Diet is a Four Letter Word

Nothing tastes as good as thin feels. A moment on the lips, a lifetime on the hips (thighs, stomach, ass, whatever). Fight hunger. Starve for perfection. You are what you eat. And my personal favorite – You can’t spell diet without DIE.

Diets don’t work. At least, that’s what the weight watchers commercials tell me. And it’s true! Look at the phrases associated with diets. Go ahead, take a nice long look. It’s phrases like these that cause woman who would otherwise be perfectly happy, comfortable and possibly confident in their bodies to run screaming from the cookie isle – only to wind up down there two weeks later, because they just can’t kick the habit.

Nothing tastes as good as thin feels. So, what? I’m giving up all food? A moment on the lips, a lifetime on the hips. Read subtext: it tastes good now, but you’ll hate yourself later. Fight hunger. Since when is eating a war? You get my point.

Part of My Zen is balance. A *gasp* balanced diet falls into this category. What’s a balanced diet mean though? Depriving myself of calories to fit into those skinny jeans? Running three miles for every donut I indulge in? Saying NO to all bad foods? Question: What is a bad food? A brownie that hijacked my car and stole my wallet? A side of fries that’s facing 25-life for murdering an eggplant?

I stepped on the scale this morning, feeling thin, confident, and excited to see what progress I had made. (Note: progress in this context is derrived from the idea that if the number on the scale is lower than when I started my road to Zen, I have somehow found a way to calculate and measure success) I peeked down to see what the blaring red numbers would tell me – one pound. One FUCKING pound. I haven’t eaten fast food in 10 days, I’m doing yoga an average of four times a week, I’m eating vegetables for Christ’s sake! And I’ve only lost a pound. I was so pissed off I started making excuses – Well, I did have a tall glass of water right before bed, maybe it’s water weight. Maybe I was standing funny so the reading was off. I did have that cookie at 10, maybe my stomach’s just clinging to those calories for…sport.

Okay, time for a self-intervention. Why am I getting so upset over one pound? Isn’t this supposed to be about turning over a healthy leaf, not about shedding massive amounts of weight? And hey, some people really struggle to loose one pound in a week, and here I am, pissed off that it wasn’t enough. What did I expect? That my body would be in such shock to not have its weekly (sometimes twice a week) bacon burrito or bacon waffle or BLT (hold the T) that I would be pulling numbers like the contestants on the biggest loser? Congratulations Casey, you’ve lost 18 pounds this week, how does that make you feel?

I had to talk myself down, stop beating myself up, and remind myself what’s really important – balance, peace, calm, serenity, Zen. I feel better at the beginning of this week than I did last week. A little more fit, making better food choices, more aware of being hungry versus bored. I refuse to let myself become/remain a woman whose self-efficacy is based on a number. Maybe I should throw out my scale…