How to Make Healthy Eating a Way of Life
Staying fit is important among aspiring and pro cheerleaders, that’s why they train hard and watch what they eat.
More often than not, the first thing that comes to mind when you’re going to go for auditions is to “lose weight”. If you don’t know your way around health and fitness just yet, you might just end up skipping meals or cutting down on some food groups to shed off some pounds.
Cheerleaders are athletes that require more than your average amount of stamina to be able to perform at their best.
Diet isn’t just randomly eating less of a food group or skipping a meal. It’s about knowing what your body needs for whatever activity you’re having (in this case, cheerleading performance, workouts and dance classes). Not eating healthy will drain you physically and make you prone to injuries.
Food is the fuel of your body, so you have to make sure you’re eating healthy according to your needs.
To stay in tip-top shape whether you’re aspiring to get into an audition or you’re already a pro cheerleader, make sure you get good servings of complex carbohydrates, lean protein, and unsaturated fat to sustain your energy levels.
Read: Top Nutrition Secrets for Pro Cheerleaders
But if you have never thought much about this before pro cheerleading, maybe you’re thinking, “Yikes! That seems hard.”
Here’s our strategy:
1. Eat food that keeps you full for a longer period
Make sure what you eat appeases your hunger, so you’re not constantly hungry. If you don’t, you’re bound to eat more.
2. Don’t forget breakfast!
Lots of people try to skip this, but you shouldn’t. Pro cheerleading is tedious, so it’s best that you eat a healthy breakfast be you’re able to get the first essential nutrients and energy that you need for the day.
3. Practice reading the label.
Now, this maybe a bit of work when you’re doing groceries, but once you get in the habit of checking out labels first, then you’ll reap the rewards. Count the calories that go into your meals.
4. Control food portions.
Do you know what’s a good trick that I learned? It’s eating food on a smaller plate. This way your plate will always look full while keeping the serving small.
5. Mindful eating, please.
Dig into your behavior and feelings when you’re around food. Don’t do any form of emotional eating. You only have to eat when you’re hungry, and by hungry, I mean, not starving because when you are, you’ll have higher tendencies to eat more than you should.
6. Start small.
Start ahead of time, so you won’t have to do changes all of a sudden, and gradually change your eating habits. When you do this, your body becomes accustomed to it until you’re able to actually live it. Suddenly jumping on a diet is more likely to fail, not to mention, hard to sustain.
7. Be realistic.
There are a gazillion diets out there that you can try while on your pro cheerleading journey. Don’t make unrealistic goals for yourself, so you won’t have to feel so much pressure. Instead, find a diet that you can stick to.
8. Refuse junk.
If you’re the one doing your groceries, skip the junk food area. It’s all too easy to pick up a bag of chips during the day when it’s lying around your pantry. Keep healthy snacks around to avoid temptation.
9. If you fail, get back up.
Now, this might happen, and I don’t want you to think that you’re a complete failure. The key is getting right back on track as soon as you realize this slip off. Don’t let one meal bring you down!
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