The house that I grew up in is in rural Vermont. The driveway that leads to the house is a winding 1/10th of a mile dirt road. It is the kind of dirt road that has some grass growing in between the tire tracks. These tire tracks have been worn down lower than the middle where the grass grows.
When that driveway was put in, I was 5 years old and it was flat - no grooves. But almost 40 years of daily trips up and down the driveway have made grooves/ruts from where car tires continually run.
Your brain works in a similar fashion. When you repeat an action or behavior, the neurons make grooves. These grooves help information travel faster, making the action easier.
When we are building new habits, often our focus is on the new thing that we are doing. The new habit that we are working to build. We can get frustrated when the new habit doesn’t take in 7, 21, or 28 days (or whatever made-up-magic number people say it takes to install a new habit).
New habits are often put into place to replace a current action that is now deemed unsavory. One thing that we rarely consider is now deep are the neuronal grooves of the unsavory habit. How long have we been building and sustaining the habit that we are trying to get rid of?
How do we create a new habit that is strong while also negating the impact of the old habit that is currently robust.
This process isn’t instant, no matter how hard we wish it was. This process is hard (good luck trying to drive down a worn dirt road outside of the timeworn ruts), but not impossible.
This is why it is important to give yourself the perspective of time. You aren’t just making a new habit, you are overwriting an old one as well. The only way that you can do this is through repetition. Then it comes to nutrition...
Repetition is built and sustained one meal at a time.
So keep eating the way that you have planned. Keep working on being more consistent. The more deliberate and focused you are with your effort, the faster and deeper the new neuronal tracks will be laid. This leads to stronger habits that sustain and over time those grooves from the old habits will fade away and you'll be in a different rut.
A good rut.
A rut that was created by your (new) habits that sustain your strong, fit, and healthy life.
You got this and I’m here to help.
Fats - All Omega-6 Fats aren’t Pro-Inflammatory
Last week, we briefly looked at how the theory behind the omega-3:omega-6 ratio doesn’t translate into systemic pro-inflammatory or anti-inflammatory changes in people.
I went to graduate school with the hopes of studying the benefits of omega-3s and the detriments of omega-6s. But one of the hardest truths that I accepted as a graduate student was that the data didn’t support dietary omega-6 fats being universally pro-inflammatory. Here’s an excerpt from a research review paper on this topic..
…despite long-held belief to the contrary, the available evidence demonstrates that
high dietary intake or high plasma concentrations of LA [linoleic acid] do not appear to result in increased tissue ARA [arachidonic acid] or in increased in vivo or ex vivo concentrations of inflammatory markers in humans.
The details here center on the fact that a majority of the omega-6 fats that people are shorter in length - linoleic acid. This is the omega-6 fat found in nuts, seeds, canola oil, and vegetable oils. This isn’t converted very efficiently to the longer chain arachidonic acid which is much more proinflammatory in nature.
The practical side (I know the above paragraph got a little sciency) of this is that nuts and seeds contain omega-6 fats, they are beneficial to your health, and don’t lead to increases in inflammation. Eat them :)
Protein - Plant Protein Powders..a heaping scoop of meh?
I would like to thank all of the marketers in the world for making the benefits of plant protein confusing.
We’ve all heard - eat more plant protein. For a very long time this meant eating more beans, nuts, seeds, lentils, grains, and soy. No one wanted to eat plant protein powder as it tasted like fermented grass clippings.
If you eat foods rich in plant protein, you are getting a lot more nutrition than just protein. My interpretation of the science behind plant protein has been just that - when you eat a lot of plant protein containing foods, you get a lot of other nutrients, fiber, phytochemicals, etc - thus the benefit isn’t likely as much due to the unique mix of amino acids that you get from plants (because it isn’t very unique) as it is all of the other great nutrition in these foods.
Enter Plant Protein Powder 2.0 - It doesn’t taste like fermented grass clippings but it is still earthy. Earthy is tolerable. If you follow a vegan diet or can’t have dairy - this has been literally a game changer.
But I have a hard time believing that one gets the same health benefits from eating brown rice, black beans, and pistachios as they do 1 scoop of plant protein powder that contains the amino acid extracted from peas and rice.
So how do we make sense of this?
- Eating so many plants that you get a relatively meaningful amount of protein in your diet is going to pay big dividends to your health and body weight.
- Using a plant protein powder does not confer the health benefits that you get from #1 above.
- Whey protein is the gold standard when it comes to promoting muscle growth and repair so if you aren’t excluding dairy from your diet - whey is the way to go.
Carbs - Insoluble vs. Soluble Fiber
Talking excitedly about fiber is a guaranteed way to make sure that you are alone with no one to chat with at a cocktail party (potentially speaking from personal experience here). But that doesn’t mean that there isn’t a lot to talk about with fiber.
Fiber is one of the most important signals in your diet. If you aren’t getting enough fiber from whole foods, then it is a signal that your diet isn’t where it needs to be.
The basic recommendation is 14g of fiber per 1,000 calories.
But not all fiber is created equal. The fiber in the new ‘healthy soda’ that you see at the grocery store likely doesn’t count here (but that is another topic for another time).
Traditionally there are 2 types of fiber - soluble and insoluble.
Both are important. Soluble fiber is the kind of fiber that will form a gel. If you are a regular oatmeal eater or if you’ve ever made chia seed pudding - you'll know what I mean. This kind of fiber helps with feeling full, lowering cholesterol and even helping control blood sugar levels.
Insoluble fiber is the roughage that vegetables bring to the table. Insoluble fiber keeps your bowels regular, helps with the tone/fitness of your intestines, and also helping with feelings of fullness.
- Soluble fibers come in large part from beans, lentils, oats, sweet potatoes, apples, chia seeds, flax, oranges, and avocados.
- Insoluble fibers come mainly from broccoli, brown rice, asparagus, nuts, kale, and the skins of fruits and vegetables.
You need both. Soluble fiber can be tricker to get if you are following a lower carb diet so make your food choices accordingly.
Talk soon,
Dr. Mike
|
|
Mike Roussell, PhD
Nutrition Strategist
|