You’re busy. We get it. Making time to cook a balanced meal isn’t always possible when life seamlessly segues from work to one personal life commitment to another. There aren’t always enough hours in a day to cook, or anywhere convenient to pop a prepared meal in a microwave. Those fast food chains operate at the speed of life. Stovetop cooking? Not so much.
However, “those fast food chains” have a drawback you’re well aware of: they’re horribly unhealthy for you. So what’s the next best thing that’s quick and convenient? Meal replacement shakes, bars, and whatnot. Much better, right?
Not so fast.
We at OHS will never encourage you to practice skipping meals and filling them in with meal replacements. We’ll explain why in a moment. First, we want to make sure you’re aware of what’s in a typical meal replacement product:
- Synthetic vitamins and minerals
- Added sugars and artificial sweeteners
- Artificial ingredients your body doesn’t recognize as nutrition
- Inadequate protein and fiber to induce satiety
- Preservatives that further block your body from realizing you’ve fed it anything of value
What’s worse, if you have stomach problems, meal replacements don’t help. In fact, they can make indigestion even worse. And if you’re eating/drinking them for weight loss? Not helping either. In fact, they’re only perpetuating your struggle to lose weight.
So, what’s the main reason why we discourage you from reaching for meal replacements? They don’t help you eat a balanced meal or teach you how to plan meals. Doing both are key to achieving optimal health.
Okay, okay, take a moment to get all your excuses about why you don’t always have time to cook out of your system. We’ll wait. *Looks at wristwatch and waits.* Okay, done? Good.
Excuses aren’t solutions. Hard as this is to hear, we care enough about your health to be blunt with you. “Those who fail to plan, plan to fail.” Same goes with meal planning. You found the time to buy those meal replacement products. You can find/make the time throw a bunch of healthy, hearty items in a crock pot that’ll make you the envy of the office and fill you up at the same time. The internet is bursting with fast, easy meal ideas that fill you up and can help slim you down.
Still, we understand there are going to be times where meals don’t got as planned and things come up that catch you unprepared. In the rare instance that happens, we still want you to reach for something healthy to help keep your energy up, body going, and health at optimal levels. For that, we offer up the cleanest, most nutrient-balanced, purest, and the ONLY hypo-allergenic high protein formula available: Optimal Complete Nutrition Plus. This powder combines 9 different protein sources, ensuring you are getting pure, unadulterated nutrients delivered at the cellular level. And while we don’t encourage you to get in the habit of using it as a meal replacement, we encourage you to keep it handy for when you need something to tie you over between proper meals.
Why You Shouldn’t Skip Eating Balanced Meals/Meal Planning
It’s in your best interest to keep meal replacements to a minimum. Research and statistics show sticking to balanced meals over replacement ones makes you far more likely to eat less because you’ll actually feel FULL, more steadily lose weight (and keep it off), stay in better health, get all the nutrients your body needs, and maintain better digestive health. When hungry, your body craves nutrients, not calories.
There is no substitute for eating solid, nutritious food. It’s easy to overlook liquid calories since they go down so easy. Satiety is key to helping you not overeat and to lose weight. If you’re always hungry, you trick your body into survival mode, which slows your metabolism down and makes it easier to gain weight because your body thinks it’s in famine mode, even though it’s getting enough calories. Instead of losing fat mass, you lose muscle, which means your body burns through fewer and fewer calories over time. So, once you feed yourself real nutrition you have to chew on, your body packs on the pounds in the name of survival.
You’re going to be better off in the long run if you get in the habit of planning meals. You’ll be healthier, more satisfied, and even save money. You’ll find it easier to reach and maintain a healthy weight and, if getting in the right balance of macronutrients, enjoy the perks of higher energy and greater vitality.
The moral: balance. Adequate nutrition and optimal health come from real foods, not products pressed into bars, poured into portion-sized cartons, or a paper bag passed through a drive-thru window. Do everything in your power to eat well and avoid skipping meals or relying on replacement products to get you through the day. Your body and waistline will thank you over and over. Life is going to happen from time to time, so plan to have Optimal Complete Nutrition Plus at the ready.