Add an apple

Adding can take less willpower than subtracting

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning,
This is Laura, Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's
tip is that if you are trying to eat better,
just add fruit or a vegetable to whatever you are

(00:24):
already planning to eat. Oftentimes it can be easier to
add food that's good for you rather than forego food
that is not good for you. Eating more healthy food
will increase the overall healthiness of your diet and probably
won't require as much willpower as trying to swear off
the other stuff. So lots of people make resolutions to

(00:48):
eat healthier, but a lot of times these resolutions focus
on what not to eat. No junkie carbs, no ultra
process snacks, no fry food. These may all be good ideas,
but avoiding things we like takes a ton of willpower.

(01:08):
Imagine going to a family dinner where everyone else is
eating your grandmother's special recipe pie. A lot of times
people either get in and then maybe even eat a
lot more than they would have because they feel they
are cheating somehow, or they say no and feel ill
with self pity. Another option, eat what you like within reason,

(01:32):
but just add an apple or something else like that
to whatever you are going to eat. So if it
is looking like a doughnut for breakfast, grab an apple too,
fried chicken for lunch, add an apple pizza for dinner, yep,
an apple, or maybe it's some other type of produce.

(01:53):
Maybe it's easier to bring along a bag of baby carrots.
Or you're having chips and dip, so you add in celery.
People are having cheese and crackers as appetizers, so you
eat a lot of grapes that are also there. You
can make a big vat of vegetable soup and have
a cup of that with whatever you are eating for

(02:14):
dinner during the week. The point is that it should
be something fairly bulky. You add this filling produce onto
whatever you are planning to eat, even snacks. Adding something
particularly tasty fruit tends not to take a ton of willpower. Sure,

(02:34):
I'll have a slice of Grandma's pie and an apple.
But there are some brilliant upsides to this strategy. First,
produce is good for you, so if you are trying
to eat healthfully by eating more produce, you are adding
lots of vitamins and nutrients and fiber to your diet
go you second, all the water and fiber and produce

(02:58):
takes up a ton of space in your stomach. So
my guess is that you will have a slightly smaller
helping of pie if you are also eating an apple
than you would if it was only pie on the menu.
The net result is that you will wind up eating
less of the less healthy stuff, even if you don't

(03:19):
exercise any willpower whatsoever. Longtime listeners may recognize that this
add more of the good stuff concept fits in with
my general philosophy on time. When people want to spend
time better, they often think about the things they want
to spend less time doing, and there is something to that,

(03:42):
but it is often a lot more fun to think
about what you want to spend more time doing and
find ways to do those things. When you spend more
time with friends and on hobbies and on the kinds
of work you love, you naturally spend less time on
social media or in your inbox, even without any email hacks.

(04:04):
As with so many aspects of self improvement, success is
easier if we don't rely so much on willpower. It's
hard to live life in the negative. Adding things feels
active and ultimately tends to get at the exact same result.

(04:24):
In the meantime, this is Laura. Thanks for listening, and
here's to making the most of our time. Thanks for
listening to Before Breakfast. If you've got questions, ideas, or feedback,

(04:45):
you can reach me at Laura at Laura vandercam dot com.
Before Breakfast is a production of iHeartMedia. For more podcasts
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