Mindset shift - Food is fuel (redefining my relationship of food)

Food is fuel. It sounds simple enough. Logical. Yet our relationship with food can often be so much more complicated. Food can mean love, comfort, and celebration. We often use it to fill an emptiness or void we feel, or as a reward. 

Growing up with Italian grandparents on my mother's side of the family, I can see the truth of this statement. Preparing food for my grandmother (and even for my mother) is an expression of love. But it is important to understand that it is the fact that someone took the time to prepare a meal for you that is the expression of love - not the food itself. It was also a great expression of love to my grandmother when nieces and nephews requested her pasta when they came to visit, but it was always clear that the pasta wasn't the reason of their visit.

Celebrations and holidays were often centered around food, because it was an expression of love between our family. But these meals meant getting together and enjoying each other's company - while preparing as much as eating the meal - much more than it was about the food. No one didn't come because a certain dish wasn't going to be prepared that time.

But sometimes the feelings of love and comfort get so intertwined with the food in our minds that when we are sad or lonely we sometimes seek out to replicate those feelings through food. The problem being - food never truly measures up when it is not accompanied by the interaction. Food cannot offer you comfort or love - but it can give a sense of filling the emptiness we feel when sad or lonely. But it is shortlived and soon we need more to fill the emptiness. 

I have been stuck in a loop like this. It is not easy to get out of. We know it isn't working- the emptiness is still there as the overly full feeling of the food dissipates. But we eat some more, pushing down the feelings we don't want to deal with. But with every turn on this loop the emptiness seems to get worse as we add shame and guilt to the mix because our eating has caused us to gain weight. We isolate ourselves and so we feel more lonely and we eat more not to deal with these feelings either.

Make no mistake - food is a drug.

Breaking the cycle: 

It's never easy to break a cycle like this. For me it started with separating my emotions from food. It meant stopping myself before I ate and asking myself "am I actually hungry or is this feeding something else?" It was hit or miss at first. My ability to recognize true hunger had become hazy. I rejoined WW knowing it would give me the tools to be more mindful about my eating. Tracking helps me stop myself and consider if I am really hungry and to evaluate my choices. The first week was terrible. I went over my alotted points, but I was tracking truthfully and was able to see how much I was truly consuming.** I needed this again. I needed the structure of tracking to help me reign in my mindless and emotional eating and to remind me of proper portion sizes.

My next step was truly considering what I was eating. The saying "You are what you eat" really rings true to me. When I choose to eat healthy and vibrant foods, I feel healthy and vibrant. I am not preaching vegan or raw vegan eating (but if that is your thing morepower to ya). I have done the types of diets that are restrictive and they are just not sustainable for me. 

So, I play by the 80/20 rule over any given week. That means healthy vibrant a minimum of 80% of the time and the other 20% is for indulging when I want to. Sometimes I am 100% healthy and vibrant and it is my choice to be, but I do give myself permission to have whatever I want 20% of the time. For example when I visit my friend in Upstate New York. We ALWAYS have - amazing pizza and wings the first night. So, when I go I plan for that. The rest of the weekend there are some other indulgences, but I stick to water and coffee instead of soda. I also don't indulge at every meal while I am away. Then on my way there and back I eat as healthy as possible, often bringing my own snacks for the road. It's all about balance.

That is not to say I don't have "cravings" more often and even in my 100% weeks. But now I take the time to think - I also do not give in immediately. Sometimes these things are a kind of passing nostalgia, and within a few hours or even minutes the desire has passed. I also tend to indulge on the weekend - part of the structure of my 80/20. This means I often have a few days to really decide if I truly want whatever I am craving.

Informed is better.

Before I choose to indulge in something I will look at the label if there is one and consider the amount of sugar, fat and/or salt or I will look it up in my WW app and see how many points it is. This is allows me to make an informed decision. "Is this something I truly want?" "How did this food or type of food make me feel last time?" "Is it worth the points?" "Is there a smaller serving size?" Can I cut down the serving size?" or "Can I share with someone?" Many times I will decide things are just not worth it. Or I will share a dessert with someone instead of each getting one. And often I just cut down the serving size. Like when I wanted to try a new flavor of Lays potato chips (cheesy garlic bread) I checked the points on the WW app (11pts for the small bag in case anyone was wondering) then figured out how many grams of chips would be 1pt (9g again if anyone is wondering) and I weighed them out (pleasantly surprised to find it was about 5 chips) I then gave the rest of the bag to my daughter and her friend to share. And you know what? I ate those 5 chips and found them salty and nothing to rave about. I didn't want more and I had satisfied my curiosity.

Let me finish up with this thought. Life is short, be healthy but don't forget to stop and enjoy the good things, too. My personal rules about food are: 

🍍Make the best choices I can in any given situation.

🥠If someone offers me a bite of something - if it's something I like - I am going to take it.

🍰If I really want carrot cake for lunch on a Saturday - I'm having carrot cake. (Besides, it has all the food groups so it is obviously healthy! 😜)

Remember, moderation is key! 

**To be clear, Weight Watchers is far from restrictive nowadays. You can eat whatever you want. You are encouraged to eat a lot of fruits, vegetables and specified lean proteins that are "free" and are alotted daily points for foods outside these (carbs, other proteins, fats, oils and dairy). You are also given an allotment of weekly points to pad out your days and week as you see fit. It is a framework to help with healthier eating.

Mindset shift - How do you measure success?

