Today I almost slipped back into a hopeless overall attitude, which could have landed me right back where I was yesterday, comforting myself with food. But it was on the trip to drop off my kids at school early this morning that I happened to look into the rear-view mirror and caught sight of my youngest son eating a potato and egg taco in the back seat that immediately brought a smile to my face. The way he was chewing it looked like he was so thoroughly enjoying his food, that it inspired me to be positive again. It got me thinking that this is exactly how it should always be. We should be able to fully enjoy our food without being preoccupied with abusing it.
It is not easy to stop yourself from enjoying a great meal, when all your life you have been accustomed to indulging in tasty food, ignoring your body's loud calls for you to stop, it's full already! That has been my problem for a large part of my life. And I know this is the main problem for most people who become overweight and obese. It may not be entirely that they always overeat, but they certainly indulge by eating mainly foods that please the pallet and do nothing else.
Today I spoke to a young man about weight issues. He is overweight. His family members are overweight. One of his relatives was once known as the largest man in the region. Obesity is obviously a problem that prevails in his family. So in discussing food options and eating habits, I asked him to tell me what he had eaten last night. I assumed immediately that he had eaten all sorts of decadent sides like mashed potatoes and gravy. But he quickly proved me wrong. He had eaten only ground beef on rice. Nothing else. I was impressed...momentarily, that is, until I asked how many servings he had consumed. He admitted he had eaten three servings.
I asked him what the reason was for him to have eaten three servings? He felt put on the spot, of course. Instead of answering forthwith, he justified the extra servings by indicating that the bowl was relatively small. I asked him to be completely honest with me and say whether or not the extra servings were simply because he had enjoyed the taste of the food, and not because he had remained hungry after the first serving. He admitted that it was for the taste of it.
The majority of us do this all the time. I did this just yesterday. We indulge in tasty foods because the act of eating involves so much of the senses. It is addictive. And the worst part of it all is that we indulge in all the foods that immediately go toward creating or storing fat in our bodies.
While I sat with my young friend at lunch today talking about weight issues and how eating the wrong foods and overeating is directly tied to this, behind us was a table with pizza boxes stacked up on top of each other. There had been a meeting in that area where we had sat down. There had not been that many people there, but there sure had been a lot of pizza consumed. They had nothing else but the pies. My friend looked at me and said, "Imagine all the fat that comes with eating that." This, I recognized, was the beginning of an awakening in his awareness about the role our food choices play in our health.
So if you wish to begin to undo some of the bad habits surrounding your eating, start by identifying what foods you usually consume and how often you do. If most of the food you are eating involves flour, wheat, sugar, fried foods or a list of ingredients so complex and scientifically named that you can't even pronounce them, then you are in serous need of a food/eating habit change. If you are the type that can't handle going cold turkey, start by eliminating one of these from your everyday meals.
I would recommend starting with the sugar. Identify anything in your diet that contains sugar in any form: being regular sugar, fructose, sucrose, corn syrup or any other label that is used to disguise it. This will do wonders to normalize your insulin levels. If you are a coffee or tea drinker, hit the supermarket and buy yourself a box of stevia extract sweetener. Make sure it contains erythritol. This kind of sweetener has fewer calories than sugar. There is a product called Truvia, which is the one I use on my coffee.
Check it out here: http://truvia.com/about/?gclid=CLbc7-er4rYCFUyY4AodNXQAzg
As with anything, use in moderation. Nothing in this green Earth is safe to consume in unending quantities. That should never be the case when eating or drinking. That kind of practice is precisely what leads to obesity, because there is no balance. Even "healthy" food can make you obese if you abuse it.
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