Chocolate brownies, chocolate chip cookies, Reese's peanut butter cups, Dark Chocolate w/ Sea Salt, fresh peanut butter (crunchy or creamy... I am an equal opportunity PB lover!)
As you can tell... I'm not so much a candy person as I am a chocoholic and peanut butter fein.
How very "girl" of me, right?
When I first opened up Sweat, it took me by surprise the amount of people who thought I just didn't eat "bad stuff" ... like ever... and that in order for them to change their bodies, they too had to deny themselves all their favorites, all of the time.
Those casual conversations and comments have been a catalyst for me to be exceedingly open and honest about my anorexia and binge eating bouts of the not so distant past.
You see, I'm so utterly normal and flawed, it's beyond ridiculous, guys.
I have moments of panic sometimes, where I'm all,
"who the hell am I to give advice when I am so clearly lacking in special will power super powers!"
But, the truth is... being ORDINARY is exactly why it's important to get out there and give out hacks and tricks that are totally do-able and workable for the "normal" and dare I say, "every day" person.
And so with it being less than a week before Halloween, I want to hone in on probably the biggest food lie we (ordinary folks) tell ourselves during the holidays...
You know the one...
I'm going to eat it all now b/c tomorrow
(or after the New Year's),
I'll never eat it again!!
There are a million variations of this lie, btw. Feel free to customize it.
Mine was... I'm going to eat the whole pan right now so I won't have to think about it tomorrow. Damn stressful brownies.
Holy smokes... The casserole dishes of brownies, the jars of peanut butter, the handfuls of Reese's Peanut Butter Cups I have devoured under that pretense!!!
And of course, I always ended up having more...
except the next time it was just riddled with pure food guilt.
The total DEPRIVATION technique didn't work... yet again.
I'd curse my lack of will power!
I'd curse my lack of motivation!
I'd curse my lack of dedication!
And if I'm going to be totally honest, I'd do all of this while pinching my belly fat.
I just "wasn't the type of person" that could eat just a few and move on.
I just "wasn't strong enough" to be around sweets and be expected to control myself!
Deprivation was my weight loss management tool and, not surprisingly, it wasn't working for me.
Let me lay it out for you real clear:
Deprivation is NOT MANAGEMENT.
It is in fact the
mismanagement of weight loss!!!!
Deprivation is the easiest "strategy" to draw out yet the least likely to succeed.
Only 5% of overhaul diets work long term so best of luck to anyone still declaring war on their favorites!
May you receive your golden ticket this Halloween and be granted a temptation free life of never being lured by your gooey and sticky holiday favorites!
But for those of you sick and tired of going to war with yourself, I'd like to offer you my mindset shifts... the ones that have created a lot of peace and have led me towards a healthier body image as well as done away with most of my food guilt.
(Note the "most"... remember... I'm human, totally ordinary. I still have bad days. I don't always get it right!)
I'd like to tell you how I've HACKED (not suddenly and in overnight success) my way to making peace with those foods that once haunted my psyche...
1.
I cheat... every damn day.
Yes... I mess up, on purpose. I have a piece, or two, or three of something "unhealthy" and "forbidden" each and every single day.
I do this even,
and especially, when I'm trying to shred down.
This lowers that FOMO (fear of missing out) response... that... "it's now or never"... so eat all the things immediately!
2.
I make sure this cheat ANSWERS directly to my desires.
Some days it's sweet. Some days it's salty. Some days it's both.
I don't make compromises if I don't have to on my cheat b/c it actually... in the long run... makes me eat less than I would have had I not cheated.
Cheating, the opposite of deprivation, is my weight loss management tool. So yes, the consequence of daily cheats have actually amounted to weight loss.
3. Oh, and if your brain is all bothered by the word cheat... insert the word compromise.
Because that's all a food cheat actually is... it's a harmless compromise between deprivation and binge.
Recognize that compromise is too unsexy a word for it to "catch fire."
Ain't no one gonna Instagram their Friday night compromise, like they would their Friday night cheat.
Sell it to your mind however it needs it so that you take away the bias of all in or all out decisions.
Cheats are good.
Compromises are good!
4. I 100% recognize that "I'll never eat this again!" is an all out lie!!
It's me, looking for a permission slip to act exactly how I shouldn't.
Instead, I OWN the hell out of my decisions... the right and the not so right ones which puts a huge limit on the guilt factor.
I acknowledge that me eating over the top is a CONSCIOUS decision I am making and can make again.
Which leads me directly to #5...
5. And so when I fall short of my expectations... which STILL happens... I don't wallow in that food guilt of the past.
I actually don't entertain that inner mental bully anymore. The one who'd tell me I was fat and gross and make me pull on my belly rolls.
Instead, I put my detective skills to work and ask a few questions about what the hell all of that brownie eating was all about...
a. Was that stress eating?
b. Was that hormonal eating?
c. Did that happen because I didn't eat enough yesterday? today?
d. Was my exercise crazy intense yesterday? Did I not use a recovery meal well?
e. What can I learn about my metabolism, my food coping, my recovery meals, my hormone shifts etc...?
Getting reflective has helped me discover so many SOLUTIONS to healthier eating!
Food guilt never got me there!!
Food guilt never returned anything positive for me.
Deprivation never solved a damn thing for me.
This really smart man once said...
So... if the same technique you've been using over and over again seems not to yield the results you're looking for... maybe this Halloween... maybe this Holiday Season...
you will join me in giving a big fat middle finger to deprivation and practice the 5 mindset shifts above.
They're not as easy as deprivation to commit to.
It's definitely not as sexy and you're likely to get zero FB/IG love for it.
Oh, and that inner bully is a stubborn mo'fo... so he/she is going to get real loud and obnoxious when you don't get it just right.
It's going to make it's case for deprivation over and over and so you're going to have to get gritty and remember, going back to what doesn't work...
well that's a comfortable and familiar place, but what you're after lies outside of the box.
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