July
2008
How to Guide: Making the Switch to Primal Living in 6 Easy Steps
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There is Light at the End of the Steps
Perhaps you’ve been reading MDA for some time now, finding yourself intrigued, maybe even testing the waters a bit. The Primal Blueprint sounds good to you. It speaks to you. It makes sense. The mind is clearly motivated, but the heart is, well, a bit trepidatious. Maybe the “Act As If” challenge interested you, inspired you, but you’re not quite there yet:
“Compared to my lifestyle now, I don’t know if I could make this big of a change.”
“Do I trust that I could stick to this kind of life?”
“Maybe this is just for diehards. Do I really have it in me to be part of something like this?”
It’s not uncommon to question our motivation, our ability, even our core confidence at significant turning points. There’s nothing like a big change to make us examine what we’re really made of. But far too many of us derail ourselves before we’re even out of the starting gate. Instead of guessing what we’d do, predicting where we’d stumble, anticipating how we’d eventually fail, how about throwing “foresight” to the wind and taking a bold leap of faith? Eh? Just so you know, we’re with you on this one.
It’s important to keep in mind that Rome wasn’t built in a day, and your Primal lifestyle doesn’t need to be either. Especially if you’re more of a “slowly slip your way into the pool” type of person, perhaps these steps will make your transition a bit more manageable – and more inviting.
1. Accept that your process will be unique
Low carb living, for instance, initially takes a different toll on everyone. You might be starting from a standard American diet of 300-400 grams of carbs a day, or you might be cutting back from a lower carb diet of around 200. Either way, you know the direction you want to go, and that’s the key. You may be a diehard endurance athlete or accomplished weightlifter who feels the need for a new direction, a new focus in his/her health.
2. Allow yourself to ease into it
Not everyone needs or wants to take this approach, but there’s nothing wrong with allowing yourself this option. If you’re up for a “dive in,” particularly if you’re facing major health complication like diabetes or obesity, a fast and furious beginning can reap major health benefits quickly. (And for some, it’s like the band-aid conundrum: they’d rather do the brief, intense rip that gets them where they want to be.) However, there’s plenty of reason to take your time if that’s your way. You’ll allow yourself to gradually but genuinely incorporate the news aspects of diet, exercise, and stress reduction without feeling overwhelmed. And for some aspects of the Primal Blueprint, slow and steady may have definite benefits. Some people respond differently to the reduction in carbohydrates than others (particularly at the ketosis level). Initially, you might feel sluggish or foggy. Take time cutting down. Hold steady at 150 grams a day if needed, and use the time in the holding pattern to ramp up your efforts in other lifestyle changes. When you’re ready, coming down 10 grams at a time may be a better approach for you.
3. Divide and conquer
Sometimes it’s easier to tackle one aspect of a project (or a lifestyle) than to attend to all of them at once. If you’re trying to cut carbs and kick a nasty caffeine habit, it might behoove you to take on one at a time or at least take one slowly and focus on the other. Although all the elements of the Primal Blueprint work together (and actually make other efforts easier), there’s nothing wrong with honing in on a few select areas. Make a commitment to total health, put yourself in the center, but take on only what you feel is manageable for now. If you keep the rest in sight, chances are you’ll begin gravitating toward those other changes anyway. Healthy choices have a way of begetting other healthy choices.
4. Track your day-to-day practices (and progress)
It’s easy to sometimes get wrapped up in the “vastness” of a goal: the long-term nature of your plan. Allow yourself to focus on each day, but give yourself the opportunity to concretely view your ongoing commitment. Keep a kind of food/exercise/stress management journal. In addition to the actual foods and exercises themselves, make some observational notes on how you feel, what you are able to accomplish, where you feel challenged. Looking back on your notes will give you a sense of how far you’ve come. It can also serve as a reminder of how you made it through challenges in the past.
We wholeheartedly recommend using a tool like FitDay or The Daily Plate to this end.
