I was the damn conductor for the crazy diet train most of my life.

Always bouncing from one diet to the next, always buying every book, reading every blog,  buying every online program that I would start and maybe finish, who knows. I lived in that vortex my entire life until, finally, I said no more.

I can't do this anymore.

I finally created a life where I shed the weight, kept it off, and I DON'T diet.

I get asked a lot, "how do I even get started?" And I know how scary it is to leave a lifetime of diet mindset behind, to jump OFF of the crazy train of dieting. It's uncomfortable at first, but then (and this is the good part) it's incredible, and so so FREEING.

I talk a lot about this in my posts, and podcasts, and we definitely dive deeper into all of these in my coaching, but I want to give you three steps to get you started.

The BIGGEST dial-mover for me was incorporating more REAL food into my diet. It's actually pretty simple, just getting back to basics. In fact, we learned this back in elementary school and just overcomplicated it as we got older.

We've learned over the years that restriction is the only way, when it's the opposite. You should feel full and satisfied after your meals and you can- when you fill your plate with GOOD and REAL food.

Filling your plate with lots of good lean proteins, complex carbs, colorful veggies, and good fats will help you feel fuller for longer AND they don't have to taste like hot garbage.

Food is a wonderful medicine that can help us balance our hormones, balance our moods and energy levels and fuel our lives. When we stop looking at it as something BAD or something we should restrict, we open up a world of opportunities.

The SECOND step is paying attention to your satisfaction factor.

The more satisfied you feel with flavors, textures and volume AFTER you eat, the less likely you are to reach for the bag of cookies later.  Just focus on getting balanced meals (and allowing yourself your favorite treats so you don't fall into the guilt trap later).

Food is too damn good to be eating tasteless, unsatisfying cardboard so you can lose weight. Especially when you don't have to!

Again, it goes beyond flavor. Start paying attention to how the food makes you feel, what you would change to feel more satisfied. Do you need to add more protein to feel fuller? Do you need to pack more veggies into that smoothie to add more volume?

It's a learning process and once you start to understand what fills your satisfaction factor, the game changes.

Step three is moderation. 

I know this is such a health buzz word but it really is an important key to a sustainable lifestyle.

It's your life, you can eat whatever the hell you want. Food isn't good or bad, it's just food. Once you stop associating guilt with it, you can enjoy the foods you love again.

I have pizza almost every Friday night. And I don't binge eat it because I know it's not the last time I'm going to have it in a long time, I know I can have it whenever I want but I choose to have it for our Friday tradition. It's not BAD food, it's just food. 

When you stop telling yourself you can't have something it stops triggering that binge mentality and you can truly just enjoy it in moderation.

So, these are the three steps to get you started and I go WAY deeper into each of these in Episode 6 of my podcast so tune in for more info!