Whereas I am hesitant to call anything a “commandment”, because the pure connotation of the word sounds almost as harsh and ugly as “diet”, “fat”, “scale”, and “perfect” to me, taken in context, “commandment” in this sense is not a restrictive word.

In the sense of Intuitive Eating, nothing is restrictive.

In and of itself, Intuitive Eating is a liberating safety net for those of us who who have wasted countless years of our lives plummeting into diet demise.  Again, and again, and again.

Because they are the genius behind Intuitive Eating, and because these concepts are all entirely built around their genius, I must credit the wonderful Evelyn Tribole, (MS, RD), and Elyse Resch, (MS, RD, FADA).  They have helped so many of us chronic dieters break away from the exhaustive cycle, and I am forever grateful for their book.

That said, here are my ten commandments (nice, happy, smiley-faced commandments) for Intuitive Eating:

I must follow this list with a disclaimer:

Guess what?  Perfect is not an option.  These are my commandments, but I can’t say that I’ve ever personally been struck down by the wrath of all things evil for not following my commandments all the time.

Cough…number two…cough…daily…cough.

Perfect just doesn’t happen in real life, but who cares?  Let’s all be happy with being perfectly imperfect.  It makes us all uniquely beautiful, and it is the reason why people love us.

What are your happy, smiley-faced commandments?

Are you eating intuitively?

This is MY way, but what is YOUR way?

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]]> http://www.joggerslife.com/2009/intuitive-eating-my-way/feed/ 5 http://www.joggerslife.com/2009/uninspired-yet-so-inspired/ http://www.joggerslife.com/2009/uninspired-yet-so-inspired/#comments Wed, 28 Oct 2009 00:54:27 +0000 http://www.joggerslife.com/?p=2127

I have been feeling particularly uninspired since my post last Thursday.  I’m trying to come up with something interesting to tell you guys, but I think I’m just too brain dead to deliver.  I’ve been doing a lot of freelance writing in my spare time, so things have been busy even when they’re not supposed to be.  The extra cashola will be nice, but I’m afraid that the blog is suffering because of it.  I am trying to get a better handle on all things life and work (and freelance) related, so please be patient with me as I adjust.

p.s…I’m not complaining about the freelance gig!  I love it.

I do have one very interesting thing to tell you guys.  Ok, well…it’s interesting to me.  Maybe not to you.  It’s something that I’ve been wanting to officially talk about lately, but nothing was official yet, so I’ve been holding off.

I was accepted into the graduate program for Holistic Nutrition Studies at Clayton College of Natural Health.  This makes me happier and more excited than most things to date in my life have ever made me, and I have been dying to let you guys to know.  I begin classes on November 24th, and I hope that this decision will lead to being able to help other people with nutrition, intuitive eating, and becoming diet-free!

My honest to goodness dream is to someday incorporate a holistic approach to helping those who suffer with eating disorders.

For me, this is an enormous step.  I have spent the last 10-15 years of my life denying the things that I truly knew in my gut would make me happy.  I’m not saying that I hate my current job, or even that I plan to quit my job.  I would, however, like to pursue this avenue, because I feel that it will make me happier in the long run.  Since I was a child, I’ve wanted to help others.

In the 4th grade, I dreamed of being a physical therapist.

By the time that I was 16, the ‘physical therapist’ idea had morphed into becoming a social worker.

At the age of 20–with two years of college under my belt and no money in my pocket, I diverted into retail.  Then I moved 6 hours away from home.  Within 2 weeks of moving, I started working for the company that I currently work for.  The rest is history I guess.

In the meantime, I never came up for air.

I didn’t take a moment (or maybe I couldn’t take a moment) to consider what I really wanted.  Expenses piled up, responsibilities grew, and the opportunity never really showed itself.  I didn’t make it a priority.

What led me to this decision?  Well, as I become older and wiser, three lessons resonate the loudest for me:

• Money doesn’t mean sheet.
• Social status by way of money doesn’t mean sheet.
• One can only be truly satisfied when they do what they love and love what they do.

So, I have arranged my life over the past 2 years in such a way that I don’t need so many “things”.  The expensive bags and shoes and clothes are not a priority anymore.   Happiness, however, is of the utmost importance.  I decided to pursue my happiness.