5. Ease up if you hit rough road
Back off a bit on the intensity of exercise, for example, if you find you’re having a hard time adequately recovering from strength training or “sprinting” bouts. If you’re hitting the wall with carb reduction, hold steady or bump up your intake by 10-15 grams to see if it makes a difference over a week or two. Progress is rarely a smooth, uninterrupted trajectory for anyone. The point is to do what’s necessary to keep your general momentum and motivation going.
6. Give it time
The Primal Blueprint isn’t about temporary fixes or fad gimmicks. It’s an overarching design with suggestions to help you live your healthiest, most productive life. This kind of change takes time, care and ever evolving commitment to create a new and genuine lifestyle.
What are your thoughts on making the transition? What was/has been the most challenging aspect that had you perhaps accepting a “two steps forward, one step back” approach? What finally got you over the hump, so to speak? Do you have advice for new “apples” just beginning the transition?
extranoise Flickr Photo (CC)
Further Reading:
30 Day Primal Health Challenge
Have You Decided to Be Healthy?
Thanks for the suggestions. It’s only been a couple days and I am already having some minor struggles. This list is encouraging and I’m sure will come in handy over the course of this next month.
I’m definitely a “Plunge into the deep end” sort of person. Of course, there are certain problems with this approach. Probably one of the most common problems with the plunge is my tendency to get excited, plunge too hard, and give up early. This might look recognizable to some of you…
Monday: I’m doing it! I’m going Primal! Here I come, Grok!
Tuesday: Yeah! Not a single Starbucks, no bread, just chicken and broccoli, I’m amazing! Watch me climb that mountain over there!
Wednesday: Sore! Yeah, feel the burn it’s great, think I’ll go toss down another salad…!
Thursday: Whew, four salads in a row now. Really getting tired of oil & vinegar dressing, but look how Primal I am…?! Oh man, I’ve still got to do some wind sprints…
Friday: Weekend almost here! Time to hit TGIFriday’s with the friends…
“Hey McFly,” say the friends, “Let’s share one of those huge nacho platter appetizers.”
“No,” responds me, “I’m totally Primal, I’m ordering the…well…something on this menu…there’s got to be something-”
“Come on McFly, everyone’s eating nachos. They’re topped with bacon bits.”
“Okay,” says me, “just one…”
Two plates of nachos, a dozen mozzarella sticks, a bloomin’ onion, and a slice of chocolate cheesecake later, going Primal becomes something to do next week.
Or maybe the week after.
The solution to this problem for me came with step 4, tracking my progress. I logged onto FitDay and recorded everything I ate and all my physical activity. I was still breaking the typical 100-150 carb intake per day when I started out, but I quickly realized how simple it was to bring that number down. Just dropping the daily Starbucks decreased my carb intake by 60g daily and I wasn’t any less hungry for it. By the end of the first week I’d figured out how to sate myself the Primal way, and suddenly it wasn’t quite as hard as when I forced myself to the extreme from the beginning.
Hello everyone,
This post is a great resource for people who are looking to make changes in their lifestyle. I have been running an experiment of my own for the last month or so. The experiment began with cutting out refined sugars and other simple carbohydrates (grains, etc.) from my diet, along with reducing fruit intake, reducing alcohol, and increasing my intake of meat and vegetables.
I have learnt a lot from this experiment, and I thought I would share some of my lessons with the rest of you. I would like to think of it as my way of giving back to this great community from which I have learnt so much.
I have learnt a few things in this month:
(0) There is a thing like too much detail. Micro-management is generally not sustainable, and as such one should be very careful about what sort of ideas one uses to guide ones actions. For instance, I found it extremely difficult to use the notion of consuming 100-150 grams of carbohydrates a day as guide to my developing new eating habits. If one thinks in terms of such detailed figures, one tends to get lost and very quickly discouraged. I personally felt a sense of paralysis whenever I thought about carb-intake in this way. I did not know what was ‘right’ by this standard.
