Happy Friday!
A recent topic of conversation at my workplace recently has been diets and clean eating. So naturally, all topics about food, drink and everything food related is centralised around how we could improve on out choices and decisions when it comes to food. Ideas on food, experiences with recipes and goals with diets and clean eating are shared and it seems to be a constant topic within the team I work in. This is probably a good thing, but I wonder whether it creates pressure for some people, generates guilt or creates a sense of determination? All of the above are probably achieved, depending on the person. I fade in and out of all of those feeling, depending on the mod I’m in. If I’m unhappy, there is no sense of guilt if I cave to a Kit Kat Chunky (my favourite!), but if I am in an in-between mood, the guilt almost kills me if I cave, but then if I am in a great mood, I am in no need to be comforted by chocolate or carbs and seem to stay satisfied by my fruit and tea snacks I try to limit myself to.
A feeling of complete annoyance that I need to monitor myself so closely also fills my body, because satisfaction with good food does not always come naturally. Will power I guess is the key phrase in this argument, which is as per tradition, the hardest thing to keep to when there are temptation all over the place. I am a lover of vegetables, fruit, lean meat, grains and grains, and am more often than not, craving a big bowl of veges for dinner over McDonalds. But there are times where I WANT a potato cake or a burger from Hungry Jacks, and I come to the conclusion that it isn’t that bad, as long as I continue to respect food and enjoy good food over bad more times than not, I will be fine. But that being said, my mind wanders to the if’s, but’s and maybe’s when I choose bad over good food and I convince myself that I will do some exercise to counteract it, but I never end up getting around to it. So my visible weight and less visible health suffers, but I am in a constant internal battle with my morals vs my love of life and always come to the conclusion that everything in moderation is ok, which sometimes gets a bit out-balanced, but as long as I bring it back to equilibrium, things will be ok…I hope….as long as I do keep a sort-of close eye on my lack of will power and absolute weakness for chocolate and deep belief that nothing can solve trouble better than a Kit Kat Chunky.
Inspiration for all of this has come from a work colleague that has initiated a Clean Eating lifestyle change. She has been buying and cooking with basic ingredients and eating less if not any packaged foods. Which I love and think it is the secret to long life and true wellbeing. But it is a bit unrealistic and un-achievable in my non-routine, sporadic, social filled life at current. So I do try buy best to live by this idea. It is cheaper at the checkout, better for you, more wholesome and feed my love of cooking! All the pros of a good life really! I try and avoid filling more than a quarter of my trolley with packaged things or things from the middle isles of the supermarket – with the only main things making it into that are canned tuna, pasta, Asian ingredients, peanut butter, lentils, yogurt, sour cream and milk. Everything else in my trolley should be ideally meat, veges, fruit and some bread/wraps. This has worked for me over the last few weeks and if I do stray from this game plan, it is only minimal straying with the best options of a “bad” bunch of alternatives if possible.
So my goal now is to stick to this for good this time, as I have on and off over the past few years had thins great idea and have never stuck to it! Let’s see how I go with my cooking and ideas for food, hopefully they centralise around a main concept of healthy eating or at least smaller meal sizes…
XO
NJC
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