Flexible dieting is a simple way of eating that is hugely loved here at THE BOD.
Also referred to as tracking macronutrients (protein, carbohydrates, and fat), flexible dieting allows you the freedom to eat the foods you enjoy, while still maintaining your health and fitness goals.
You can follow a meal plan, change up your diet from day-to-day, or do a combination of both, while ensuring your caloric and macronutrient needs are met. And if you’re craving a treat throughout the day - go for it!
Flexible dieting doesn’t mean eating junk food day in, day out, however, it does mean that by focusing on your macronutrient intake rather than eating certain foods or sticking to a strict regime you can stay on track and be able to live your life with balance.
Within flexible dieting, health is your number one priority. You still need to ensure that the majority of your intake is made up of minimally processed and wholefood options, and you adhere to your micronutrient needs (minerals, fibre and vitamin intake) too.
Whether you’re looking to lose weight, build lean muscle, or maintain your weight, flexible dieting is a sustainable, simple and effective way of eating that you can do for life.
Here are some of the pro’s of flexible dieting:
- It’s a long-term and maintainable approach to eating
- Allows you to include a variety of foods and source nutrients from an array of produce
- Allows for more flexibility in your day-to-day eating
- Eat the foods you love
- Convenient when travelling, socialising or at work functions
Ready to start nailing your flexible dieting? Here’s how:
- Write down your goals
Take some time to note down your nutrition-specific goals and keep them somewhere where you can easily refer back to them. Make sure you set S.M.A.R.T goals - specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and timely. For example, “I want to drop 5kg in body weight through adhering to my macros consistently over the next 12 weeks and weighing myself daily.”
- Determine your starting point
Track your current eating habits in an app such as THE BOD App and do this for at least a week. By consistently noting down your eating habits, you have a benchmark of where to go from here. If you have been accurately adding your entries, this calorie and macronutrient breakdown will reflect your current ‘maintenance calories’ - the calories that have been maintaining your current body weight.
- Determine your macros
Use THE BOD App or THE BOD Macro Calculator to calculate your personal macronutrients based on your goals. Look at this macronutrient breakdown and calorie intake in conjunction with your current ‘maintenance calories’ and compare them. The goal is to transition to these new calories and macronutrients, and hit these targets consistently.
- Begin tracking
We recommend tracking in advance. For example, enter all the food you plan to eat the next day to avoid any ‘accidents’. Quite often, if you eat and return to tracking later, you’ll find that you may have gone over or left only a small allowance of food for the remainder of the day. You may even find that at the end of the day you are nowhere near your protein goal! We recommend entering in your main meals first (breakfast, lunch and dinner), and from there, take a look at your remaining macros to see which snacks you can fill the rest of your day with.
- Consistency
Flexible dieting has to work for you. So it’s important to find consistency and develop your own take on flexible dieting. Be as consistent as you can, and be patient. Once you’ve got the hand of tracking, you can start to get creative. Some people prefer to pick high volume food so they can fill their day up with plenty of snacks and meals, whereas others prefer calorie-dense meals and less snacking. Find what works for you, your lifestyle and preferences.
Get in touch with our Customer Support if you have questions and you'd like more help with your flexible dieting journey. We'd love to help you!
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