Benefits of Breakfast

And, of course the consequences of not eating a healthy breakfast are great as well.

The benefits of eating a healthy breakfast come from kick starting your body after an extended period of fasting. Thus the reason it is called a Break Fast.

The time between meals is greatest between dinner and breakfast, and if you don't eat breakfast, then you are giving your body an even longer period of fasting.

Our bodies really only recognize two states of eating, feast and famine. When the body thinks there is plenty of food coming at regular intervals, it processes the incoming food in such a way as to use the energy more quickly, and doesn't try to conserve energy or store it for later. When it sees what it thinks is an oncoming famine, it shifts gears and uses any food that comes in, in a way that stores more energy (think, fat) so that it will have reserves for later since there is not enough incoming.

One of the main benefits of breakfast is that it decreases the amount of time between meals, telling the body that there is no reason to store up energy, and to go ahead and start burning it up, since more will be coming later.

One of the consequences of not eating a healthy breakfast, is that the body sees a period of more than 12 hours between incoming food, and so, it stays in a mode to try to hoard the energy that it has stored, and will use any incoming food to store up more energy for the ongoing fast.

Think about it...

Most people today only put 4 to 7 hours between lunch and dinner.
But if you skip breakfast, that means that there are 17 to 20 hours between dinner and lunch.

Doesn't it seem more reasonable to start your day with a nice breakfast, followed by lunch 5 hours later, with dinner coming up after another 6 hours?

Now there's only 12 hours between dinner and breakfast, and you should be asleep for at least 8 of those hours anyways, when your body doesn't need as much energy.

Another of the benefits of breakfast, is that you will be less inclined to eat a huge, calorie laden lunch to make up for that extended period of fasting.

Another of the consequences of not eating a healthy breakfast is that we will tend to get ravenously hungry in the morning before lunch. And we all know that when we are starving, we don't tend to snack on the right foods and will generally shove whatever high calorie processed food we can get our hands on into our mouths to cover our hunger.

I think we all understand that you can't just eat sugar coated cereal,  mini chocolate donuts, or other high sugar/low nutritional value foods for breakfast and expect that to be beneficial.

Here are some healthy weight loss breakfast foods:

Non or Low Fat Yogurt
High Fiber Cereal
Fruit
Whole Grain Toast with Jam
Eggs
Whole Grain Bagel with peanut butter
Pita Bread and Yogurt
Rice with Raisins
Rice with Peaches

To get the greatest benefits out of breakfast you really need to think of it as the meal where you are going to get one quarter of your daily nutrititional requirements

The information found in and throughout The 7 Habits of Weight loss (www.7habitsofweightloss.com) is not intended as a substitute for the advice or treatment that may have been prescribed by your physician.

Information found here should NOT be construed as definitive or binding medical advice and is NOT intended to diagnose, prescribe, nor endorse any brand of products or services. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider prior to starting any new weight loss or exercise regimen or with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition.