I currently keep a food journal and I have all my coaching clients keep food journals as well.  I don’t do this to track calories, macros, or food amounts as they are not things that I feel are important or necessary.

Food Journaling is to provide more of an insight in to what we eat, why we eat it, and how it makes us feel.  Along with logging how we slept and what our bathroom habits are like.  Yes I went there.  Yes I feel that is important because it can provide insight into how our bodies handle different food items.

Keeping a log of what we eat can help on so many levels but there are three that I feel stand out the most.

1. It Helps Us Stay On Track

Perhaps you’re just starting out on a new healthy lifestyle journey or maybe you have set a goal for yourself.  By keeping track of our daily eats and habits this can help us stay on track and reach our goals.  You will have a visual of how you did that day and how it made you feel.  It provides a way for us to stay focused and work towards our goals, whatever they may be.

2. It Helps Us Spot Intolerances

Because you now have a daily log of what you’re eating, you can flip through and see if you notice any patterns. Food intolerances are varied and not the same for everyone.  You might notice that every time you have cheese you break out on your chin.  Or you sleep poorly that night.  Or you get a headache later in the day.  Journaling is a way for us to physically see how food effects us which then allows us to create an action plan to address it (if we so choose).

3. It Helps Us Be More Mindful

Of our eating and our daily habits.  By journaling, we learn more about the way our bodies handle food and stress, as a result we tend to become more mindful of what we put into our bodies and how we choose to live our lives.  Life tends to become a little clear and more focused when we have dialed in our nutrition and can help reduce the stress in our lives.

I love keeping a food journal.  It’s a no judgement zone.  It’s not meant to make us feel guilty about what we eat or to put pressure on us to eat a certain way.  It’s a learning tool.  Journaling helps us work through any issues we might be facing and paints a clearer picture of the situation allowing us to create a plan to address it.

Have you ever thought about keeping a food journal?  Perhaps you should give it a try and see how it goes!  Just give yourself a goal of doing a food journal for 7 days.  That’s not too long and after 7 days you can see if you want to keep going with it.