First, assess your calorie needs based on factors like your activity levels and weight goals.

Quite simply, if you want to lose weight, you must eat less than you burn. If you want to gain weight, you should consume more calories than you burn.

If you dislike calorie counting, you can simply apply the rules discussed above, such as monitoring portion size and focusing on whole foods.

If you have a certain deficiency or are at risk of developing one, you may wish to tailor your diet to account for this. For instance, vegetarians or people who eliminate certain food groups are at greater risk of missing out on some nutrients.

In general, you should consume foods of various types and colors to ensure you get plenty of all the macro- and micronutrients.

While many debate whether low-carbs or low-fat diets are best, the truth is that it depends on the individual.

Based on research, athletes and those looking to lose weight should consider increasing their protein intake. In addition, a lower-carbs diet may work wonders for some individuals trying to lose weight or treat type 2 diabetes.

Consider your total calorie intake and adjust your diet based on your own needs and goals.

Make Healthy Eating Sustainable

Here’s a great rule to live by: If you can’t see yourself on this diet in one, two or three years, then it’s not right for you.

Far too often, people go on extreme diets they can’t maintain, which mean they never actually develop long-term, healthy eating habits.

There are some frightening weight gain statistics showing that most people regain all the weight they lost soon after attempting a weight loss diet.

As always, balance is key. Unless you have a specific disease or dietary requirement, no food needs to be off limits forever. By totally eliminating certain foods, you may actually increase cravings and decrease long-term success.

Basing 90% of your diet on whole foods and eating smaller portions will allow you to enjoy treats occasionally yet still achieve excellent health.

This is a far healthier approach than doing the opposite and eating 90% processed food and only 10% whole food like many people do.

Create a healthy diet that you can enjoy and stick with for the long term. You can save less healthy foods, for an occasional treat.

Consider These Supplements

As the name suggests, supplements are meant to be used in addition to a healthy diet.

Including plenty of nutrient-dense foods in your diet should help you reverse deficiencies and meet all your daily needs.

However, a few well-researched supplements have been shown to be helpful in some cases.

One example is vitamin D, which is naturally obtained from sunlight and foods like oily fish. Most people have low levels or are deficient

Supplements like magnesium, zinc and omega-3s can provide additional benefits if you do not get enough of them from your diet.

Other supplements can be used to enhance sports performance. Creatine, Whey Protein and beta-alanine all have plenty of research supporting their use.

In a perfect world, your diet would be full of nutrient-dense foods with no need for supplements. However, this isn’t always achievable in the real world.

If you are already making a constant effort to improve your diet, additional supplements can help take your health a step further.

It is best to get most of your nutrients from whole foods. However, some supplements can be useful as well.

Combine Good Nutrition with Other Healthy Habits

Nutrition isn’t the only thing that matters for optimal health.

Following a healthy diet and exercising can give you an even bigger health boost.

It is also crucial to get good sleep. Research shows that sleep is just as important as nutrition for disease risk and weight control.

Hydration and water intake are also important. Drink when you’re thirsty and stay well hydrated all day.

Finally, try to minimize stress. Long-term stress is linked to many health problems. Optimal health goes way beyond just nutrition. Exercising, getting good sleep and minimizing stress is also crucial.

After all is said, the strategies outlined above will drastically improve your diet if applied, they will also boost your health, lower your disease risk and help you lose weight.

It’s often recommended to eat before exercising to top off your energy stores. However, some people may experience side effects when eating too close to exercising. These can usually be avoided by allowing sufficient time for digestion, though this time period varies by the type of exercise.

How long should you wait

When consuming a meal, food enters your stomach and is slowly processed and released into your small intestine in small amounts.

It normally takes 2–4 hours for food to completely move from your stomach to your small intestine. While it’s generally pointless to wait until food is fully digested before exercising, it’s best to give it some time to settle in your stomach.

For most people, 1–2 hours is sufficient after a moderate-sized meal, while waiting at least 30 minutes after a snack is fine.

