Eat Your Way to Health

by Liza Baker

Does one or more of these statements feel true for you?

Life is good—except when it’s terrible.

You’re starting to feel unhealthy— perhaps in a specific way, perhaps just as a vague sense of unease. You have a million obligations to others, you have no clue how to accomplish everything, and there’s just no way you can focus on your health until the to-do list is to-done.

And guess what? Now your parents need parenting! You’re exhausted—but only

ALL. THE. TIME. THE WITNESS PROTECTION PROGRAM DIET

Perhaps you’re starting to think that the only way out of the overwhelm involves a plane ticket, a wad of cash, and a change of identity?

I call this the witness protection program diet. How else are you going to get everyone to leave you alone long enough to practice even a few minutes of self care?

So you’re broken and you’re looking for the fix. Surely there’s a silver bullet, a magic supplement, a diet, a detox, a workout, a woo practice—something that will fix it all. The bad news: you won’t find it where you’re looking.

The good news: you are not broken. In fact, you are exactly where you are supposed to be right now given your genetics, your environment, and the food and lifestyle choices you’ve made so far.

If you are genetically predisposed to something—take heart! Your choices can turn those genes on or off. And if you can change your choices, you can get healthy—and stay that way.

HOW TO EAT™ YOUR WAY TO HEALTH

Getting healthy does not have to include what we think of as self care: yoga, gym

The kids are growing up and don’t need you so much— except when they do, and then they really, really need you. Right now!!

workouts, massages, mani-pedis—these can become yet another to-do list we “fail” at completing.

I prefer to think about getting healthy as a process of soul care—a fully-aligned, completely personalized program of mindful practices.

Getting healthy through soul care consists of three stages that form the acronym EAT:

Engage your inner wisdom

Align your choices with your goals

Transform your life

ENGAGE

Many of us turn to the world around us for advice on how to get healthy: doctors, alternative practitioners, friends, family, the guru du jour, books, articles, blog posts, Dr. Google, and even celebrities love to tell us what we “should” be doing.

Very few of us turn inward for that information, and that’s problematic.

Bio-individuality is the concept that we are all unicorns—there’s nobody else in the world like us, so why would any one solution work for everyone? It’s the idea that your kale might be my kryptonite.

The best example I know of bioindividuality comes from my own family: my brother and I share the same gene pool, but he’s a committed vegan who thinks nothing of putting in a seven-mile run over his lunch break; I am an omnivore who prefers walking and yoga, preferably at 4:00am. Yet in our mid-50s, we’re

both extremely fit—each by following our own path.

Inner wisdom is the deep knowing that senses what is right for us. What’s right for us may not be right for someone else; what’s right for us today may not be what was right for us last year or in the next stage of our lives.

We tend to discount inner wisdom in favor of others’ quick fixes.

You may think you’re not intuitive; I’d argue that you really are—you just stopped listening to your intuition.

What’s intuition feel like? If I offer you some piping hot soup on a hot and humid Michigan summer day, do you think, “Oh, yes please!” and pull up a chair, or do you think, “Oh, HELL no!” and back away?

That’s your inner wisdom, it’s that simple: swaying toward or away from an option. It’s your body (not your mind) reacting to the question, “Is this right for me right now?” (BTW, neither option is wrong!)

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TAKE ACTION

What have you been considering as the next goal in your health journey? Is it changing your eating style, moving your body more, sleeping more? Think of one thing and ask yourself, “Is this the right choice for me right now?”

Tune into your inner wisdom for the answer.

Keep going until you find an option you sway toward.

ALIGN

At every moment, you have a choice that relates to the health goal you decided on in the previous section: chocolate cake or an apple? Netflix or workout? scroll through Instagram or go to sleep? We all know which choices align with our health goals.

One way to think about getting healthy is to make the better choice 50% of the time. Then 60%, then 70%, then 75%, then 80% or 90%. And you can stop there: if eight or nine times out of 10, you make the better choice, then the other times are not going to kill you— in fact, you might need a little treat to keep going.

What if you’re having trouble making the aligned choice most of the time?

“You don’t want to spend your life slamming up against every obstacle, blaming every person or situation , only to get to the end of your life, realizing, damn It’s me.”

— Carl David Blake

I offer you the following tips and tricks:

Own the opposite: when you don’t make the better choice, own it. You’re still claiming agency over your health rather than giving it away to inertia or peer pressure or whatever. You are making a choice.

I choose to get fast food.

I choose not to work out.

Use “I am one who” language: over time, you can rewire your brain and become the person you aim to be.

I am one who eats fruit for dessert.

I am one who works out 5 days a week.

Create a non-negotiable “container” full of healthy options: when you get to make a choice, the container feels less restrictive.

Container: I am someone who eats fruit for dessert. Options: peach, plum, or cherry? Fresh or dried?

Container: I am someone who works out for 30 minutes a day. Options: cardio, strength, flexibility, balance, a mix?

Crowd out the worse choice with the better one: over time your nutritional status and improved health will make the aligned choice more appealing. Have an apple first, then—if you still want it—a small piece of cake.

Work out first, then allow yourself as much time (or less) on Netflix as you worked out.

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TAKE ACTION

Identify one area in which you consistently face a choice. Which option is more aligned with your health goal? Try to make the better choice 50% of the time for a week or two.

TRANSFORM

After one to two weeks of consistently making one small, aligned choice in one area of your life, you will notice a difference!

The next step is to start making one more aligned choice in the same area.

Now that you are choosing water over soda at least 50% of the time, choose fruit over sweets at least 50% of the time.

Now that you are walking for 10 minutes every day rather than immediately heading to the couch after work, add 5 minutes of stretching.

Or pick a different area:

Now that you’re choosing water over a soft drink 50% of the time, go for a walk around the block rather than turning on the TV.

Now that you’re walking 10 minutes a day, choose oatmeal for breakfast instead of a donut.

For change to be truly sustainable— for transformation to occur—it takes time: you didn’t get yourself into this mess overnight, so don’t expect to get healthy overnight. As you make the aligned choice more than 50% of the time, it will become a habit. It might be a tiny one—and it’s still a good habit.

And transformation comes from layering one tiny habit on top of another, over and over and over.

Some final tips for the journey:

When you feel like progress has slowed, ask yourself, “What would it look like if this were easy?” and set your sights on that. If your goal is to lose 50 pounds, “easy” looks like losing one pound. If your goal is to run a 10K, “easy” looks like a walk around the block.

Remember to celebrate your wins and look at your challenges with curiosity rather than judgment. There’s a big difference between “OMG. Why did I make that choice again?!?” and “Huh. Why did I make that choice again?”

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TAKE ACTION

Identify the next aligned choice you’d like to add to your first one.

Start making both better choices 50% of the time (or more).

Rinse and repeat.