Drop the Labels
How do you typically talk about different types of food?
Do you refer to food as healthy or unhealthy?
Good or bad?
I have a question for you – what purpose does labeling the type of food you eat serve in your life?
Does it make you feel “better” when you eat a salad?
Do you feel like “crap” when you eat a burger and fries?
Yes, there are some foods that pack more of a nutritional punch than others.
And for sure there are some foods that will leave your body feeling better than others.
But food is just food – period.
And one of the big problems with labels are that they are very specific to the person – everyone is NOT going to agree on what is healthy, unhealthy, good or bad.
Heck, if you listen to the news on any given day – they are praising the same foods as healthy that they told us two years ago might kill us! (the poor misunderstood egg)
The fact of the matter is certain foods are going to work for you that don’t work for me and vice versa.
And there is NOTHING wrong with that.
Just this past weekend we were celebrating the 4th of July with some friends at the lake. I had a couple of YUMMY Angry Orchard apple ciders (in the past these would’ve been labeled “off plan” and a “treat”) as we enjoyed our time on the boat – well the next day I had HORRIBLE heartburn, bloating, and my body was itching like crazy. Now I realize that this might sound like an odd reaction to a couple of ciders – but the older I get – my body’s feedback is telling me that it just doesn’t jive with alcohol anymore. And since the food I ate that day is stuff that I would eat on a typical day – it was easy for me to identify the drinks as the “culprit”.
So what did I make all of this mean? WELL – once upon a time – my mindset might’ve shifted to a place of frustration, anger, and self-sabotage. Frustration and anger that I was SO GOOD about my food choices and yet look at my body fighting against me. Why does all of this have to be SO HARD? This isn’t fair! Screw it – I’m just going to pig out on other “crap” then.
Does this sound familiar at all?
Seriously, take a look at what purpose labeling foods serves in your life.
Why not just say WHAT you ate instead of “I ate like crap today”. What does crap mean to you? What does cheating on your diet mean to you? How do you feel and what actions do you take when you feel like you’ve cheated and ate like crap?
Why not just drop the drama around the fact that some foods work well for you and some foods don’t? And then take ownership of choosing what you eat without beating yourself up or ridiculing your body?
This is where I find so many of my clients struggle with their relationship with food. For so long they have tried to make rules (or adopt someone else’s) around what they can eat and what they can’t. And then when they eat something that is “off limits” – they spiral into a cycle of shame, guilt, and beating themselves up.
What if you dropped all of the labels? What if you no longer looked at food as healthy vs unhealthy? Good vs bad?
And what if you decided it was more important to your relationship with food and your body to LISTEN to the feedback your body is giving you? And then made your eating decisions from this place of knowledge?
What if?
