LiveWell
FitNow

Keep It Simple Sweetie

Posted by Jennifer Campoli on June 10th, 2010
Filed under Body image, intuitive eating, Motivation, Self esteem | 2 Comments »

I am getting married in a month…oh my goodness I am getting married in A MONTH!!!!!!

Is this the time I am supposed to freak out now? I haven't. Actually I feel amazing. Outside of all the little todo's that are piling up each week we are having the time of our lives planning this weekend. The thought of bringing the people who matter most together and having them all in one place at one time…there is just nothing better than that!

As we've been planning our wedding for the past number of months, I can remember making a decision when I started dress shopping. At the time I was happy with my body. I felt healthy, fit and content.

I didn't want the next months of my life to be focused on how I could change or mold this body into something that it isn't in order to look a certain way or feel a certain way on my wedding day. I want to feel strong, yes. I want to feel healthy, yes. And I want to feel beautiful. But I didn't want to continue history by experimenting with diets, restriction or excessive exercise. And so that decision was made in October.

Here we are a month before the day…how am I feeling?

I feel everything I want to feel. But if I'm going to be honest with you, I have to admit that there have been moments, days, even weeks where that negative voice in my head, that was barely even a whisper, started to blare it's ideas about how to change my body. There were days where I tried to eat "perfectly." There were days where I was planning how to lose 5 pounds by cutting out x, y and z. There were weeks where I tried to attain a level of perfection with my eating and fitness routine that simply wasn't realistic.

That voice came from a place that I no longer wanted to be. I started to make things complicated. I started to make things hard.

And then one day my mind and I had a come to Jesus moment. No more complication, no more must do's. It was time to remind myself of the KISS strategy: keep it simple sweetie. And so for the past month I have focused on the simple ideas that I know will keep my body and my mind healthy and strong.

I exercise 5-6x a week. I do this because it relieves my mind and it strengthens my body. It has shaped my body and given my muscles the chance to come alive.

I eat protein with every meal. Protein is part of my satisfaction factor. It is part of what gives my body energy to keep moving.

I take off the pressure. I simply try to eat well. I don't follow a rigid plan that expects particular or devised food that leaves no room for flexibility. I keep our fridge and pantry full of foods that I love.

I eat with a conscious mind. I pay attention to my food and I only put things into my body that feel good in it and that I truly desire.

I make sure it is worth it. I eat foods that I think are worth the indulgence. If I look at the buffet and certain foods simply don't seem worth it to me, I can walk away. I don't walk away because I "can't" have the ice cream. I walk away because well, ice cream just doesn't sound all that good right now! (But a smoothie always sounds good!)

Over the past month I've reminded myself of how simple eating and respecting your body can be. While I am in no way trying to paint an unrealistic picture of how I view food, I do think that we often complicate things well beyond what is necessary. We often give food too much power. We forget that we have the power, that we have the ability to decide what we do and do not want to do. And that IT CAN BE SIMPLE!

So, in a rambling sort of way friends…this is how I have arrived one month before my wedding feeling unbelievably incredible about myself, my fiance, my wedding day and how I will feel on that day.

Tell me…how do you try to simplify things in your life?

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.