That is my decision in a nutshell.  It took a long time for me to finally decide, but I did it.  I’m sure you guys will hear all about it (exhaustively) as it goes down.  Aren’t you so excited?  (ha!)

What have you learned about happiness as you become older?

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I’m not sure if anyone has noticed, because this fact is undoubtedly more important in my world than in any of yours, but I stopped keeping food logs again.

Without going into a whole slew of psycho-babble about the reasons why I’ve decided that I will not be keeping logs right now, the simple answer is that I just don’t feel like it.

I was becoming very stressed out about forgetting to write things down, and I was starting to get nervous if I didn’t eat all of my food groups. It was more thinking than I really needed to do about food, and considering my history, I just think that any situation that causes me to be stressed out about eating is just a bad idea.

I also think that I was eating too much at times just because I “needed” to (according to my log)–not because wanted to.

Being the chronic over thinker than I am, of course this decision leads me down various thought paths:

Why did these food logs work so well for me while I was in treatment, but now they feel more like a crutch to me?

Why wasn’t I concerned about eating all of my food groups back then?

Was I concerned back then but it just already felt normal to me so I didn’t think twice about it?

Eating has come full-circle for me. Again.

I will say that I am happiest food-wise when I don’t have to think about what I’m eating, and I can eat what I want. I guess the eating-disordered voice buried deep my psyche still thinks that I am not sensible enough to make good choices.

Quieting that voice on a daily basis is probably the most difficult part. Some days it’s louder than others. For some reason, keeping food logs is making my ED voice scream at me.

So, I’ll quiet the screaming for now. It doesn’t mean that I won’t fall back to logging, but just for a moment, I’m going to enjoy a little peace and quiet.

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Thoughtful Food Log 8-12-09 Www.joggerslife.com

* Have you joined my Facebook Group yet?

* See how my training is going over here!

* Wonder what I’m eating?

* Everyone loves a giveaway!

For the last half of the day, all I could think of was peanut butter jar oats.  I was obsessed.  I finally got home around 6PM, and decided that I didn’t care if it wasn’t breakfast anymore.  I had oats for dinner, dammit.

And they were delicious.

After a few bites of the Chicken Spaghetti that I made for My Gazelle, I went to sleep.  I was so tired that when I got into bed, I said aloud:

“Ohhh…this feels like heaven on earth!”

Have you ever had a night like that, when you’re so exhausted that your 25 year old mattress and $10 sheet set from Ollies Surplus feel like a cloud existing in heaven?

For me, it was one of those nights.

And I slept wonderfully.

With peanut butter oats in my belly.

Thoughtful Food Log 8-11-09 Www.joggerslife.com

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Birthday cake and an ice cream cone entered my life within 4 hours of each other.  Even after all of this time, I still haven’t decided if that is a good thing or a bad thing.  The ice cream cone was very enjoyable (as always), but the cake I could have done without.

Thoughtful Food Log 8-10-09 Www.joggerslife.com

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Thoughtful Food Log 8-7-09 Www.joggerslife.com

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A day of firsts!

After my first speed workout ever, I tried my first Jay Robb Strawberry Egg White Protein packet, and it was so yummy!  Even better than the vanilla that I tried the other day.  Mixed in my homemade almond milk, it tasted just like a strawberry milk shake!

Thoughtful Food Log 8-6-09 www.joggerslife.com

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Today, these were my poison.  Well, actually…only eating a small cup of Panera’s Summer Corn Chowder and whole grain bread was my poison.  Just not enough food to carry me through the rest of the day.

So, I crushed this bag of chips.

Poor chips.

But, just for the record, they were really (really) good.  So, it’s not like I was eating them and hating every moment of it.

Oh well, life goes on.

Thoughtful Food Log 8-5-09 Www.joggerslife.com

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]]> http://www.joggerslife.com/2009/food-fest-8509/feed/ 2 http://www.joggerslife.com/2009/food-fest-72309/ http://www.joggerslife.com/2009/food-fest-72309/#comments Fri, 24 Jul 2009 12:57:52 +0000 http://www.joggerslife.com/?p=1246

Look for today’s Fun Food and Fitness Friday later on today!

Thoughtful Food Log 7-23-09 www.joggerslife.com

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