The average person finds it hard to rid themselves of nasty, unhealthy habits, especially those that have to do with food.

Let’s be honest, junk food can be quite yummy. Yummier than fruits and veggies. The hamburgers, the pizza, the chips, and then washing it all down with your favorite beer–sounds like an awesome Friday night plan.

But we all know you can’t eat like that everyday if you want to live to see 50. You need to make different choices now while you still can. You need to want to do it, because nobody can make you except yourself.

What makes it hard to decide to eat clean? Well, there are different factors to it.

Some people have a mistaken notion that healthy equals boring or bland. And it doesn’t just affect their palates, but their lifestyle as well.

How will they bond with their buddies over wings and beer if they’re conscious about what they’re eating? How will they enjoy brunch with the ladies if they’re counting the calories? How will they enjoy sleepovers without pizza?

So it’s really a matter of thinking differently that you need to achieve.

You need to find a way that will make it easier to wrap your head around the concept that eating healthy is not confining, but liberating.

Here’s how:

See the value

Food is there to provide nutrients to your body, in order for it to function at its best. If you see food that way, instead of an outlet for your emotions, a hobby, or a distraction, you are putting the right value to your food.

You need to put value on your life.

If you keep eating junk food, ask yourself if it’s providing value to your body as a nutrient, and ask yourself if it’s providing value to your life.

Don’t even try to be perfect

You’re not trying to be in the dean’s list, you’re not trying to be an Olympian, you’re just trying to be healthy.

You’re not being graded by how well you ace every part of your diet. You can leave some wiggle room without feeling guilty or feeling like a failure.

The reason why most diets get abandoned is because when people break a meal, they are overwhelmed by guilt and decide to just throw everything away because of their weakness.

But weakness is part of the human composition. So accept that you have weaknesses and allow for them. You’re not a prisoner after all.

Realize good food is everywhere

Knowing that you’re not limited to just salads and raw veggies for snacks will help keep your morale high.

People get discouraged from going on a diet because they think they’ll be drawing the short straw.

They think that there’s really not much good food available that will satisfy their cravings. When you say healthy, they hear bland.

But that’s just not true! There are so many satisfying meals that are healthy.

Organic meats are everywhere now, there are healthy burgers, veggie burgers, wraps, etc. More and more restaurants are also moving towards the healthier options so their menu includes spectacular choices nowadays.

Even going vegetarian isn’t so bad!

So educate yourself of the different kinds of food that’s available in the market now. You’d be surprised at the quality and the quantity.