Lately, I've compared myself to a yo-yo. Yes...you heard me right. I diet and try to perfect the perfect beach ready body only to find myself several months later, retracting the previous attempts at weight loss by sabotaging myself with a pint of Ben and Jerry's or those deliciously misleading Krispy Kremes. Seriously, shouldn't a food shaped like a zero be the equivalence of zero calories?
The bottom line is that it's just hard. I enjoy food. I like the feeling of comfort I get from it. I love a delectable dessert or a southern staple like fried chicken and casseroles. While those foods taste amazing, they leave me feeling empty, gorged, and sometimes just plain icky. I know that healthy foods, fresh vegetables and fruits, make me feel much better physically but why in the world can't they taste like the butter, salt, and sugar our bodies are so addicted to?
Last week, I began yet another attempt to "eat clean". For me, this means no processed foods. Nothing that has an ingredient I can't pronounce. Nothing manufactured in a facility or factory. It's not as hard as it seems. Today I have had hard boiled eggs, turkey and lettuce wraps, fruit, raw veggies, and lots of water. I feel full. I don't feel "hangry", yes folks this is a real emotion for us foodies! And the water? I've drank more water than a teacher should legally be allowed to drink in a single school day. Who has time to go to the bathroom with a classroom full of kids?
I made my decision to jump back on the clean eating boat, after feeling mega guilty about the junk I feed my family. The response? Not great. William looks at it awhile before he decides to eat it and Camdyn makes a face that is equal to that of confusion and curiously. "Mom can I really eat this? It looks like grass!" is what I imagine her brain is saying. My hope is that they will grow to enjoy these foods and I can get better at preparing them....without the southern sauté of classic butter or cream and without the extra dash of salt, milk, or added sugar.
You know I can create an analogy out of everything and my mind went that route again today. I had to go to Winston to visit a student who was sick in the hospital. Everyone knows you can't visit the big city without a Krispy Kreme drive thru run, the occasional grande caramel latte from Starbucks, or the calorie packed strawberry cheesecake milkshake from cookout. Today I did. I resisted and instead of those items, I chose water and my handful of almonds and walnuts (yes, I chewed slowly and pretended they were glazed doughnuts). It was a hard choice, but I felt better afterward.
I began to think about my recent clean eating attempts and thought of my attempts in resisting things in my Christian walk. People, places, music, TV, distractions,etc. I also thought of what I choose to fill my life with and what I choose to eliminate. Lately, I've begun to purge the pantry of my life. The panty filled with those things that may seem good at the moment like those foods we like, but aren't good for us in the long run. It takes preparation and preparedness to resist doing those things you used to do, being with those people you used to be with, listening to and watching those things you used to, amongst other things. Just like I have to think ahead and pack my bag with healthy snacks, I must arm my spirit with courage and grace of resisting the devil and the many obstacles he throws in my path. I've begun to feel my spiritual cart with more bible study, more praise, more worship, more Christian fellowship.
If I worried as much about what I choose to fill my spirit with, like I do what I fill my body with, I could probably lose a lot of spiritual baggage like the weight I also want to lose. I think at times I get so bogged down by the negativity of the world and the junk the devil places in my path, that I end up tripping or becoming that yo-yo in my Christian walk. I can't go back and forth anymore. I want Jesus to be my fuel for life. I want to be spiritually fed instead of looking to other things to fill me up when I'm hungry for a change in my life.
Here's to Christ instead of cakes! :)
1 Corinthians 6:19-20