Halloween might be in the rearview mirror, but the bowl of Halloween candy is still sitting in the kitchen.
And if you’ve got kids, there’s a pretty good chance you’ve got enough miniature chocolate bars and gummies to last until NEXT Christmas. It can be awfully tempting to dive into those tiny chocolates and gummies every time you walk past them.
But I’m here to tell you something…
It’s totally fine if you do.
Seriously.
You should be able to enjoy a little candy here and there without feeling like you’ve completely ruined your diet.
Hell, a mini KitKat has about 70 calories in it.
That’s hardly going to make or break your progress.
If you can’t fit a little chocolate into your daily food plan, you might be making things a little too complicated.
Now, that doesn’t mean you should spend the next three weeks eating your body weight in Halloween candy.
There’s a difference between enjoying a few treats and eating an entire bowl of candy every time you walk through the kitchen.
And that brings me to something I see far too often with people trying to lose weight.
They think they need to eliminate all the foods they enjoy.
No chocolate.
No pizza.
No burgers.
No beer.
Just chicken, broccoli, and enough self-discipline to make a monk jealous.
And eventually? They get sick of it.
They end up eating the very foods they were trying to avoid, feel guilty about it, and convince themselves they’ve blown their entire diet. So they might as well keep eating.
Sound familiar?
The goal isn’t to eliminate your favourite foods. It’s to learn how to enjoy them without letting them take over.
Here’s how I’d approach that bowl of leftover Halloween candy.
1. Out of sight, out of mind
If you keep candy sitting right in front of you all day, you’re probably going to eat more of it.
Not necessarily because you’re hungry. Not even because you particularly want it.
Sometimes it’s just there. You walk into the kitchen, see a mini chocolate bar, grab it, and carry on with your day.
Then you do it again.
And again.
Before you know it, you’ve eaten half a dozen chocolates without really thinking about it.
One simple solution? Put the halloween candy away.
Stick it in a cupboard, pantry, or somewhere you aren’t constantly staring at it.
This gives you a little more time to think about whether you actually want some candy or if you’re just grabbing it out of habit.
And that small distinction can make a pretty big difference.
You don’t need to ban Halloween candy from your house. You just don’t need it staring you in the face every time you walk through the kitchen.
2. Fuel your gains
Here’s something a lot of people forget: Candy isn’t inherently bad for you.
Most candy is made up of carbohydrates, primarily sugar, and sugar is simply a source of energy your body can use.
That makes a few pieces of Halloween candy a perfectly reasonable option before or after a workout.
Heading to the gym after work? A couple of mini chocolate bars can provide some quick energy before you train.
Just finished a tough workout? Enjoy a little candy alongside your protein shake or another snack.
Will candy magically build muscle or burn fat? Not at all.
But it can absolutely fit into a nutrition plan that supports those goals.
You don’t need to turn every meal into some perfectly optimized combination of nutrients.
Sometimes you can just enjoy a little chocolate and get on with your day.
3. Pair up your candy
One of the easiest ways to stop yourself from mindlessly eating candy is to make it part of something else you’re already eating.
Instead of grabbing a handful of chocolates every time you walk into the kitchen, try pairing them with a meal or snack.
Here are a few examples:
- Have a mini chocolate bar alongside an apple.
- Add a little chocolate to your Greek yogurt.
- Enjoy a couple of pieces of Halloween candy after your lunch.
- Enjoy a few pieces alongside your protein shake after training.
The idea isn’t to make candy healthier by adding something else to it.
It’s to give yourself a little more structure around when and how you’re enjoying it.
Instead of constantly picking at candy throughout the day, you’re making a conscious decision to enjoy it as part of a meal or snack and that can make it a lot easier to keep things under control.
4. Stop treating Halloween candy like it’s forbidden
This might actually be the most important one.
If you’ve spent the last few months telling yourself that chocolate is off-limits, there’s a pretty good chance you’re going to want it even more… and when you finally give yourself permission to eat it?
You might feel like you need to eat as much as possible before you go back to being “good” tomorrow.
That’s the problem with putting foods on a pedestal.
You create this unnecessary sense of urgency around eating them.
Instead, try reminding yourself that candy isn’t going anywhere.
You can have a mini KitKat today.
You can have another one tomorrow.
And you can have chocolate next week, next month, or whenever you feel like it.
You don’t need to eat the entire bowl just because it’s sitting in your kitchen.
And you certainly don’t need to punish yourself for enjoying a few pieces.
The more comfortable you become with enjoying your favourite foods, the less power they tend to have over you.
You don’t need to eat all the Halloween candy before next Halloween
Here’s the thing, you don’t need to go on a free-for-all with the leftover Halloween candy.
You don’t need to throw it all in the garbage, either.
You definitely don’t need to spend the next month feeling guilty every time you eat a mini chocolate bar.
Most of that candy can probably last until next Halloween, but that doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy a few pieces of your leftovers or your kids’ plunder.
A little halloween candy isn’t going to ruin your progress.
Neither is a burger, a pizza, or a beer with your buddies.
What matters far more is what you’re doing consistently.
Your workouts, daily activity, overall nutrition, sleep, and all the other little habits that add up over time.
One mini KitKat isn’t going to undo all of that, and neither is enjoying a few pieces of candy over the weekend.
You don’t need to eat perfectly to get results. You just need a way of eating that you can actually stick with.
Want to learn how to make nutrition easier?
This is exactly the kind of stuff I coach people on inside the Everyday Athlete Program.
Not just what to eat, but how to make nutrition work around your actual life.
Your favourite foods. Your busy schedule. Your weekends. Your family.
All the other things that make eating perfectly every day completely unrealistic.
Your goal shouldn’t be to spend the rest of your life dieting. It’s to build a system that helps you lose fat, build muscle, and feel better without giving up everything you enjoy along the way.
If you’re ready to stop making nutrition so complicated and start building something you can actually stick with, click here to join the Everyday Athlete Nutrition Reset – for FREE.
If you’re looking for ideas when it comes to eating on the go, and what to look for in Fast Food check out THIS ARTICLE
Rich Hill,
Edmonton Personal Trainer & Online Fitness Coach
Let’s Work Together
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