My solution was twofold: First, I decided to restrict my carb intake to just vegetables and some berries. Second, I decided to let my stomach tell me how much was too much. I decided to never eat until I was hungry, and to never eat to fullness. There is a middle-point between empty and full where one feels satisfied. By experimenting with the portions and timings of my meals, I was able to approximate this middle ground more often. A little while ago, I tried feeding in a typical days food into fitday.com, and it showed that I consumed around 90g of carbohydrate for the day. That day was pretty typical, so it seems that I found my way to the prescribed number without having to think in terms of that number. I think it is very important to trust your body and let it be your guide.
(1) After a while of listening to my body, I realized that a lot of my snacking could only be termed as really compulsive behavior. Granted I only ever snacked on nuts, and that too in very limited quantities, but it was the act of snacking itself (regardless of the quality and quantity of the snack) caused me to raise my eyebrows. I realized I did not need many of my munches (I was not feeling hunger pangs), nor did I really want them. But I went ahead and ate anyway. And then I found my mind trying to justify the snack to itself on the grounds that it wasn’t much, and it wasn’t sugary, etc. This is suggested some sort of malaise in my relationship with food.
My solution has been to begin a food diary where I mark a big fat yellow or red mark on any day I find that I snacked unnecessarily between meals. A yellow mark would mean it was a minor transgression. A red mark would mean a major trasgression. With online tools, it is very easy to maintain such a log, and it keeps one extremely honest. There is no hiding from your actions once you have recorded them somewhere for all to see. I think that if one is to make fundamental changes to one’s attitude toward food, then one needs to be completely honest with oneself. And a physical journal of some sort is indispensable in this regard.
(2) The final challenge I faced in making all these changes was the social reaction of my family. In general, people will not understand when a person starts a primal-like lifestyle. It is very tempting to make concessions –especially intially– when you are in the midst of people who continue with habits you yourself have grown up in. In these moments, I have found that a relatively detailed study of all the science underlying the principles of the primal blueprint really helps. Once one understands it, one knows that the popular eating habits of society are the fads, not the primal ones. Then it becomes much easier to hold one’s course. And then a magical thing happens with time: the temptations to eat sugary food, to snack, to drink that extra cup of coffee begin to disappear when you stop acting on them for a while. You begin to slip more into ‘auto-pilot’ where you instincts guide you to healthy actions. And then when you reach that place of constancy it is really hard to get knocked off again.
* * *
So to summarize my rather long post, I would simply like to reiterate that it is
(a) important to listen to your body and let it be your guide.
(b) important to use tools like diaries and journals to maintain the essential honesty.
(c) important to study the science to strengthen the quality and sharpness of your focus.
I hope that this experience of mine will prove helpful to some Apple out there. Thank you very much!
Apurva
Oh, and I forgot to mention a fourth very important realization I have had during the course of my ongoing experiment:
It is very important to focus on the process rather than the goal. Patience is a big virtue here. It is important to trust your actions and focus on living cleaner and better everyday. It is important to have faith that the results will come if you give it your time and sincerity. Drive any idea of a particular ‘deadline’ or a quick fix away from your mind like the plague (or a cake
).
This is important because it takes a lot of time to get to the place you want to be health-wise. The body has its own way of changing, and it is important to realize that all you can do is change the underlying causes through your actions. The results will take their time to follow.
For instance, initially I had thoughts like “Maybe in two weeks I will feel less skin when I pinch my belly”, or “Hopefully my belt will have to tightened up a notch by the end of the month”. But now I think in terms of “Hmm, I had an unnecessary snack at work mid-morning yesterday. My goal for today is to guard against a repeat of that”. Or it maybe something like “The last time I went to that restaurant, I couldn’t resist a piece of their hot bread. I am going to be more in control today.”
We should always set goals, but let the goals be focused on making day-to-day improvements rather than on fixed results. Enjoy the process and the results will come.
Enjoy,
Apurva
Do I trust that I could stick to this kind of life? This is the hardest aspect of doing the primal diet. I have reservations about my own resolve. But I am currently overweight and will implement the divide and conquer strategy. I am looking forward to loosing weight so maybe this will help with motivation. Does anyone know any good paleo recipes?
No plunging in for me. I’m a walk-into-the-pool-one-inch-at-a-time kind of person.
