Resolution Revolution

Happy New Year everyone!
New Year= Fresh Start= Resolution Season.

I am not normally a person who makes resolutions. I have a hard time sticking to my daily to do list so long term goals like lose weight and pay off debt, forget about it! But this year, I decided to go ahead and make some resolutions or rather long term goals.

Why? Because the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again while expecting different results. I haven’t changed the way I do things but I have been expecting things to magically change. Unless I change myself and the way I do things, I cannot move forward.

One of my long term goals this year is to lose weight and adopt a healthier lifestyle. But, I always make so many excuses. The two biggest ones are: not wanting to cook two meals (because my husband won’t eat “rabbit food” and tofu will kill him) and healthy food is expensive.

But excuses only serve to keep us subservient to our bad habits. So I sat and thought about those two things for a while. How could I overcome the daunting task of cooking two meals and the expense of good food. I like the idea of the Nutrisystem and Jenny Craig diets but both diets are so cost prohibitive. But they do solve the problem of cooking two meals. You cook for your family and then you have your own healthy meal in the freezer ready to go. So why can’t I make my own healthy meals in bulk and freeze them in portion sizes? Well, it costs too much to eat right! WRONG.

I sat down and started making a list of budget meals that I can make that are healthy and that will freeze well. I came up with a pretty long list. Things like enchiladas freeze well and if you skip the meat and use beans for protein and bulk it up with veggies, use salsa instead of enchilada sauce and sprinkle with reduced fat cheese, you have a healthy, filling meal that isn’t hard on your budget.

The same thing is true with lasagna. I came across a great, easy, and budget friendly lasagna recipe when I was excluding dairy from my diet while I was nursing my youngest. There isn’t any cheese in it and that’s what usually costs so much when you are putting together lasagna. It’s filled with spinach, tofu and turkey sausage and I promise you won’t miss the cheese! So what’s my point?

You can eat well, on a budget but you just have to get creative. My family’s weekly grocery budget is $60.00 and now granted I haven’t shopped for my freezer friendly healthy meals yet, but I can tell you through sales, coupons and smart shopping, I won’t be breaking my budget to lose weight. It just takes creativity and some time. I scour the web for easy meals that are budget friendly. There are little changes you can do to any of your meals to make them healthier. Ground turkey for instance is much cheaper than ground beef. You can get a pound of very lean ground turkey for $2.00 (at Walmart) and just substituting that for ground beef in a recipe will save you money and your waist line.

The biggest thing you can do for your waist line (and your wallet for that matter) is portion control. That’s the thing I have the hardest time with. I hate to watch my portions but when you are looking to lose weight, it is a must. I did Weight Watchers for a while and the thing that worked best for me was to actually measure out my portions and not eat anymore than that. It was hard for the first 2 weeks but I got used to it and managed to stick to my Weight Watchers plan for a couple of months until my husband came home from Iraq and declared that real Asians don’t eat brown rice.

But I’m not going to let my husband or my finances stop me from accomplishing my goal this year.