How Should You 'Budget' Cookies?

If you have four cookies in your kitchen, is it better to eat all four at once or have one every day for four days?

This is a real-life question I was asked.

As with all things nutrition, it depends!

1. The Big Picture 🖼

2. Explain It To Me It Like I’m 5 🧒

3. Junk Food? 🍔

4. Let’s Cut This Cookie 🍪

5. Parting Zen 🧘‍♂️

The Big Picture 🖼

Here are some of the factors it depends on:

• What you ate yesterday, today, and will eat tomorrow.

• How active you were yesterday, today, and will be tomorrow.

• Your emotional relationship with food, eating, and cravings.

• The type and size of the cookies.

• Your physiology.

• What is happening in your life right now?

• Your history with sweets and nutritional consistency.

So you can see, it depends!

Explain It To Me Like I’m 5 👦

Today’s topic, as simply as possible:

“No two people are the same.”

Junk Food? 🍔

I do not recommend a diet full of ultra-processed foods.

However, you can eat a cookie.

Let’s Cut This Cookie 🍪

I’ve made the point that there is no cookie-cutter approach.

Let’s get more specific.

I listed 7 possible things to consider above.

If I were on a call with you as your coach, I would ask you questions.

Questions designed to uncover:

• The root cause of what may be holding you back, now or in the past;

• The lowest-hanging fruit / easiest possible path to make progress.

For example:

If you’ve just baked cookies for Mother’s Day, have a few extra lying around, have no history of going overboard with eating sweets, do not generally keep cookies in the house, and are relatively well-balanced, then … it probably doesn’t matter much.

However:

If you’re already struggling and unhappy with your weight and tend to eat sweets in excess whenever they’re around, then we would explore potentially giving them or throwing them away to reduce the temptation.

These are hypothetical, but you get the point.

Strictly from a caloric perspective:

With all other factors being equal and relatively balanced, meaning that eating the cookies posed zero risk of additional inconsistency, if I had to pick only one choice (eat 4 cookies now or eat 1 per day for 4 days), I’d pick the latter option.

Why spread it out?

It’s more consistent and less extreme.

Yet I still concede that there are some people for whom the ‘larger dose’ is the way they might be more consistent over time.

I’ve worked with them before. It's like people who do well with 6 disciplined days per week plus 1 ‘cheat day.’

There’s room for both of us :)

Parting Zen 🧘‍♂️

A simple word, phrase, or thought to take with you:

Be well,

Coach Matt

PS: ATTENTION DADS:

PPS: Here are some other newsletters I recommend:

PPS: My common-sense disclaimer …

The advice I offer is not medical advice. If you have any medical issues, please consult your doctor first. The advice I offer should be personalized to your needs. I can help you make those personalizations or refer you out. Reply to this email if you need help.