Sunday is the international day of rest. It’s the day we’re supposed to relax, spend time with family, get some sun on the boat or beach, and refresh for the week. It’s mandated in the Bible, in Exodus 34:21, “Six days you shall labor, but on the seventh day you shall rest;”

…Ok then why does my coach tell me to meal prep on Sundays?

Your coach has the best of intentions. They want you to be prepared. Because they believe a meal that happens by accident, often doesn’t have your best health in mind.

But who has that kind of time to grocery shop, cook, and place their food into cute little tuperwares every Sunday?

Most people don’t. I don’t. I want to enjoy my time with family and write witty posts like this one to you.

I don’t like giving advice to my clients that I find hard to do myself. I’m in pretty good shape, but I’m far from obsessed with my nutrition. I believe my nutrition is there to serve my life, and not the other way around. My life is not there to serve my nutrition.

If you can make meal prep happen every Sunday, awesome, more power to ya. But what I find from the clients I work with is that it’s another “myth of the fit” that discourages them from doing anything because they think they can’t do everything.

So how do we find balance between being prepared for eating this week and not spending our whole Sunday planning our meals like Coach Belichick before the Super Bowl? How do we do something that will help our week? Here are a few tips…

Most Sundays our family gathers together for a Sunday family dinner. We are way more focused on that dinner on Sunday than any other to come that week. But what we will do is make a ton of protein for that dinner. So whether it be chicken, beef, pork, fish, etc., we are always making more than we will eat that night. We almost always have leftovers of protein to head into the week.

Then when it comes to lunch for Monday or Tuesday, all we have to do is steam a bag of veggies and/or rice and boom!…a quick, nutritious meal is made in minutes. You are welcome to still use cute little tupperwares for your leftover proteins.

This doesn’t have to be just a Sunday dinner thing, it can, and should be an EVERY night thing. ALWAYS make more protein that you need for that dinner. Then save a portion for lunch the next day or two.

Making sides to your protein is way easier when that first step is taken care of. Frozen items like veggies, rice, potatoes, etc. are super easy to heat and eat. You can also make salads with your leftover protein.

If you get into a consistent habit of always making more than you need for dinner, and always having a lunch for tomorrow, you’ll find meal prep Sundays aren’t even needed. And then you’re also eating fresher meals and not one that’s 3-5 days old.

You may not full-on meal prep on Sunday, but I think it’s helpful to lay out some kind of plan for the week.

Find some new healthy recipes or go back to a tried and true one you haven’t had in a while. Write down your plan and get it on paper. You can create a grocery list in your notes app. If you are a family that likes to do the shopping and meal planning together than share the notes app with your spouse. This way you’ll be on the same page about what’s needed from the store and what’s to come with meals in the week.

Another great way to be more efficient with your grocery shopping is to use Instacart. Instacart saves so much time when you don’t have to visit the grocery store yourself, but even better, it saves time because it remembers the products you’ve ordered before. We order a lot of the same things over and over again. It’s not uncommon for my wife to place our family’s Instacart order in the 10-minute drive we have coming home from church on Sundays. This saves her so much time and we get to spend more time with each other and our kids.

My last piece of advice if you’re struggling to make more meals at home is to use a meal order service like idealnutritionnow.com. I love that they have gluten-free options and a wide selection. They have subscription service, or you can order as few meals as you’d like. You can also pick up meals from their PGA Blvd. location.

If you have any meal prep tips and hacks to help save your Sundays, I’d love to hear them. Getting on track with your nutrition doesn’t have to be a drastic change to your schedule or lifestyle. Small, new habits can add up to massive changes.

Let your Sundays refresh you so that you feel energized physically, mentally, and spiritually to take on your week.

-Coach Tony