- Creatures of Habit by Jenna Gestetner | Resolute
- Posts
- A Habit for Stress Free Lunches 🌱
A Habit for Stress Free Lunches 🌱
Jenna Gestetner
September 10, 2023
prep·a·ration
noun
Definition: The process of getting something ready.
How often have you faced midday decision fatigue because of 'what's for lunch?’
Or ended up ordering takeout because you couldn’t decide or didn’t want to spend time making food?
SCIENCE:
Any decisions, including small food-related ones, tax your cognitive resources. This depletion affects your capacity for subsequent choices throughout the day.
Overwhelmed with decisions, we tend to lean towards default or less optimal choices.
Research consistently demonstrates that balanced diets, rich in whole foods and low in processed items, significantly enhance cognitive performance and mood.
On the other hand, spontaneous food choices, especially under stress, often lean towards unhealthy, processed foods that can make you less energetic and productive.
IMPACT:
Meal prepping isn't just about food; it's about optimizing your time and cognitive power. It translates to heightened productivity, elevated creativity, and sustained energy levels.
When lunch decisions and preparation time are removed from your short break, you eliminate unnecessary stress, allowing for more focused and clear-headed decision-making elsewhere.
IMPLEMENTATION:
Why habits? Your time is valuable and limited; you don’t need more complex systems. My goal is to provide you with simple, effective tools to support your physical and mental well-being and make you more efficient and conserve mental energy. (read more)
Plan out your lunches for the week and prepare them for easy lunch breaks.
Step 1: Decide what you will have for your 5 lunches this week
The simplest way to do this is by picking a protein, carb, and vegetable.
Step 2: Cook enough for 5 meals
Step 3: Portion the food into 5 containers
Step 4: Store the containers in the fridge or freezer
Now, all you’ll have to do is take it out, heat it up, and enjoy!
TOOLKIT:
In every edition of Creatures of Habit, I feature a product to help you implement this week’s habit.
Getting a new lunchbox or container set will help motivate you to form a new habit.
CHALLENGE:
This week, challenge yourself to prep your lunches at the beginning of the week.
Need food ideas? Respond to this email, and I’ll give you some suggestions.
After last week, I told you I’d check-in. Did you try the challenge? Did you feel the effects of smiling? Reply to this email to let me know.
“Planning is bringing the future into the presnt so you can do something about it now.”
Until next week!
- Jenna Gestetner :)