Jonathan Steedman (00:01.336)
Hey team, we're going to talk about meal planning today. I know it's not the most exciting, sexiest topic, but honestly, it is a fundamental part of good nutrition. Yes, you can tick all of your nutrient boxes and eat a healthy, balanced, varied diet without any planning, but honestly, I'm yet to see it. And I've spoken to thousands and thousands of people about their nutrition at this point in time.

People who do no planning generally struggle to hit their goals. Now, there is a whole, there is a wide array of what we would consider planning from

you know, small bits and pieces here and there through to very detailed meticulous planning. I want to take you through kind of the different options, give you a few ideas, take, I want you to take what you need and leave what you don't. Okay, so this isn't like a blanket recommendation. Everyone must do all of this. These are just a few ideas I want to throw out and I want you to grab the one that is the most helpful for you.

you need to be doing some level of planning. you're currently doing no planning, this is your sign to take something from this podcast and start implementing it. If you're already doing some planning, hells yeah, keep that up.

This is a topic of conversation that comes up all of the time inside Weighd Off. Weighd Off is the weight loss program group that I run. got really awesome community, so we're always chatting through this stuff, chatting through our weeks, chatting through what's working, what we're struggling with. And meal planning is a huge part of that because that's one of the pillars of people getting results.

Jonathan Steedman (01:42.592)
Yeah, I'm not talking about supplements or peptides or whatever the sexiest thing. I've said that word. I've said sexy too many times already. But I'm not talking about that stuff. That stuff is exciting, but actually is not important really compared to having a plan. So there are two main ways that I would recommend planning. Okay. The first is either having a specific I have planned

I'm having this on Monday, this on Tuesday, this on Wednesday, so you've planned sort of your days. Or having a pool, i.e. I need to plan five dinners for this week. So I'm going to figure out what those five dinners are. I am going to...

buy the ingredients for all of them and then I'm kind of going to see what I feel like from each day to each day so I'm not locked in to you know wondering whether Thursday night I'm still going to feel like a stir-fry right some people and I will admit I'm more the I have already decided what I'm having for the week I got too many other things and decisions to make in my day I'm actually like to not have to think about dinner I let past Jono figure that out

But I know a lot of people don't like that rigidity and so if that's you that doesn't mean don't plan it just means have a more flexible plan have a pool figure out five meals and buy the stuff for that a Few tips in terms of actually getting your meal planning to happen. The first is something called Habit stacking which I stole from James clear who stole from BJ fog so sue all of us and that is

If you are struggling to get into a rhythm of meal planning, find a trigger in your week that will encourage you to do it. Now that trigger could be a time-based trigger. So it might be like it is for me every Tuesday morning, I do my meal planning or it could be a habit or an activity based trigger. I.e. when you're sitting at your kids swimming every Wednesday night, you do your meal planning or when you're having your Saturday morning coffee, you do your meal planning. One of those things that

Jonathan Steedman (03:45.526)
One of those triggers that is reliable and happens without you thinking, use that to trigger the meal planning habit, which we're maybe still trying to build. On that note, just a friendly reminder that you don't actually have to meal plan and prep on the weekend. That might work for you, but I spent an embarrassingly long amount of time trying to meal plan and prep on the weekend before I realized that that is actually the worst time of the week for me. I got kids, know, often I'm... Anyway.

I now meal plan Tuesday mornings after I drop them at school because that fits in with my week. And so just make sure that you're not trying to stick to this plan because that's what you just heard. That's meal planning Sunday, Sunday meal prep, right? Sunday meal planning. So that's first thing. Find a time in your week. Find a trigger. What else is I going to say? You can tell how well I've planned this.

Jonathan Steedman (05:09.626)
yes, another tip I was gonna give you is whatever method you use to meal plan, I would try and go digital. I love paper and so much, for this option, digital just works better. It's because you can carry it around with you. Whether you use notes or a calendar or a spreadsheet or something like that, don't just wipe.

the plan and putting your new one each week. What I did a while ago was I copied. So I just use notes in my phone and rather than...

you know, deleting last week's meal plan and putting it back in. I just copied it and pasted it on top. And so now I have like, I'm probably coming up on six months worth of meal plans historically. And so if I'm ever stuck for ideas, I just do a quick scroll back three or four months. And often what I'll find is like a bunch of meals that have just kind of fallen out of the rotation that I've forgotten about. I'm like, crap, yeah, I totally forgot about that. And I bring that back in. So that can be a good way to help.

Make sure that you're not trying to plan from the ground up each and every week. So those are a couple of tips for meal planning. Like I said at the top, pick what style of meal planning you're going to do. Are you going to do more of a pool based option where you just pick X amount of meals and make sure you're shopped for that? Or are you going to be a little bit more prescriptive and put that on those days?

Even if you're being more prescriptive, you probably don't need to plan out every single meal on every single day. If you reflect on your weeks, you can probably identify which times in your day, which meals are problematic for you. might be, so for me, it's lunch and dinner. always like my first meal of the day is pretty reliable. I don't really have to think about it. And then lunch can be a bit how you're going. And then dinner, I mean, obviously I'm going to have dinner, but because usually I'm juggling the kids.

Jonathan Steedman (07:07.36)
I can't just make it up as I go. So I don't plan my breakfasts. I kind of have a couple that I just rotate through, but I plan my lunches and my dinners. So don't feel that you need to plan your whole day. Just plan the meals that are a little bit shakier. Okay. And that way you can be kind of, um, you know, can, you can plug those gaps if you will. So my last two, but very important tips. First and foremost,

Please don't forget that there are seven days in the week, not four or five. And I know that sounds funny, but the amount of times that we have solved problems in people's week because they were only planning for Monday through Thursday and they forgot about Friday, Saturday, Sunday. Plan for all seven days. There's seven days in the week, plan for seven days. And that leads nicely into my final point. Don't view this meal plan as a rigid structure that you cannot flex.

Right? Just because you said Thursday night I'm going to have stir-fry doesn't mean that you can't move that to Wednesday and swap those meals around. That's totally fine. Right? It also, you might have said, but John, I don't want to plan on the weekend because I don't know what I'm doing. I'm going out Saturday night. Great. That goes in your plan. All right?

your plan for dinner Saturday night is out or away. Honestly, putting that in, but still having all seven days filled out is so much better than being like, I'll just do the days that I'm sure of. And I guess I'll just hope for the best on the days I'm unsure of, because those are the days that are messing you up. So at least have a plan for them. It is better to have a plan and deviate from it than to not have a plan to begin with. Okay.

That was my meal plan ramble. I hope there was a few nuggets in there that you can pull out and maybe upgrade your meal planning a little bit because again, like I said at the top, it is not the most exciting topic, but it can be one of the most powerful improvements you can make to improve your health, your nutrition, your weight loss goals, your muscle gain goals, your gym goals, your performance goals.

Jonathan Steedman (09:17.411)
this can really impact all of them. So I hope I've been able to help a little bit with that. And if I have, please let me know. And if I haven't, I mean, I really want to know, but I probably should know. So if this has been useless, let me know that as well. Anyway, thanks, team. Bye.