The definition of success is the accomplishment of an aim or purpose. But how do we gauge our success?

In school I learnt the SMART criteria for goal setting. A goal should be specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time sensitive. So, you create a goal and with this criteria you have a way to measure it's success. 

But how do you measure succes for more complex or ambiguous goals? How do you measure the success of a marriage - in years together - by how many fights you've had or didn't have? What about being a successful parent? By your child's behaviour - their grades - their career choices? Things are not so cut and dry.

What if we choose the wrong measurement of success? What if the measurement is fine but our goal is unrealistic? 

Take weight loss. We have a specific goal - a weight, a time frame to achieve it, it is measurable by weighing ourselves at regular intervals, and it is achievable with the right effort to change the way we eat and adding more exercise. The problem is often that our goals are not realistic. The weight we want to achieve is not realistic, or it is not realistic within our self-imposed time frame, or with the planning and effort we are willing to put in. 

What if we change the criteria? What if instead of focusing on the number on the scale as my measure of success, I chose to base my success on the effort I am putting into all aspects of my health instead of just my weight? What if my success was measured in how many times I got back up after I failed - or the good habits I am creating - or the effort I put into my health? It's much harder to fail when you are basing your success on the effort you are putting in rather than the results. What if we based our success on how many times we make the healthy choice - or get in a workout or a walk or some form of self care? The results on the scale will follow if we put our effort and focus on the steps to get us there.

It is the same with any goal. So, wish it, dream it, then make a plan to crush it! 👊👍

It is always scariest before you start....

I am a writer. There I said it.

And now you may be thinking "well, yeah you write this blog don't you?" You would be right. But the huge part of that little 4 word sentence for me is the removal of the word 'aspiring'. I always seem to downplay it. It's just something we do when we are starting something out, right? (Okay, so maybe I am not just starting to write... maybe I have been writing for about 2/3rds of my life so far. But I am starting to put my writing out there and letting anyone read it. That's new.)

The heatwave this week (the 3rd since the beginning of July if I'm not mistaken), has taken its toll on me. Overheated, tired and cranky are not the most conducive to writing or anything else for that matter (it has been a week since I have done anything more than walking). So, I had a spot of writer's block for this week's post... which is why you are getting this on Thursday instead of Wednesday. Thankfully, the heatwave seems to have broken. I got am amazing night's sleep and am feeling myself again!

So, last night amidst my struggle to put pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard as it were), I did a little Googling about writer's block. I found an interesting correlation between the causes of writer's block and what keeps us from moving forward with a million other things in our lives - health, fitness, or starting any endeavor really. The most common reasons are: Timing, fear and perfectionism.

While timing can be a huge and very valid factor in why we are not finding forward motion whether it be in writing or in fitness and health, it is important not to let it become an excuse. For me, timing was a major reason for my writer's block this week. The heatwave, my last week at work before vacation and being currently short staffed because my colleague is on vacation and having a newbie asking questions every 5 minutes, meaning my workload is prolific. These are all valid reasons why my blod post is late this week. But they are not valid reasons to skip writing a post this week. Now that the heat has let up, I am sneaking in the time to write. Understanding that sometimes the timing is off is important, but it is equally important not to get caught up waiting for inspiration or motivation. Learning to recognize when you are using something like timing as an excuse is key to forward motion and achieving goals whatever they may be.

Fear often keeps us from starting. We fear that we aren't good enough or that people will judge us. This applies tot writing, of course, putting your thoughts and feelings out there for people to read and critique is terrifying. The same can be said of taking a class in something new and foreign, joining a gym when we are not at our fittest or even making a move in our carreer or lives. Fear can paralyze you if you let it. But as the King of Horror says above, the scariest moment is before you start. So, get out there and take the leap! I did with this blog and I can tell you, that barring any mind melting heatwave it has become easier with each post! Once you take the plunge things get easier because you know you can do it. And even if you suck at first the more you do the better you become. Practice makes perfect! 

Which brings us to perfectionism. Nothing is ever perfect. Life is about improvement and progress. Perfectionism is one of my biggest obstacles especially in my fiction writing, but even for this blog. I often restart my posts 2 or 3 times (4 for this one) before I feel ready to post them. Still, in the end I accept that they won't be perfect or I will never post them. With my fiction it is more complicated. I get to a point in every story I write where I start to 2nd guess certain things, things that mean going back and restarting - not from scratch, but with a major overhaul. I am striving to learn to just get that 1st draft done. To make a note of whatever new idea I have come up with and continue with it from there so that I can make changes in the edit... I am still working on that.

We wait for the perfect time to start that never comes. Or we want every word to be the perfect one before we show anyone one (maybe that's just me 😉). We want to be the right weight, the right size, the right whatever before we start something. "I want to be a size 10 before I wear a bikini", "I want to weigh a certain weight before I join the gym or run or dance or go to a Zumba class". The thing is while we are waiting for this designated "perfect" moment to come we are at a stand still we are not living our best life. 

Life is short we need to make the most of every minute and fill it with things that bring us joy as much as we possibly can. So remember, life is about growth - about progress not perfection. So, get up and dance, join the gym, go for a run or anything else you've been putting off! Life is happening right now. So, try something you've been putting off, stumble, fall and get back up! Hell, even suck at something and laugh at how bad you are at it! But take pride in the fact that you let go of a desire for perfection that doesn't exist and that you took a leap! What have you been putting off?

Pressing publish now!!! 👊