Spring Break 2K16 Body Ready

Are you going somewhere warm, relaxing, and tropical for Spring Break? Have you yet to shed your unwanted winter coat? Well, I have the plan for you: Spring Break 2k16 Diet –

HA! Just kidding. Did I trick you? Did you think you were going to read another article from an average unqualified student trying to tell you what new fad diet will help you lose 10 pounds in a week? Did you think I was going to prescribe you the magic pill to make any extra “jiggle” disappear into thin air? Did you expect me to tell you the next food group to cut out of your nutrition? I’m sorry to let you down, but you need to hear what I’m about to say.

For some reason, we have a tendency to impose some type of strange morality onto food – for which we can thank commercials, billboards, magazines, & social media’s glorification of thin body types, weight loss programs, fad diets and supplements. With this constant bombardment surrounding our everyday lives, we have created an innate system characterizing foods as “good” and “bad.” Have you ever loudly commented that you’re being SO “bad” for eating the dessert you just ordered, implying that you usually don’t eat these types of foods? Or, have you praised yourself for only having a salad at a large family gathering, sticking to your “good” eating? We all have, even if we don’t admit it. But in reality, eating these foods (along with their innate imaginary traits we assigned them) has no reflection on your character – it only justifies my claim that our culture has developed a bizarre phobia of weight gain. Cut out that dialogue! Cut out calling food “bad”!

We’ve started to believe that being thin equates to being healthy and being thin must include dieting. In fact, it’s become a part of our natural instinct, which is actually damaging you mentally and socially. By associating foods with good and evil, your “healthy body” goal turns from enjoying life’s luxuries to constantly striving to achieve perfection (particularly “perfect health”). But, who set the standards of perfection? Who made the rules to begin with?

Let me give you a scenario and tell me if at some point in your life, this was you:

• Scenario 1 – You decide to make a bigger effort to be healthy and tell yourself you shouldn’t eat ice cream and desserts. However, you immediately feel unhappy and end up indulging in it anyways.

• Scenario 2 – You are motivated to be healthier and lose a few pounds, so you cut out what you deem as “bad.” You stick to the diet for a couple months, only to regain all of the weight back afterwards once you reintroduce these “bad” foods back into your everyday diet.

Sound familiar? I’m sure it does. According to studies, only 5% of dieters keep the weight off due to the way dieting turns on nature’s emergency switch. The body sees restriction as a form of starvation and thus the draws you towards calorie dense foods and cravings. However, since you have restricted and dieted, your metabolism has slowed – thus, at the end of this “diet” you go back to eating normally and reintroducing all of your “off limit” foods, and you experience weight gain! WOAH! So, what do you do? You decide to diet again, and the vicious cycle continues. Except, this cycle comes with guilt and feeling undeserving when you gain weight or make a “bad” food choice. Food should be a source of enjoyment rather than a way to gauge your self-worth.

The minute you decide that a number on a scale or a piece of food defines who you are as a person, is when you should step back and think. Think about why you are restricting yourself and why you want to change yourself. Because, let me remind you, a healthy body comes in all shapes and sizes; and by definition, being “healthy” encompasses physical, mental, emotional, and social happiness and well-being.

So, you want a spring break body? Don’t diet. Don’t restrict. Let’s start the spread of a new fad diet – the No Fad Diet! Let’s focus on being mentally healthy and enjoying food and everything that life throws at us. Food is our fuel; it is the energy we need just to function. Food keeps us happy, which creates positive social situations and self-love.

Now, I’m not telling you to eat everything in sight and spend your night downing a chocolate cake. Instead, I want you to think about being a Mindful Eater or an Intuitive Eater. When your stomach is rumbling, eat the foods you want. While you are eating, take in all of the joys that the different tastes are bringing you: be present in the activity of eating. And when you find yourself getting full, be mindful and honor that feeling by not stuffing yourself with every last bite. By doing this, you allow yourself to have what you want in the quantities that your body feels necessary – trust your body.

That’s what I want you to take out of this – respect and love yourself. Be selfish! No “Spring Break 2k16 Body” will satisfy you or make you happy, especially when you are hurting your body by restricting it from what it truly wants. You want to go out with friends, have a few crazy drinks, and come home to a pizza? Go for it! You want to build a salad the size of your face and sit in a park eating it on a sunny day? By all means, that sounds great! Find the lifestyle that makes you happy and fits best to you and your personality – that lifestyle of yours is maintainable, keeping you smiling and stress-free.