At this point in quarantine, I have basically experienced just about the full range of emotions and I’ve admittedly eaten my way through most of them. From boredom to plain old emotional eating, if there is one thing I have learned during the past six weeks it’s that that’s more than enough time to make a big difference in your life good or bad. Despite some states starting to open up, for many of us it will be quite some time before life starts returning to normal. For that reason, and to help curb the overeating, I’m here today to share with you why now is the perfect time to start meal planning.
I’ve talked about meal planning many times before and if you are a part of my now silent email list you probably have received at least one of my free meal planner printables. Meal planning is one of the most important tools I use to keep my life organized. A simple 20 date can save me money, time and stress.
Over the past six weeks or so I have gotten lazy. I attribute much of it to emotions from the scary situation we are all in to being isolated from family and friends and of course the lack of income and watching my business going from starting a record year to zero seemingly overnight.
Coupled with the fact that getting groceries is no longer something you can take for granted. Gone are the days when toilet paper, paper towels and eggs are plentiful. Instead I often feel like I’m happy to get when I can and then try to eat around what we were able to bring home instead of planning means and buying what we need. It’s exhausting.
Six weeks into this and I think everything is compounding on itself and I find that I’m not only stressed and bored but sluggish from the wrong foods. This is reason 1 for why now is the perfect time to start meal planning. I’ll get into the reasons below.
Meal Planning Keeps you On Track
Whether you are on a diet or simply eating for a healthy lifestyle, planning your meals a week or even month ahead makes it so much easier to stay on track. Whether your goals are to lose weight or simply improve or maintain good health, when you have a meal plan established you are more focused when shopping which means you aren’t bringing the wrong things into your home to eat. And because you don’t have extra things, you are almost forced to keep on track.
Meal Planning Saves you Money
As mentioned above, when you have a meal plan and know exactly what you need for the week you are less likely to buy extra items that cost more money. You don’t need these extra items anyway so leaving them in the store means you are only paying for what you really need. This saves you money.
Way back in January, before COVID-19 changed life as we know it, B and I started ordering our groceries through the Wal-Mart app and immediately saw a major reduction in our grocery bill. I mean that some weeks we were spending less than 50% of what we used to and while part of that was simply solid meal planning, the other part of this was that we weren’t lured by things in the store because we’re only searching for the specific items we needed.
Meal planning can be a family Affair
With everyone cooped up at home, why not gather the whole family together for a joint meal planning effort. Maybe allow each member of the family to pick a meal or a favorite recipe or plan something they will create for the rest of the family. This gets everyone involved and excited and provides something for you all to look forward to.
Meal Planning Helps you Start Establishing Good Habits
I mentioned diet and lifestyle above but if now, with most of us at home, is a great time to start establishing good habits so when things do start transitioning to a more “normal” state, you already have the habits in place to plan your meals. You are likely less busy and less distracted right now with running all over the place, working late, traffic, etc. so starting good habits now will make it easier to continue as things return to a more normal state.
If any or all of these reasons for meal planning has sold you then I have a special little bonus tool to help get you started.
I’ve updated the meal planner that I give to my email subscribers and I’m giving it to you here for FREE. No sign up required!
This meal planner is has no dates so you can download and use again and again. It includes my weekly meal planner, a shopping list organized by categories in most grocery stores and a bonus +5 Tips for Easy Meal Planning.
Download this FREE Meal Planner Here!
Oh, and if you love the planner, I invite you to sign up for my newsletter below. Subscribers get freebies like this plus so much more!
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