The Hemp Connection:
lent

Every year when Lent comes around, I'm reminded of my years working in an eating disorder treatment center. It was the time when my patients viewed the holiday as an excuse to indulge their disease. Over night, everyone seemed to become Catholic and want the special dietary rules to apply to them!

I decided to have a rule that other than the"fish on Friday" tradition, all Lenten sacrifices would have to relate to something other than food. After all, Lent is supposed to be a practice of sacrifice, and making it easier to live in your comfort zone is not really what Lent is about.

Here are ten sacrifices to consider that may indirectly have to do with food, but in a way that may allow you to come out of Lent with a new healthy habit that benefits you long after the 40 days it felt like a sacrifice.

Any behavior change is hard. The purpose of Lent is not to punish yourself, but to pull yourself out of living with a focus on yourself and turning it toward others. The healthier you feel, the more likely it is you will want to interact with others. And social support can, over the long haul, help to balance your hormones.

The beauty of Lent as compared to a New Year's resolution is, you only have to commit to 40 days. Then you can re-evaluate. There is something about the permanency of a New Year's resolution that almost insures its being broken. Lent is a way to try a new behavior on for size and evaluate if it works for you.

1. Give up negative self-talk

2. Put away excessive weighing on the scale

3. Instead of spending money on that nail job or that new eye shadow color, buy the fish oil. And take it!

4. Go to bed at a regular, earlier, hour.

5. Get up early and get to that yoga class on time.

6. Pack your lunch.

7. Limit your social networking time (Facebook, Twitter) and attend a new meetup group once a week. A group that has absolutely nothing to do with food, exercise, fertility, or PCOS.

8. Practice a daily random act of kindness.

9. Do something daily that has no purpose and is just plain fun!

10. Spend a little bit of extra money on organic household cleaning products.

Lent is a time we tend to think of sacrifice. Typically we jump into thinking of vices we need to give up. On the theme of grief, perhaps this year Lent can be the time you work to adopt a healthy habit. Any change in behavior involves sacrifice, but real behavior change is hard if you’re only focusing on what you’re NOT going to do. If you haven’t decided what you ARE going to do when you don’t do what it is you DON’T want to do, you’re not very likely to succeed at changing the behavior.
Most women who diet make the mistake of focusing on what they aren’t going to eat. If a large majority of their diet is junk, and all they do is remove it, that leaves big voids of food that aren’t being filled. I’ve heard over and over through the years, how surprised clients are to find how much they genuinely can eat and still lose weight. They’d never thought of it as a journey of what TO eat. It’s always been about what NOT to eat. I like to keep them so busy eating everything they need to eat that they are too full to think of what they’re missing out on.
Adding exercise is going to mean giving up TV time. Going to bed a little earlier is going to mean giving up your nightly date with Jay Leno. Delegating more to someone else is going to mean giving up control of something.
Practicing better self-care truly does mean giving something up. It’s not an either/or thing. All of those are sacrifices, but instead of denying them to yourself, which often means setting yourself up for an indulgent binge come Easter, think of Lent as an opportunity to adopt a new behavior!
If you’re having a hard time giving up the chocolate, think of what you can add to your diet when you crave it. A packet of Justin’s Nut Butter? A handful of nuts? Greek yogurt? Some string cheese?
Not doing it for you to hear these suggestions? Then maybe it’s not the chocolate that’s the problem. Maybe it’s the dependence on binge eating to deal with stress. Try sacrificing an hour of Facebook time for an hour of yoga class.
Anytime you ADD a new behavior, it requires sacrifice of something else in order for you to make room for it. If you’re only focusing on the sacrifice, it’s going to suck.
Lent is a great time to change a behavior, provided your focus is on the newer, nurturing choice, rather than on viewing what you’re trying NOT to do as a punishment.
How can you succeed with what you’ve given up for Lent? What healthy choice can you use to fill in the void?