Tag Archives: lifestyle

Junk food

I’ve been craving sugar recently. I keep finding myself drawn to sweet foods and candy. It starts off as a nibble, and once I’ve made the initial break in discipline, then it becomes easy to keep going.

It’s ok to treat yourself, but this seems different. It seems lazy, it seems as though I am not making a choice. The snacks are choosing me.

So now I’m going to have to change that, but I need to frame it properly in my mind. Cutting out all junk food seems like a punishment, a self-imposed restriction that I must endure. But I’m not sure how else to think about it?

Maybe I just need to buy myself some healthy comfort foods. Maybe I should start drinking berry shakes again in the morning, to get some natural sugars in me. This is an example of something delicious and still quite healthy.

I’m not opposed to having a bit of junk food every now and then, but I like having control over the decision. I also like that decision to be about me making good choices, rather than about me avoiding bad ones.

Lifestyle as process, not outcome

I love this quote:

New goals don’t deliver new results. New lifestyles do.

And a lifestyle is not an outcome, it is a process. For this reason, all of your energy should go into building better habits, not chasing better results. ~ James Clear, author of Atomic Habits.

Regular fitness, listening to audio books while I work out (and instead of the radio in my car), regular writing, time restricted eating, and daily meditation… these are lifestyle choices I made, I track daily, and I hold myself accountable to.

This year I made lifestyle choices that have made me feel so much better about myself.

Result: I have more of myself to offer to others, family and work. Sure, I still feel overwhelmed at times, and I still feel like I’ve got more on my plate than I can handle, but I also feel more resilient and up for the challenge.

Lifestyle is a process, not an outcome, and I’m working on that process daily. As I approach my one-year anniversary of tracking these things, I now need to reexamine my process. What am I now doing regardless of my tracking, that is now habit, and what do I need to track more closely to ensure I’m refining the process, and my habits, to make my lifestyle even richer and more rewarding?