I’ve had a great deal of success in carb reduction by focusing on one meal at a time.
First of all, I eliminated the after-dinner-snack carbs.
Then I eliminated carbs from my dinner, which really took a lot of attitude adjustment. If I was having stir-fried veggies and chicken, I wanted some rice to go with it, dammit! It took me a while to get used to it, but now my stir-fries are about twice as big as they used to be (and with cashews or nuts on top!) and I don’t miss the rice at all.
Then I worked on breakfast. I used to eat cereal on a regular basis, but I switched to cottage cheese and fruit, which has been my standard wake-up meal for months now.
Right now I’m at the stage where I no longer eat any bread, pasta, or other refined grains during the week, but I let myself go a little crazy on the week-end, such as having a bun and ketchup with my buffalo-burger, or a big bowl of popcorn on Sunday afternoon.
I was really excited about this challenge. I already eat fairly well and track what I eat, but I was still eating around 175 grams of carbs a day. Today I made a deliberate effort not to have sugar free gum (I usually chew a pack a day) and sugar free cocoa (provided by the office) as well as bring some protein to throw on the salad I normally get at work instead of relying on the highly suspect probably reconstituted cafeteria chicken breast. End result? Just finished dinner and I’m sitting at 75 carbs and feeling GREAT.
I’m all about little changes. So for example, when I wanted something hot to drink today (my office is freezing) I got chamomile tea instead of the cocoa.
Rachel,
Just remember that if you cut your carb intake by 100 grams (400 calories) you are going to need to replace those calories with, primarily, fat; assuming of course you are already getting adequate protein. This may sound obvious, but many people that cut carbs make the mistake of not eating enough calories. I suspect this is one of the big reasons people feel as if they have lower energy levels when beginning a low carb diet. Good luck on the challenge and keep in touch!
Apurva, thanks for sharing those insights. Very helpful to all.
McFly, I hear you on the salad repetition deal, but don’t forget, once you stop eating carbs, you can load up on fats. There are some killer creamy dressings out there. Dragonmamma got that when she decided to increase the stir-fry instead of adding the rice. I find when dining out that any restaurant will gladly double your veggies if you decide to can the rice or potatoes.
Jim, if I could somehow convince you that once you start down this road, it’s no lonmger about sacrifice. You’ll see (as the commenters here do) that you don’t have that craving for bread or sugar or dessert….or if you do, it’s a great once in a while (and you can pretend you and Grok found a stash of honey this one time). It’s upposed to be a way of living that rewards you with great tasting food choices even though you agree to forgo some others.
Hello everyone,
iam doing good so far the only problem i run into is eating enough carbs.Iam used to the Atkins style of thinking im stuck in induction mode 20 grams of carbs it just kills me to eat berries because of the carbs.But otherwise im primal.
Hi Aaron,
Thanks for the concern. I had a bunch of hazelnuts, walnuts, and almonds for dessert (I usually have fruit mixed with Fage 2% Greek yogurt) with dinner and I used whole coconut milk rather than my usual light stuff in my curry. I ended up at 1500 calories, which is my normal intake, but a much more significant portion of my calories came from fat than is typical for me.
Lately, the biggest obstacle I’ve faced with a primal-style diet is limiting fruit. I recently moved to LA and am surrounded with so much fruit, especially since it’s summer now and my favorites are coming into season (figs, apricots, cherries, berries - yum!). I have successfully eliminated/cut way back on starchy carbs (no more bread, rice, potatoes, corn, etc) and I’ve changed my workout habits (2 days a week of high-intensity cardio intervals + 2 days of weight lifting + a few miles of walking every day) but I still really want to eat fruit! Any tips? Am I sabotaging myself if I enjoy a few servings of fruit per day while it’s in season?
Heres a great website for recipies http://www.cleochatra.blogspot.com there all low carb look around on the site and also scroll down and look to the right theres a lot of veggie recipies.I made lasanua last night gluten free the crust was made of cauliflower to take place of noodles.yummy it was full of veggies.
enjoy