Eat like you have to

Every once in a while, the same conversations we’ve always had seem to click in a brand new way. And I’m excited to share my new findings with you.

You have the option to never exercise another day of your life. Quality of life will deteriorate quickly, you’ll have to start being reliant on others for everything, and you can forget about being happy with what you see in the mirror, but you could do it.

I hope that you find sustainable movement practices that don’t make this a reality, but my point is that you technically could decide that you hate exercise so much that you never do it again.

You do not have the option to never eat again. Whether you like it or not, you need sustenance to survive. And this is the binary that ends up being incredibly liberating, although at first, quite daunting.

So often when people go about making changes to their diet, they want to dive all in. They want to count their calories, do Whole 30 and get rid of all of their favorite foods, and take the most restrictive route to get results as quickly as possible.

It makes sense. Maybe if we can sustain a high intensity for long enough, the weight loss will stick - and I’d rather only have to focus on my nutrition for 30 days than think about having to do it for the rest of my life.

“this is the binary that ends up being incredibly liberating, although at first, quite daunting.”

Conceptually, you understand this doesn’t work. And it’s for the exact reason that I mentioned above. You don’t get to magic give up eating after you successfully finish the Whole 30. You have to eat every single day after that for the rest of your life.

That’s why when I discuss nutrition, I try and be incredibly pragmatic about the process of improvement.

If you can’t see yourself being able to do this diet 30 years from now, it’s not worth your time trying it now.

Need I remind you again? You have to eat for the rest of your life.

Building a positive relationship with food and developing easy to maintain habits with eating are worth figuring out now because the alternative is resenting food for the rest of your life.

You have to eat, and you get to decide right now, right here, today what your relationship with food is going to be.

You get to decide right now, right here, today what your relationship with food is going to be.

You get to decide:

Are you going to do the work now to figure out how to enjoy healthy foods and not eat too much and appreciate the fuel that food gives you?

It’s not easy! I’m not going to bullshit you and say that it’s a magic switch that you can flip on and off. It will be incredibly challenging and I don’t want to downplay that.

But the alternative is a life-long battle with food that leads to poor results and resentment.

Now, you may be a procrastinator. Maybe you are saying to yourself that you’ll figure it out tomorrow.

There is nothing more important to your health than starting to figure this out today. Stop procrastinating. Start reminding yourself that you need to eat for the rest of your life, so you better start figuring your shit out.