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You can’t outrun a bad diet.

As much as I hate how toxic diet culture has become, the reality of the situation is that if you want to make a change to your body…if you want to lose weight or look a certain way…you HAVE to change what you eat.

Reality check: Whatever you do currently is probably not cutting it, otherwise you would already look how you want to look.

I’ve gone through every diet you can think of. I started back in high school with the Atkins Diet, which made me lose a tremendous amount of weight quickly. Eventually, I would grow tired of the restrictiveness of a low carb diet and I ballooned back up in weight again. This cycle of weight loss and weight gain continued several times over the next decade, with each iteration leaving me slightly heavier overall than before. This goes in line with the research: dieting to lose weight actually tends to make you gain weight.

So what now? Do you just give up? Come to grips with your fat self? If you want to lose weight for health or aesthetic reasons, the answer has to be true, long-term lifestyle change. It’s the simple solution that is unbelievably hard to do.

Your body wants to remain in homeostasis, which means it doesn’t want to change. However, if you make small changes and make those habits stick, then over time…little by little…you can transform yourself. You can level up. It’s a grind, and you will fail along the path…but if you are mostly consistent, your body will have no choice but to change.

One of my meals prepped: a curry chicken.

Meal prep is one of the most powerful habit changes you can make when it comes to eating healthier. In fact, I would consider meal prep a KEYSTONE habit, which is a habit that leads to a cascade of other habits. It can create massive change for your life, your looks, and your health.

When I meal prep I accomplish several things: I eat healthier, I save money, I get better at cooking, I find new recipes to share and write about, and I save myself the hassle of having to ponder what I am going to eat for every meal. It’s a very high value activity that levels me up in multiple categories.

So how do you do it? How do you begin to meal prep and start making massive change in your journey to greatness? Let’s take it step by step.

Write down your food origin story.

A food origin story is your back story of your relationship with food and how you got to where you are today. Writing one can create ownership and highlight the unique aspects of your individual journey. Check out my example here.

Break down what foods you really like to eat.

Be specific. What flavors do you enjoy, what textures? What vegetables, what meats, what starches? This will make it very clear how you should structure your eating to create a sustainable habit.

Figure out your goals and understand what its going to take to get there.

Do you want to lose weight? Do you need to gain weight? Do you need to lower your blood sugar or cholesterol? (For the last two I’d suggest getting some help from a registered dietician). What does your eating need to look like to hit those goals?

Research.

Find meal prep recipes that cater to what foods you enjoy eating. Get recipes that reflect what you like to eat, then modify them to fit your goals. If you like eating pizza but need to lose weight, there are some choices you can make…you can eat pizza less, you can reduce your serving sizes, or you can find a recipe that makes sense to fit the macro nutrient levels that are recommended for your goals. The goal is not to avoid everything you love to eat. The goal is to find ways to enjoy food mindfully and with respect to your health goals.
Protip: Thinking of what you can ADD vs SUBTRACT from your diet makes change much easier to integrate. (This is usually vegetables and fiber.)
The trap here is to stay in this step way too long. Give yourself a few days to do this…then THAT’S IT. Start doing. You’ll figure it out and adjust on the way.

Plan and Schedule.

Now that you have some recipes in hand, plan which ones you are going to prepare first. Start with once a week preparing a meal that makes 5 servings. Sunday is the best day for most people, as it allows them to make lunch for the entire workweek. Gather the ingredients and schedule a block of time to prepare dinner.
Once you know the day that you’re going to do it, make sure everything is ready for that day. Don’t try to multi task. Give yourself a few hours to prep, especially if you aren’t used to cooking. Make sure you have all the tools you need to prepare your meal beforehand. It’s really easy to delay things because you don’t have this or that…so don’t let yourself make those excuses.

Execute.

Prepare your meal! If you haven’t cooked much previously, I highly suggest give yourself more time than you think you need. There are a few things that have helped me tremendously with meal prep: a large dutch oven and an air fryer. A large dutch oven can easily fit five servings of protein for stews or casseroles, you can throw it in the oven, and its easy to clean. An air fryer lets you do a lot of things that you would normally have to do in the oven (like roast vegetables), except it does the job better and in less time.
Protip: if you are like me and dont really like vegetables…try chopping them small and throwing them into a stew or casserole. You won’t even notice them if you have a little sauce to flavor everything.
Once the meal is completed, portion out your meals for the week. Having re-usable meal prep boxes makes this much easier. These are the ones I use. They should stay good for five days.

Give Yourself Feedback.

First, give yourself feedback for how the meal prep came out: How was the recipe you picked? Did it taste good or was it just edible? How can you adjust it for next time?
As you continue to meal prep, use whatever metric appropriate for your goals. If your goal is to change the shape of your body, take progress photos and compare them to previous ones to see how much you’ve changed. You can also take body measurements such as waist size or chest size to see progress. The scale is the easiest to use, but I personally think that it can be discouraging for someone trying to be healthier. Your weight fluctuates frequently, and it does not account for added muscle in addition to losing fat. It can be extremely disheartening to see the same number on the scale and see that it is unchanged (despite all other metrics pointing to improvement). So here’s a tip: lose the scale and focus on other metrics like waist size, energy levels, strength goals, endurance, or how clothes are fitting.

Be consistent.

This is the most important part of the whole process. Lifestyle change is the goal-it’s not something that you’ll only be doing for a few weeks. It needs to be something you do long term to make lasting changes.
One thing I’d recommend is finding some way to track your progress VISUALLY. Jerry Seinfeld would make an X on a calendar for every day that he would work on his comedy. Eventually it would create a chain of Xs that was very motivational for him. He never wanted to “break the chain”, so he would keep at it. Sometimes it something as simple as this that can change behavior. And if you slip up…forgive yourself. Just try not to do it two days in a row.

Another meal prep: thai basil chicken (pad ka prao)

Summary

I know these steps work because I am using them myself. I’ve dropped several inches on my waist since starting on my own journey 6 weeks ago, all without ever denying myself good food or the occasional restaurant meal or ice cream. My body is more muscular, and I’m starting to see the veins pop out in my forearms and even on my bicep, which is something I never thought I’d achieve. While it is true that I weight lift frequently, most of this aesthetic change can be attributed to making meal prep a lifestyle change.

I’ll be sharing recipes, workout routines and tips and tricks for making sustainable long lasting habits in later posts because it is my passion and my goal to transform you into the warriors and heroes that you deserve to be. If you want to join a community of other adventurers on their own journey, come join our Facebook group: Gamify Fitness, where we make fitness an adventure using game mechanics to make getting healthy more engaging…and more fun.

Why Meal Prep is KEY to Lifestyle Change