We are moving through December and the holiday season is in full swing! This month I’ve already enjoyed some incredible sugar cookies, started making some warm and nourishing soups (because the temperatures finally seem to be dropping!), and carried my very own Christmas tree down a wayyy too steep hillside and out of the forest so that it could be set up in my living room.
Things are getting festive 🙂
As the weeks go on, I am enjoying balancing out the parts of the festivities that I love while also keeping a safe distance from the parts that I don’t need in my life (remember when I wrote about the importance of that a couple weeks back?).
And, as the weeks go on, I plan on continuing to check in with myself as I balance the joys of the holiday season (that which truly brings me joy) while also supporting my health.
Balance – it is such an important theme this holiday season as we work to balance out our healthy choices with many of the holiday festivities that may not be so healthy (hello sugar cookies coated in butter frosting!)
Let’s take a further look at how to maintain this healthy balance.
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Last week I wrote about two common strategies for being healthy during the holiday season, speaking to how these strategies can be useful (when they actually do align with you) or they can be harmful (when they don’t align with you and yet to try to make them).
Personally, I’m one of those people that doesn’t really jive with either simple framework, and because I’m guessing a lot of you are too, today I thought we’d take a look at my favorite way of making healthy decisions.
This is a variation of a process that serves me whenever I make a decision, particularly the challenging ones that involve my health.
The process:
- Release the need to follow anyone else’s idea of what you should try to do. This is a tilt of the hat to last week’s post. Instead of forcing yourself to follow any idealized idea that someone told you that you need to follow (“you should say no to all treats and stick to your diet” ; or, “you should let yourself indulge a bit”), the idea is to learn to take action with what actually works for you! Note, this doesn’t mean disregard any potential ideas that could help you – but to instead acknowledge that if a particular idea isn’t working for you, then let it go!
- Be clear on what your own health goals are and what it will take to meet them, while simultaneously being clear on what truly brings you joy. Here we bring in that idea of balance! If you have made commitments to yourself to achieve certain health goals, then you’ll want to stick with yourself and follow through; at the same time, it’s generally good for your health and well-being to align with what brings you joy, and since it’s the holidays, it might be fair to give yourself more space to embrace the joy of the season.
- Make each decision mindfully. Before you make a decision, be clear on why – do you actually want that sugary treat, or is it actually probably way too sweet but you find yourself driven to eat it anyway? Or maybe it could be yummy but you already had too much to eat and it wouldn’t make you feel good.
- Then, as you make a decision, tune back in – did you enjoy it? Did it make you feel good? Did it make you feel crappy?
This practice is easy enough if you back away from the chaos of the holiday season, create some space, and think through the answers. I recommend finding some time to think through some of these pieces:
- what is it that you really want and what will it take to get there?
- what is it that you truly enjoy during the holidays?
- if these are conflicting, to what extent would you compromise on one for the sake of the other
For example, if you’ve been seriously focused on making healthy choices to lose that excess and unhealthy weight, yet you still love holiday treats, that’s perfectly okay! Just make sure you are clear on what you really want and where you’re willing to compromise.
Finally, to help you out even further, the next step is putting this mindfulness into practice whenever you find yourself in a heated debate with yourself about what action you should take. This piece is especially important because, as we all know, we can make whatever decisions we want when we are separated from the chaos (for example, alone in a quiet room away from any indulgences), but once we find ourselves facing a mountain of cookies, our thoughts may change.
Next time you notice yourself in an internal battle (perhaps over whether or not to indulge in a certain treat), try this:
Practice
- Pause – stop whatever you were doing
- Exhale – let your breath release fully. Follow up with several slow breaths
- Check in with yourself: What were you doing and why were you doing that? Was it something that you actually would enjoy?
- Allow the answers to come to you, whether it’s in the form of a clear thought or a sensation in your body
- Make a decision. Eat the cookie or don’t eat the cookie. Whatever you do, I promise you it’s no big deal
- Check in with yourself afterwards: did you actually enjoy the results of that decision? Did it make you feel good? Bad? Tune in, and let whatever comes to you sink in so that you can make an even better decision for your own self next time
One final note
Once again, what really matters is not that you make the perfect decision over and over again this holiday season. The fact is, there is no perfect nor right answer regarding whether or not you should or should not indulge.
Healthy living can be far simpler than we tell ourselves it is as we chase after the right way to go about things, and once we take the pressure off, we find that whether or not we “eat that cookie” doesn’t actually matter.
What does matter is this:
- That your overall patterns of behavior tend to support the health of your body. That is, over time, are you consuming foods that nourish your body and are you overeating foods that are driving pathways of poor health in your body
- Whatever decision you decide to make next time you are offered a treat, that you engage in it mindfully, making a conscious choice and tuning into your own self to examine whether or not that actually provided the joy you were seeking
Eating a treat one day or occasionally indulging in treats is most likely not going to impact health outcomes.
- However, if eating one treat leads to eating a mountain of cookies all week long, then the outcome is impacted
- Another option: if restricting yourself from indulging in treats leads to binging on a mountain of treats later on, then the outcome is impacted
The bottom line: the actual decision you make needs to be made based on what will best serve you. Sometimes it’s the best thing to indulge a bit. Other times it’s best to turn down a treat.
The answer – well, that’s to be determined by you in each moment, and figuring out how to make better decisions that truly support your health it is a skill to be developed over time.
To help you out, call upon this practice whenever you find yourself facing what you feel is a heated and difficult decision.
Try it out and let me know how it goes!