At that point, food has digested enough to avoid stomach upset with that said, as the intensity of the exercise increases, so does the risk of side effects.

 Food quantity and type

When it comes to eating before exercise, meal size and composition play a significant role. The larger the meal you eat, the longer it will take to digest, increasing the amount of time you should wait before exercising.

Additionally, the composition of the meal affects digestion time.

Meals that are higher in fat, protein, and fiber tend to be digested slower than those containing a larger proportion of simple carbs and more processed proteins, such as those found in some protein shakes and supplements.

High protein foods include intact animal proteins such as beef, pork, chicken, and fish.

Therefore, it’s best to avoid eating large meals that are high in fat, protein, and fiber shortly before exercising to avoid any possible negative side effects.

Potential side effects

While the side effects that may occur from eating close to a workout are highly individual, the most common ones are digestive symptoms and performance issues. Some the digestive symptoms may include; bloating, nausea, cramping, reflux, vomiting, diarrhea, sluggishness, just to mention a few.

Data suggests that endurance athletes like runners and cyclists are at the highest risk of experiencing these side effects due to the nature of their sport. Lower intensity sports such as golf, walking, and archery are much less likely to trigger digestive symptoms.

Moreover, most of these side effects can be avoided by allowing some time for digestion before training.

Typically, 1–2 hours is sufficient after a moderate-sized meal, while waiting at least 30 minutes after a snack is fine.

However, you may find that you can comfortably train shortly after eating, or on the contrary, you may require waiting several hours to avoid side effects.

Therefore, you should experiment to determine your ideal digestion period before exercising. To optimize your energy stores, it’s generally recommended to eat something before exercising.

There are great deals of Nutritious fruits one can enjoy and get all their nutritional value, but when it comes to maintaining a Keto diet one might have concerns about what type of fruits one should eat and even if one should eat at all.

A Keto diet is a very low carbs, high fat eating plan on which carbs intake is often restricted to less than 20–50 grams per day, As such, many high carbs foods are considered off-limits on this diet, including certain types of grains, starchy vegetables, legumes, and fruits, so with this in mind one will really wonder.

However, some fruits are low in carbs and can fit into a well-rounded Keto diet. Hence, this article will be taking a look at some fruits that can perfectly into your Keto diet.

Avocadoes

Avocadoes are the first on the list, although mostly referred to as vegetable, it is biologically a Fruit. Thanks to its high content of heart friend fats, this makes Avocado great for a Keto diet.

They are quite low in carbs and very high fiber and they have other great nutrients like Vitamin K, Vitamin C, Folate, and Potassium.

So with Avocadoes you are good to go!

Watermelon

Watermelons are another great source of nutrient and a powerhouse for a source of hydration and very easy to add to a Keto diet.

In relation with other fruits, watermelon is relatively low in net carbs, and is rich in a variety of vitamins and minerals, including vitamin C, potassium, and copper.

So watermelon is an excellent choice to add to a Keto diet.

Strawberries

Strawberries are delicious, nutritious and are full of health benefits. They are low in carb and high in fiber, these makes it an excellent choice for a Keto diet.

Some of the nutrients present in Strawberries include: Vitamin C, Folate and Manganese.

Go right ahead and enjoy your Strawberries!

Lemons

Lemons are a great source of vitamins C, popular for flavoring food and drinks.

Containing a type of fiber known as pectin, that helps in stabilizing blood sugar levels, slow the growth of cancer cell and fight against inflammation. This fiber qualifies Lemon as a fruit for a Keto diet.

Lemons also contain nutrients like vitamin B6 and potassium.

Tomatoes

Tomatoes are packed with a lot of health benefits. Although mostly used as a vegetable, it is botanically classified as a fruit.

With higher fiber content than carbs, this makes tomatoes fit as a fruit for a Keto diet.

There are a whole of other fruits that are great for your Keto diet, just go ahead and enjoy them to the fullest.