How to Eat Healthy When You’re Crazy Busy 

We all know that eating healthy is easier when you have plenty of time to plan meals, grocery shop, prep food and cook dinner. The problem is that most of us don’t live that way every week.

There are workdays that run late, kids who need to be somewhere, appointments, travel, meetings and nights when you get home and have absolutely no desire to cook. Sometimes you realize at 2:00 in the afternoon that you never really ate lunch.

We get it. We have busy lives too.

One of the things we really want people to understand about nutrition is that eating well doesn’t have to be complicated. In fact, if your plan for eating healthy requires hours of meal prep and a perfectly organized week, it probably isn’t going to be sustainable for very long.

The goal is to find a way of eating that supports your body and also works in your actual life. Here are some of the things we do ourselves and recommend to our patients.

1. Not Every Meal Needs to Be a Recipe

This is probably one of the easiest ways to simplify healthy eating.

We tend to think dinner needs to be a recipe, but it really doesn’t. Some nights dinner can simply be a protein, a couple of vegetables and a healthy fat. Add a carbohydrate that works well for you and you have a great meal.

Maybe that’s grilled chicken, roasted vegetables, avocado and a sweet potato. Maybe it’s eggs with vegetables and fruit. Maybe it’s leftover salmon over greens with whatever vegetables are still in the refrigerator.

It doesn’t need to be complicated to be nutritious.

Once you stop feeling like you need to “make something” every night, healthy eating gets a lot easier.

2. Figure Out Your Emergency Meals

Everyone should have a few meals they can make without thinking about them.

These are the meals for the night when you get home late, everyone is hungry and the dinner you thought you were going to make is clearly not happening.

For us, an emergency meal needs to be fast, made with ingredients we usually have around and something we actually want to eat.

It could be rotisserie chicken with a big salad and roasted or frozen vegetables. Eggs and vegetables are another easy option. You could throw together a bowl using leftover protein, vegetables, avocado and a simple dressing. Soup can also be an easy meal, especially if you add extra vegetables or protein to it.

Pick three or four meals that work for your household and keep those ingredients around. It sounds almost too simple, but eliminating the 6:00 p.m. “What are we going to eat?” conversation makes a huge difference.

3. You Don’t Have to Meal Prep All Day Sunday

If you love spending Sunday afternoon cooking meals for the entire week, great. If you don’t, you are definitely not alone.

We actually think it can be easier to prep ingredients instead of complete meals.

Wash some vegetables. Make a protein. Roast a tray of vegetables. Cook something you can use as a side throughout the week. Make a dressing or sauce you love. Cut up some fruit so it’s easy to grab.

Now you have food ready to turn into different meals.

Tonight the chicken and vegetables might be dinner. Tomorrow the chicken goes over a salad for lunch. The next night the vegetables can go into a bowl with another protein.

You’re doing some of the work ahead of time without committing yourself to eating the exact same meal for five days.

4. Use Convenience Foods

We think people sometimes make healthy eating harder than it needs to be because they believe everything has to be made from scratch.

It doesn’t.

Frozen vegetables are incredibly convenient. So are prewashed greens, precut vegetables, frozen fruit, canned beans, cooked proteins and other minimally processed foods that save you time.

There is nothing wrong with buying the chopped vegetables if buying them means you’ll actually eat them.

Of course, we still recommend reading ingredient labels and choosing products that fit the way you want to eat. The point is that convenience can be a really useful tool when you’re trying to eat well during a busy week.

5. Think About Food Before You’re Starving

You don’t need to have every meal planned for the next seven days, but thinking just a little bit ahead can save you from a lot of last minute decisions.

If you know tomorrow is packed with meetings, what are you going to eat for lunch? If you’re going to get home late, what could you have ready for dinner? If you’ll be in the car all afternoon, could you bring something with you?

We aren’t talking about rigid schedules or obsessing over food. This is simply about noticing the predictable parts of your week and making them easier on yourself.

6. Keep Your Grocery List Pretty Boring

You really don’t need a completely different grocery list every week.

Most of us have a core group of foods we eat regularly, so start there. Choose a few proteins, plenty of vegetables, some fruit, healthy fats and the other staples that work well for you and your family.

Then choose a few meals you want to make that week and add anything else you need.

One of the easiest ways to make healthy eating feel overwhelming is to buy ingredients for seven completely different recipes. You end up spending more money, doing more prep and often throwing away food at the end of the week.

A little repetition is actually helpful.

7. When You Cook, Make Extra

This is one of our favorite ways to save time because it barely feels like meal prep.

If you’re grilling chicken, make extra. If you’re roasting vegetables, fill the whole pan. If you’re making soup, make enough for another meal.

You’re already cooking, so you might as well make that time work harder for you.

Having leftover protein or vegetables in the refrigerator can be the difference between throwing together a healthy lunch in five minutes and ordering something because there’s “nothing to eat.”

8. Have a Plan for the Weeks That Completely Fall Apart

Because they will.

There will be weeks when you don’t grocery shop. There will be nights when you order takeout. You’ll travel, eat at restaurants, go to parties and have days when your food choices look nothing like what you planned.

That doesn’t mean you failed.

One meal doesn’t determine your health, and neither does one busy week. You don’t need to punish yourself or wait until Monday to start eating well again. You can simply make a choice at your next meal that feels good for your body and move on.

We would much rather see someone eat well most of the time for years than eat “perfectly” for three weeks and then give up because it was impossible to maintain.

One More Thing About “Healthy” Food

This is an important part of how we approach nutrition at Next Level Nutrition.

There isn’t one perfect way of eating that works for everyone.

Two people can eat the exact same food and feel completely different afterward. A food can be nutritious and still not work particularly well for your body.

We see this with patients all the time. Someone can be eating foods they genuinely believe are healthy and still dealing with bloating, reflux, fatigue, cravings, brain fog or other symptoms.

That doesn’t necessarily mean the food is bad. It means we need to pay attention to the individual.

How do you feel after you eat? How is your digestion? How is your energy throughout the day? Are you hungry again an hour later? Do certain meals leave you bloated or uncomfortable? Are there foods that seem to make you feel noticeably better?

We believe your body gives you a lot of information when you learn how to listen to it.

That’s really the philosophy behind Next Level Nutrition. Your body isn’t working against you. It’s communicating.

Healthy eating isn’t about creating more rules or becoming afraid of certain foods. It’s about understanding your own body well enough that you can make choices with confidence.

Make Healthy Eating Easier, Not Harder

If there’s one thing we hope you take away from this, it’s that eating well doesn’t need to take over your life.

Keep good food in the house. Have a few meals you can make without thinking. Use convenience foods when you need them. Cook extra when you’re already cooking. Plan for your busiest days instead of hoping they won’t happen.

Most importantly, give yourself some flexibility.

The way you eat needs to work on a random busy Wednesday, not just on the weeks when everything goes according to plan.

Looking for More Simple Meal Ideas?

This is actually one of the reasons we created the Next Level Nutrition Cookbook (coming soon!!!)  We wanted a collection of nourishing recipes that we would actually make ourselves and that could help take some of the daily decision making out of eating well.

And if you’re eating healthy but still struggling with things like bloating, reflux, fatigue, inflammation, cravings or weight loss resistance, that’s a little different. Your body may be giving you information that is worth paying attention to.

Our free Metabolic Assessment is a simple place to start. It can help you look at some of the patterns that may be influencing how you feel and better understand what your next step could be.

[Take the Free Metabolic Assessment →]