't even realize these things are coming into our mouth. So what the food journal does is allows us to kind of go, okay, everything I eat I have to write down. What? Well, when you have that mindset, everything I eat I have to write down, you start to realize, well, I don't want to eat that. I don't want to have to write down three bites of cereal Because I dug into the cereal box.

So you start to become more and more aware.

So there's research that says that as soon as somebody does a food journal or a food diary, that alone starts to change eating behavior. Now, everything I've said so far makes it sound like I'm making an argument for. For a food journal or a food diary. And they do have their uses, and they do have their tools, But I'm going to point out the difference and what works far more effectively.

And it has to do with how our brains work. And I'm going to let you know.

A story about one of my clients, Just so you have an awareness of how this works in real time. So I had, working with one of my clients, we're working through some head health goals, some physical goals, and upon having him list down what he typically eats and list down what he enjoys eating, what he likes, There were two things that came out. I didn't ask him for specifics. And what he did is he wrote down what he tends to like to eat, and then later on, I had him write down what he ate in the last five days. Now, those two lists were very, very different. And it's because of how we operate within our brains. When we are coming from a place of reaction or response, we're typically diving into a place of either comfort, pleasure, fear, and all of those places come from our very primal brain or our limbic brain. So what he wrote on the second list, what he actually ate, that food diary or that food journal, was everything that he ate based on how he was feeling at that given time. Now, if we're basing our food on how we're feeling at that given time, a lot of the time, for most of us, it's based on habit, emotion, unconscious decisions. And if that's the case, we're eating in this fashion that isn't necessarily serving our future goals.

So we have this brain that we.

Are so, so lucky to tap into, unlike so many, unlike almost any other creature out there. We can preconceive something, we can imagine a future we can plan. And other creatures don't plan, but we do. And that's the difference between our primal brain and our prefrontal corte.

So what he gave me, without knowing.

Was his 1 list of what he would like to be eating or what he likes to eat as healthy options, Was his prefrontal cortex planning something out. But then the list he actually gave from what he ate over the past five days was totally different. And the reason it was totally different is because he was operating from a different part of his brain. The I'm hungry. The I want something that tastes good right now. The I want pleasure. The I'm in a social environment kind of reactive state. So when I say that a food diary or a food journal doesn't work.

What I'm talking about is it doesn't.

Work for the future goal that you're trying to get to because a food journal or a food diary ends up being very reactive in nature. So.

So what you really want to get.

Towards is food planning. And this is where you've heard a ton of times about meal planning. But there's a difference. When you've meal planned, you've made a whole bunch of meals and you've got all that meal prep done, but you may not still be really in the mindset of planning, visualizing what exactly are you going to eat in the next 24 hours and you've made that decision ahead of time. It is the same thing as planning out your schedule for work.

There is no way most of you who are in a group like this.

Listening to the podcast I'm recording for or in your empowered top performers, if.

You'Re a top performer, there's no way.

On earth you're stepping into your day and going, oh, let's see what happens.

That's not happening.

You have pre planned your day, likely pre planned your week. And anything that's very important to you.

In your next quarter, your you have.

Scheduled it in the same thing goes for your food. So you're pre planning exactly what you're eating in the next 24 hour period.

But also honoring knowing that you're going to want something for pleasure, knowing that you're going to want something for an emotional connection with other people, knowing that you're going to want something that nourishes you for your workouts, so you can.

Pre plan all of that in as well. So I'm not saying that when you do a pre planned for food plan for the following day or the next 48 hours, it's the super perfect, strict, disciplined guideline. It's not that at all. If you schedule your workday, you plan for lunch, you plan for a break, you plan for some downtime, maybe you.

Plan for some workouts or meditation.

So in doing so, you have premeditated what you know you need and you know you want.

And some things that are pleasurable for you as well. And the same thing goes when it comes to planning what you're going to.

Eat in the next day.

A food plan includes putting things like.

I know when I will want that treat and I know when I'm going to have it. So if I crave something sweet at 2 o', clock, then it's okay because I know that I'm going to have that sweet thing after dinner at 6 o'. Clock.

So it's much more.

You've already planned for your pitfalls.

You've already planned for what you need not only to nourish you, but you've also planned for what you know you're.

Going to want in terms of maybe your treats or maybe a beer with some friends. That's planned in because you know your schedule. So that is a huge difference between a food diary, a food or a food journal versus pre planning a food plan for your next day, your next 48 hours, or your next week. And the main difference? Remember, it's not your fault that you're craving something or you're reactive eating or.

Any of those things. It's coming from a part of your brain that's responsive and reactive and filling a void.

So you know that if you are coming at it from a time where.

You are looking into your future, you.

Are planning and thinking with your prefrontal cortex. You will be able to plan for success and have a best result and best outcome that's not reactive in nature. So a completely different scenario. So if you have questions on that.

If that really lands with you, please pop a thumbs up. It's really hard for me to tell or pop a response in our podcast. It's really hard for me to tell what what is really landing and what.

Isn'T in this kind of online bubble.

I hope this one has you take a look at what you're planning for your food a little bit differently so.

That you're not feeling like you are wrong when you've eaten a cupcake or anything like that.

It's not a right or wrong or good or bad. Just know that your primal brain is always going to seek pleasure. Your primal brain is always going to try to find a comfort. Your primal brain is always going to avoid fear and it's your emotional center too. So you're naturally going to have these reactive responses. But your prefrontal cortex can plan and your prefrontal cortex can care for you and offer things in a way that really serves you and still honors some fun and some grace and some connection.

In how we tend to use food.

Food in our lives besides just nourishing our bodies. So I hope that lands well for you. Remember, a food plan can help you get to your results faster. If you're looking for nourishing for performance, nourishing for your best thinking, nourishing for maybe even weight loss, nourishing for whatever you have going on, and instead of.

Just reactively writing down what happened, different ball game.

And I know you are top performers, so I know you want to have.

Your best A game. And that is how you can have.

Your best A game with the foods that you eat. So I hope this is good info for you to serve your life. Have a fantastic day. I'll be on Truth Bomb Tuesday tomorrow talking a little more about sugar. Sugar baby, have a fantastic day and I will talk to you soon.