This year I have been trying to pay a little more attention to my health.  I now find myself exercising much more, trying to get a little more sleep, and paying more attention to the things that I eat and drink every day.  As part of this effort to live better, I have been trying to incorporate flax seed into my diet because of it’s reported ability to lower cholesterol, stabilize blood pressure, fight off cancer, and other assorted wonders.

Something I discovered is that wanting to eat more flax is not as easy as actually eating more flax.  First, it is not something you normally think of as an ingredient, so it takes some intentional effort to include it.  Perhaps the biggest barrier for me was simply that it came in a box, which was stored in my pantry – out of sight, out of mind.  I needed to make it more accessible to use and more convenient to incorporate into my diet.  I needed to make Flax easier.

So how do you make something like flax seed easier to consume.  Well, it occurred to me that the spices and seasonings I use most often are salt, pepper, and sugar.  Is it because these are my favorites?  Nope, they are just the most readily accessible.  All 3 of these things have their own special containers, ensuring they are always within arms reach of any meal.  So why not create a Flax shaker?  That is what I did.

I bought a simple sugar pourer and loaded it up with ground brown flax seed.  As a result I find it much easier to incorporate flax into my diet.  An example of this is at breakfast, where I typically start the day with some yogurt.  Now it just takes 2 seconds to sprinkle a little flax right on top and make my healthy breakfast just a little more healthy.  By using the sugar pourer for flax, I have very quickly converted this into a habitual part of my routine.  In addition to being highly caffeinated, I am also fully flaxinated.  Hopefully, this little switch will make a big difference in my health.  Time will tell.

What little tricks and tips do you have to improve your diet?