Author: Caroline

young and the resting

Let Your Diet Choose YOU

No one wants to eat food that doesn’t make them feel good.

If we were all to get out of our own way, we would easily and intuitively go for food that tasted good and made us feel great: nourished, calm, satiated, and healthy. That is what we want and what our bodies want.

We would naturally and easily steer away from foods that our body didn’t jive with (Whatever that may be. We are ALL different).

And when we veered from those foods and ate something that wasn’t “the best” for our particular bodies, it would be no big thing: “eh, I’ll be fine”.

And then we would move on. No shame. No dwelling. No serious horrible consequences, except maybe a stomachache or a pimple or headache.

But as long as we are in our own way, forcing certain restrictions and diets and rules on ourselves, that easy, joyful intuitive diet is never actually going to happen.

You MUST get out of your own way in order to start to let your body do it’s thing. And you’re body’s “thing” for a whole year might be mac n’ cheese. And that is a really important part of the “getting out of your own way” journey.

Because here is the thing, if all you eat for a year is mac n’ cheese, eventually you will be over mac n’ cheese. And if wheat and dairy jive with you, you’ll have it on occasion. And if wheat and dairy don’t jive with you, you’ll still probably have it on occasion. And it’ll be fine. But you will be out of your own way… and your body will start to eat what it really, really craves.

The more you judge what your body craves, the less authentic those cravings will be.

Get out of your own way.

Stop dieting.

Stop judging what you need to eat during the process. And let your “diet” eventually choose you.

And when you eat something that you think “isn’t good”, remember: it doesn’t matter. The less it matters, the more easily you will be able to truly want and choose foods that feel good and make you feel alive.

Perfection? Fuck. It.

 

New Year’s Resolutions Are Stupid

Generally, I hate common new year’s resolutions.

They feed right into that black and white, self-hating, guilt inducing, atone-for-your-carb sins cycle.

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Resolutions are the diet, and the backlash is just around the corner. February guilt, anyone?

This year, do me a favor and throw out the self-hating, militaristic resolutions, and if you must resolve, resolve sanely:

Resolve to Eat what you really love

You have gotten yourself nowhere by staying in a diet/repent cycle. Break it now.

Resolve to invest your time in what/who you really care about

Life is too short to waste it. Get real with yourself about what makes you come alive. Which brings us to…

Resolve to Be Honest with yourself

Stop avoiding yourself. Stop avoiding the truth. Stop avoiding. Ask yourself “where am I lying to myself?”. It is life changing. And don’t feel guilty. We all do it.

Resolve to Stretch

Get on the floor and stretch your body. Don’t force exercise you don’t feel like doing, just don’t. Exercise only to feel alive. But get in a quick habit of stretching your body because you are alive, and your body is great, and it deserves to be lived in and and stretched.

Resolve to sleep better and get real rest

You freaking deserve it.

Resolve to love yourself more in 2015

You are worth it. This year. With this mind and this body. You have always been worth it. So give yourself permission to do cool things, and say what you mean, and do what you like. You will never be more ready than you are now. And no one is ever going to give you permission except you. No one. Don’t wait for your thin fantasy, or love fantasy or job fantasy to do what you have been waiting to do.

What else? Comment below!

Ok. GO BE AWESOME.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

(Also, don’t miss the last few hours to register for my program with the Holiday price at over 50% off!)

What Are You Avoiding?

Human beings avoid.

We avoid our lives and ourselves by fixating on food, tv, gossip, or turning to drugs, alcohol, fantasy, excuses, workaholism, and even relationship addiction.

Our biggest life defense mechanism is avoidance. And it is a nasty beast.

There is nothing wrong with having pleasures in your life. And of course, you know there is nothing wrong with food. But when we are avoiding our lives, those perfectly fine activities and vices turn into a shield, a crutch, and a drug.

One of the biggest assets you can have in your recovery with food, is a willingness to stop avoiding. A willingness to face yourself, right where you are, without nasty judgment.

Stop avoiding how you feel, stop avoiding what you want, stop avoiding your own power in your life, stop avoiding everything. And please: stop judging yourself and turning it into a vicious cycle.

I know it sounds simplistic, but it is true. Once you stop avoiding the scarier things in your life, you will develop a sort of resilience, a willingness to be alive. A comfortability with discomfort. A fearlessness with the fear you cannot avoid.

The things we are scared of aren’t actually as horrible as we make them out to be while we are avoiding them.

What does this have to do with eating? EVERYTHING. 

If you are willing to begin, very simply, by dealing with things as they are now. That includes your body, but everything else also, your healing will be real, profound, and lasting. Your eating isn’t happening in a vacuum. It is a symptom of the way we are going through life. It is the fallout of a fearful relationship with life.

Your emotions feel impossible to live with, so you stuff them away and distract yourself, but they are not impossible.

I have become so great at dealing with things as they come up. Rolling with the punches and expanding my capacity to feel and my willingness to deal. I like to ask myself “what am I avoiding now?”, and then I go DEAL with that thing.

But this past week I have been avoiding everything. Letting things pile up. Ignoring what I need to do. Being too tired to deal with how I feel. Watching more television than usual. Fighting off an illness my sister had over Thanksgiving. Feeling unable to deal with things as they come up. That’s ok. That happens. It is life.

This is life. Up and down. Fluctuating. The only thing I can do, and we can do, is realize and accept that it is temporary. I am going to clean my room. And then I am going to throw out the chicken soup I made that doesn’t taste good.

Fuck It.