Hey kiddos! How’s life?
We are currently experiencing a ThunderBlizzard so I have a SNOW DAY!! Anyone who works in the schools will tell you that Snow Days are WAY better as adults than as kids. #1 You get paid. HELLO??? #2 You don’t have to spend any time catching up on the homework you should have done the night before (who else totally did this as a kid?) #3 Sleeping in as an adult has a sweetness that it never had when you were a kid. Plus you have time to blog and what not. Win, win. (I will say this probably changes once you have kids of your own. Then they are also home and there goes your sleeping in and blogging and sanity. I’ve been told the ideal situation is to work in a different district than where your kids attend school and your district closes and their’s doesn’t! I mean…No, you totally want to spend the day with your kids. You really do. You don’t desperately need a day off where you can pee in peace. Truthfully I have no clue since I’m not a parent so I’ll shut up now before I offend someone by pretending to be exhausted by my non-existent kids.) Either way, I put on my productive comfy clothes and did some laundry, am blogging, and have plans to make some homemade granola and granola bars later this afternoon.
(Is it just me or do other people have lazy comfy clothes and productive comfy clothes? To me, if I put on my oversized, mens sweatpants and a sweatshirt, I just know nothing productive is going to take place that day. I won’t even make it off the couch. BUT if I put on my yoga pants and a regular comfy shirt, there is a much greater possibility that I may accomplish something productive. No? Just me? Okay then.)
So, update on my life: my real food-ing is going awesome! I love how I feel and how much energy I have. I have not taken a mid-day nap since I started eating clean! Which is awesome (not that I don’t love napping but it really interferes with any sort of productivity) because I seriously seemed to fall into a post-lunch nap at least a couple days a week before I switched to real food. I LOVE not counting calories or obsessing over portions and just eating until I feel satisfied and then stopping. That is something I have never been able to do before. Stopping after I’m satisfied. And the best part is, I am not stressing about not counting every morsel of food that goes into my mouth because I am satisfied with so much LESS. By eating nutrient rich, real, traditional foods, I am finally feeling satisfied after a meal. I’m not obsessing over when I can eat again because I don’t feel truly satisfied and I can enjoy the fullness I feel in the moment. It’s awesome. AWE-SOME.
Just to be clear, I am not knocking counting calories or portions at all. I was able to lose 53 pounds that way! It can work for sure. I have just come to realize that there is no one eating plan for everyone and what works for me may not work for you and your body. I truly respect everyone’s individual journey to health. Seriously. I just realize now that counting calories was only another facet of my obsession with food and by fostering a system where every calorie counted, it encouraged me to cut calories where ever I could so I could eat more, not better. So I picked up anything that said Light, Low Fat, Diet, 100 Calories, Zero Calories etc. Which meant that the majority of what I was eating was overly processed, chemically laden ‘foods’ that are so far from what God intended us to eat that I’m surprised our bodies can even recognize them. (I’m starting to think they can’t.)
I see now that three years ago when I started walking this road with God, God opened my eyes to see the sin of my eating and poor stewardship of the body He had given me, and I was free to get healthy, but I tried to walk God’s way to health by eating the world’s food, using the world’s ways. Not His. That’s a recipe for failure. We can’t try to walk with God but take the world’s path to get to our destination. The world’s ways often work for a while but eventually leave us unfulfilled, unsatisfied, frustrated, and unhappy. I found myself feeling all those things these last few months. That is how the world lures us in. The world’s ways promise success and happiness…until they don’t and you need to find another thing from the world to make you feel good again. A new diet plan, a new type of food to avoid, a new cleanse to try, a new weight loss group to join. “If only I tried this…I would make it this time.” They often leave us feeling like we are the failure, not the path we chose to take. The world’s ways are tricky like that. They never seem to get a bad reputation for the flaws in their plans, we always seem to get the blame for not trying hard enough, not wanting it enough, not choosing the right things, not being good enough.
That’s why God’s way is the only way to go. We still have to do our part. We still have to make choices and want it for ourselves and try hard when temptation strikes, but God’s way keeps it’s promise. God’s way always fulfills, satisfies, and brings lasting victory. God’s way give us the strength we need to make the right choices, try hard even when we don’t feel like it, and provides a way out when temptation strikes (1 Corinthians 10:13). The world, it seems, wants us to fail so that we will feel the need to buy the newest workout program, subscribe to the newest diet tip service, or whatever else they can get us to say yes and open our wallet to. I don’t know about you, but I’m tired of the world’s ways. I’m tired of the promises that this (insert product/diet/program) will be the key to my weight loss and health…only until the next version comes out and then they change their minds and say “no wait, THIS one is really it!” I want God’s plan, God’s way, God’s help, God’s strength, God’s encouragement, God’s victory. And the best part is, I can have it and so can anyone else who truly desires it! Without “two low payments of $39.95” or a subscription fee. Yes, God’s way costs. It costs my pride, my selfishness, my weakness, my stubbornness, my sin. But, if I ask Him, God can replace all that with humility, selflessness, strength, a soft heart, and forgiveness. I won’t ever get all the money I’ve spent on the newest diet or fitness craze back, but with God, He’s already given me more than I’ve ever paid.
These are the things that this Real Food Revolution is teaching me. (Who knew I could be so insightful?? Weird, right?) I love eating foods that God envisioned for us to eat and enjoy. I love knowing that I’m nourishing my body with foods that God designed for us to nourish our bodies with! It brings me closer to Him in a weird, funny way. Like I said, please know that I only speak for myself and you have to decide between you and God what is the right eating plan for you. God made each of us different and each of our bodies different, so we all need a different plan to fit our needs.
All in all, God is good. Every day. All the time.
This is totally not what I planned to write about today but sometimes you just gotta go where your fingers take you. I will be posting in the next couple days what I actually planned to write about: the results of some new recipe experiments I tried this week and my new Real Food meal planning system!
Also…………….
I have something REALLY exciting coming in the mail this week!!! I can’t wait to tell you all about it! But i’m going to keep it a surprise until then! (I can feel your excitement building.)
❤
Molly
Ditching the Processed. 