I May Have Done Something Awesome

I went out of town for a weekend with friends and family with every intention of being uber-healthy and writing a fabulous blog post today about all the ways I thwarted unhealthy vacation food and pioneered my own path of virtuous nutrition the whole time, keeping my body clean and healthy and fueled for vitality.  And I so very much wish I could tell you that story today. But I can't, because I didn't do any of those things.  But, it's cool.

I didn't realize it until last night, but when I thought back on my nutritional choices over the weekend and tried to feel all bad about them, I realized I didn't have that much to feel bad about.  Yeah, I ate a bunch of sugar and fatty foods that I don't usually eat and I felt the physical impact (translation: like crap) but when I really sat down and itemized my nutrition, it just wasn't that bad overall.

Practicing what I preach is really important to me, but the whole, "all things in moderation" thing is a hard one for me to practice. My brain just doesn't work that way. I am either on or off, all or nothing, in or out.  In the spirit of not being a hypocrite, I have been working hard at moderation, and living in the middle is weird and uncomfortable and I don't like it. 

But I am always telling people that change happens when things get weird, so hopefully the amount of time I spent in the middle this weekend means that change is happening for me, too.

After I realized that my scandalous nutrition wasn't exactly front-page news, I sat down to figure out what I had done differently this time to get such a happy result.  Here's what I decided, and what may also help anyone else out there struggling with living in the middle:

1. I didn't drink.  We all know that alcohol lowers our inhibitions, and not having a mind-altering substance flowing through my veins really made a huge difference.

2. I kept moving.  While I didn't work out or run this weekend, I did stay really busy.  There wasn't a lot of down time for munching, which helped me stick to actual meals instead of vacation grazing on high-sodium stuff.

3. I drank a ton of water.  I was almost always full because I kept the water flowing.  I always feel healthier when I am well-hydrated, and apparently I make better decisions, too.

Coming home to such a happy realization was like a whole new vacation. I hope my little epiphany awakens something new in your health today, too. Go find out! Get weird!