End Your Love Affair With Food!
So often a reader will tell me that they love food, or that they love a certain food. I try to explain to them that love should be reserved for our family, our pets and ourselves. When pressed, the person will nearly always recant and say, "Well, I don't love it, but I really like it."
I think when we say we love a certain food, it gives that food a lot of control over us. Think about it: You love your parents, your spouse, your friends and your children, right? And, therefore, you feel a certain responsibility toward them. You would never ignore them, shut them out of your life or purposely decide never to see them again, would you?
Well, in the case of the unhealthy foods that we believe we love, I think we should take a different approach. I think they should be cast aside, banned and sent to the trash. Why?
The problem with the unhealthy foods that we love, or our vice foods as I like to call them, is that it is a case of love at first bite. That very first bite does us in, and we are hooked. We become prisoners of love and true goners. If you LOVE chocolate and take that very first bite, are you able to put it down and not finish the candy bar or the box? If you LOVE fried chicken, do you really eat just ONE piece, or do you have many?
What about pizza, another great love of our lives. Have you ever had one piece and then broken up with the remaining cheesy, gooey and tempting pieces left in the box? Or, how about potato chips? Lays potato tells us that "no one can eat just one" for a reason. No one can!
So you see, it is really the first bite of the unhealthy food item that is the problem. If you can just say NO to the first bite, then you don't have the internal struggle of when to stop having more bites.
I know this to be true from first hand experience. 12 years ago, I lived a morbidly obese lifestyle in a morbidly obese body. Ice cream was truly my lover. I had a horrible marriage and was very lonely, so night after night, I curled up on the sofa with my ½ gallon and fell in love -- bite after bite.
The ice cream filled a void that nothing else seemed to fill. But, the problem was that I was dieting. I was constantly trying to lose weight, going on diet after diet, but still continuing the affair with my lover: Espresso and Cream (Light) Baskin-Robbins ice cream.
To me, my love of ice cream was an obsession. I am embarrassed to admit to you that I even bounced checks to buy my fix. Like with any unhealthy addiction we have in life, it had to stop.
I swore off ice cream in January of 1995. It has now been almost 12 years, and I am proud to say that I have not had ONE bite of ice cream, not ONE, since the very day that I decided to stop. It is an interesting coincidence that by Christmas of that year, I was also down about 100 pounds.
I remember wearing dressy black velvet walking-shorts to my parent's home for Christmas dinner. Everyone was telling me how skinny I was. It felt great. It felt even better not to eat everything on my plate, nor take seconds of everything. And, I didn't even miss not having dessert.
You see, I had replaced my love of ice cream with a new love: MYSELF! For many years now, that love has remained strong and has seen me through a divorce, single parenthood, dating and falling in love, getting remarried and embarking on a mission to help others to find true love. Love of self is the only kind of love that will help YOU to realize your dreams and goals.
So, do you really love food, or is it time to look a bit deeper for a new love?
Email Julia with your comments at julia@juliahavey.com
EDITOR'S NOTE: You've seen Julia on the QVC home shopping network and The Wayne Brady show and heard on Oprah & Friends XM w/ Dr. Oz. She's been called "America's Master Motivator, someone with the passion of Tony Robbins, enthusiasm of Richard Simmons and the humor of Jerry Seinfeld." To get your copy of Julia's blockbuster motivational books, Awaken the Diet Within, From Overweight to Looking Great -- If I Can Do It, So Can You! The Vice Busting Diet click here--http://www.ViceBustingDiet.com
Related Tags: weight loss, obesity, diet, fat loss, obese, fat, weight, oz, diet plan, deiting, obesity pandemic
Julia Griggs Havey
Master Motivator, Author, Motivational Speaker
http://www.JuliaHavey.com
• eDiets.com Expert and 2000- present; 14 Million readers worldwide
• "The Vice Busting Diet!"- Foreword written by Dr. David L. Katz (The Way to Eat, The Flavor Point Diet); endorsements from Dr. Mehmet Oz (You, The Owner's Manual) and Mark Victor Hansen (Chicken Soup… series co-author) St. Martin's Press
• Filed the first Obesity related lawsuit against Coca-Cola 7/06
• Keynote speaker World Obesity and Overweight Congress, September 2005
• Keynote speaker "Success in the City" Houston, 2005
• Warner Books Author; Best-selling "Awaken the Diet Within; from Overweight to Looking great!" #2 on Amazon.com Health ranking (just behind the renown Dr. Atkins!), #10 overall. (2003-4)
• Missouri Governor's Council on Overweight and Obesity
• LifeChanger creator, Internet's most popular motivational weight loss program.
• Motivational speaking nationwide, various size events from 200-3,000 attendees
• Mother, wife, Global Obesity activist
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