You may be questioning the title of this article and asking, what does living with intention even mean? Well, you’ll know after reading and finding out the difference between counting macros and living with intention when it comes to your diet.
Fad diets are always super popular. They appear to be a too good to be true easy button when it comes to unlocking the secret to health or weight loss. You see all your friends dropping lots of weight and feeling great in a short amount of time while following the newest trendy diet, so you think you should give it a try. You follow it for a little while and lose some weight. All is good and it’s not too hard to follow, until life starts to kick in and you get busy. You default to what’s easy for you. That may be restaurants, fast food, or frozen boxed meals. There goes the diet and there goes the weight loss (plus some), and to top it off, you feel awful again.
Counting Macros
Counting macros is definitely one of those fad diets. Counting macros is a very diligent diet making you count all your macronutrients and calories. Macronutrients are the big things in food…carbohydrates, proteins and fats. When following a macro counting diet, you get allowed a certain number of grams per macro you need to eat. If done correctly, yes it usually leads to weight loss, because you’re eating less!
To keep track of how many macros are in the foods you eat or how many you’ve eaten, there are several apps and trackers. It’s not too hard to keep track if you’re eating processed food because the food is all in there…you just click to add and you get your total, and how much you have left.
Living with Intention
Doing something with intention means you are doing it on purpose and with meaning behind it. Living with intention takes becoming attuned to what your body is speaking to you. I try to teach my clients to be intentional with their food choices to learn how that food makes her body feel. My clients aren’t coming to me strictly for weight loss. There is a diagnosis or a life-altering symptom she wants to be healed from and she knows what she puts in her mouth is so very important to how she is going to feel.
Living with intention takes changing your mindset to knowing an easy button is always too good to be true. It takes knowing what really works is putting in the hard work and maybe missing out on some things that are not going to lead you to health but being ok with that.
Why Counting Macros Doesn’t Work and Why Living with Intention Does
Counting macros does take intention. You are intentionally counting calories and the amount of macronutrients you eat, but it’s still the easy button because you aren’t listening to your body. You’re not learning to be in tune with what your body is speaking to you…prime example, hunger and satiety. When you’re hungry and when you’re satisfied, your body will tell you. If you’re counting macros, you may feel those cues but may have to ignore one or both because you have number goals to hit.
When counting macros, most become hyper focused on numbers not nutrients. Yes food has macronutrients, and those are important, but it also has micronutrients (vitamins and minerals). Every process in the body works off a micronutrient. If your diet isn’t providing enough micronutrients, you can become deficient.
The problem counting macros has but living with intention doesn’t is the nutrient density of the diet. Most people eat a very processed, nutrient void diet when following macro counting. This is because it’s the easy way to count macros is by eating what’s in the tracking apps…processed foods. But if living with intention with your diet, you are free to choose very nutrient rich foods that offer large amounts of nutrients.
I have had my fair share of clients come to me after following macro counting diets. Yes they lost weight but soon, they felt terrible. Their bodies were screaming out for nutrients through symptoms and they no longer knew what was the best way to eat.
Let’s Connect!
Have you ever followed a macro counting diet? Diet you feel tied to an app or feel trapped by numbers? Respond with your experience.
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