Starling Fitness: Daily writings on Fitness, Diet, and Health

The first question that needs to be answered when tackling this is, “Why?” Why do you want to cut a certain food out of your life? What’s the point? The best way to prevent the feeling of deprivation is not depriving yourself.

Weight loss isn’t enough. If you want to lose weight, I promise you that you can do it without removing that food from your life. It is possible to eat healthy with rare treats in order to stave off deprivation. If you think you have to cut foods out of your life in order to lose weight or prevent binges, you need to read this entry on Vulnerability Foods.

Getting fit is not enough. Unless you are an Olympic athlete, a rare treat of your favorite foods is not going to influence your performance. No matter how many personal trainers say, “Food is fuel,” it doesn’t make it the whole truth. If food were solely fuel, there would be no creme brulee. Food is about pleasure just as much as it’s about providing nutrition.

What if the food doesn’t give you pleasure, however? What if when I asked you, “Why do you want to cut a certain food out of your life?” you answered, “Because thirty minutes after eating, I always find myself in the bathroom defecating what feels like a diamond encrusted howler monkey.” Then that sounds like a valid reason to stop eating it. If you answered, “Whenever I eat that food, I get a mind-splitting headache,” that’s another good reason. It could even be something as simple as, “I just feel kinda yucky after I eat it.” If your reason has a clear manifestation, then this section is for you.

Just because it makes you feel like a howler monkey is clawing its way out of your abdomen doesn’t mean the food doesn’t taste good. It doesn’t even mean that people will be understanding when you tell them. “How about just a little bit of ice cream? A little bit won’t hurt, will it?” You will have internal voices tempting you to eat it and external ones.

Internal Voices:

• “It tastes so good.” Concentrating on the taste of the food instead of the final outcome can undermine you. Make sure that you counter every thought about the taste of the food with the vivid visualization of the final outcome. Every time you think about the taste of the food, remember the howler monkey, screeching headache or whatever your symptoms are after eating the food.

• “I’ve been so good. I deserve it.” Cutting this food out of your life isn’t about being “good” or “bad.” It’s about living a healthy life. It’s about enjoying your life without diamond encrusted howler monkeys. You deserve to feel healthy every day.

• “Just a little bit won’t hurt.” This might be true. You need to experiment with your body and find out what your limits are. Maybe a tiny portion of this food won’t hurt you. Once you’ve tested the confines of your physiology, keep within them. Be absolutely sure how much you can tolerate and stay within those boundaries.

External Voices:

• “Just a little bit won’t hurt.” If you haven’t tested your limitations, then this phrase might be true, but if you know your boundaries, be firm with them. It took me a long time to find out how much of that food I can eat. I know that even a little bit will make me sick.

• “Humans have been eating that for centuries. You can’t be THAT sensitive to it.” Food now is so different from what it was centuries ago. Our livestock is immunized with drugs and fed with specially bred feed that didn’t exist centuries ago. Our food has been cross bred and sprayed with so many chemicals that it barely resembles the food that existed centuries ago. It took me a long time to find out what was making me sick. Now that I know, I’m not going to go back.

• “So now you’re all picky about your food?” I’m picky about how I feel. That food really makes me sick. You don’t get to see how sick I am because it happens after I leave you. Wouldn’t you feel bad if you found out that I was up all night sick?

If you know for a fact that a food is making you sick, you are so lucky. Sometimes it takes people years to find out which ingredient or additive is causing their trouble. Now that you know what you need to cut out of your diet, don’t let it stand in the way of your health. There is no food worth the discomfort.