Thin is not "in". Healthy eating habits are not about starving yourself. If anything, healthy eating habits are about feeding our family adequately with foods selected from the five food groups (more about this later). When you adopt healthy eating habits and foods for a healthy diet in adequate quantities,

* You feel good,
* You feel energetic throughout the day
* Your skin glows in good health
* Your immune system improves dramatically
* You have less chances of suffering from heart disease, diabetes, cancer, etc.
* Reduced chances of being depressed
* Your intellectual ability improves
* Your memory improves
* Your body weight is maintained
* You spend less on medical bills

Preparation for a shift to healthy eating habits:

Think success

Do you have the power to give up that twice-a-week burger and French fries? Or does your tongue rule you? Of course not! Each of us has the power and ability to take charge of our health. Whether we want to live out our future life on a healthy diet plan of pills or be bright and sprightly with health as good if not better than those at half our age is up to us.

Once you take the first big step of saying "yes you can", remember that from time to time you will crave for some of the junk foods you loved so much. For such occasions, keep a fruit handy. Any fruit will do. Have whenever you feel like eating a burger or French fries or whatever - fruit really does the trick!

Acquire the basic knowledge of healthy foods and healthy eating out

This site has a lot of information on what constitutes healthy food and the quantities you should be eating. Pay special attention to the Healthy Eating Pyramid. It really is not difficult at all. Food is broadly divided into 5 parts; Grains, Vegetables, Fruit, Milk and the fifth part consists of Meats and beans. Each part consists of certain healthy food items and the quantities to be consumed on a daily basis. Once you have this basic knowledge you are ready to make the transition to good health by switching over to healthy diet foods.

Now that we know what to eat, let's change over to healthy eating habits.

Healthy eating habit 1: Cook daily

Any cut or cooked food begins to lose nutrients immediately. All nutrients are lost approximately 3 hours after cutting or cooking. So the first portion control diets plan should be to cook daily and not on a weekly basis.

Healthy eating habit 2: Plan your meals

Planning meals avoids last minute random selection of food. Healthy eating breakfast put you in control of your diet and in charge of what goes into your stomach.

Healthy eating habit 3: Eat on time and portion sizes of food

Your stomach secretes digestive juices at regular intervals in expectation of food. If it does not get food when it expects it, you begin to suffer from acidity and other medical problems. Conversely, if you feed the stomach when it does not expect to be fed, the food remains undigested for a long time because of the lack of digestive juices. The production of digestive juices and introduction of food into the stomach should coincide.

Healthy eating habit 4: Control the portions

When we lay out food on the dining table, family members' pickup their plates and heap food onto their plates. There is little control over the quantity of food they eat. Also, people tend to pick and choose and most dislike vegetables. Ideally, you should serve yourself and each member of the family taking care to see that the weight management programs are maintained and that each person receives the correct quantity of all the food on the table. If you have problems with portion sizes, use food portion plate and scoopers. These are ideal tools for ensuring portion sizes.

Healthy eating habit 5: Shop at the perimeter of the grocery store

At your next visit to the grocery store take a look at the items that are stocked at the perimeter of the store. You will be surprised to see fresh fruits, vegetables, dairy products, fish, poultry and whole grain breads i.e. all the healthy portion size you need. The interior in contrast is stocked with processed foods - the kind you should avoid.