Hello there!
Let’s get to the 3 things we will be talking about today.
on how I find it difficult to get back to my routine, even though I’ve done it for years and years.
on cravings and how to cope with them.
on calorie counting, when to use it and how
It’d be lovely if you can share one of these 3 posts (I will link to the original, detailed post and not the snippet) with ONE of your friends. Thanks!
12 weeks on, 1 week off
Over the quarter break at The Quad, it is a time to turn off the alarms and wake up when the body decides to wake up. It is time to mentally and physically recover. While I love my job, it is still hard and I find it necessary to have a few release points scattered throughout the course of the year. Weekends are one, and a week off every quarter is another.
But once the break is over and I need to get back to my routine of waking up at 3.45 am is not that straightforward. I thought it was but every quarter starts off the same way. Last Sunday night, I set my alarm. But I woke up at 3.45 am and turned the alarm off (I don’t hit snooze) and went back to sleep. On Monday night, I coaxed myself into not setting the alarm.
So, when Tuesday night came around, I was a bit annoyed with myself. I set the alarm as usual and steeled myself to wake up. But at 3.45 am, that resolve is not there. Thankfully, I had a trick up my sleeve which was to take my dog for a walk before I had a chance to say otherwise. So, my poor dog was woken up at 3.45 am and taken out and after a 10-minute walk I was awake and any thoughts of going back to bed were done.
And I was back on the wagon. I had a productive morning, and Thursday was easy. And Friday was easier still.
For us, when it comes to a new habit, there’s a lot of inertia and obstacles we are battling. If a habit that I do 90% of the time has a bit of starting trouble, imagine the starting trouble for something we do 0% of the time.
That’s why it is key to start small i.e. instead of going from zero activity to “I will walk for 60 minutes daily”, something simpler might be “I will walk for 5 minutes daily”.
on cravings.
Control the controllable. Whether you get a craving or not is not under your control.
But whether you give in to it or not is under your control.
Here are some ideas about what to do.
Expect it. Don't assume (wrongly) that because you have made a decision to not eat sugar, that's all there is to eat. You will have cravings. Multiple times. At stupid times. By expecting it, you won't be thrown off by it when it does happen.
By making a decision early, you have already done something right. "I am not going to eat sugar this week" has reduced most of the decisions and fatigue that result from it. The decision is already made and most times, that will cover you. It is only when we are bombarded with many "Do I eat this piece of sugar now?" bits of decision making does fatigue win over.
As simple as this sounds, the most effective way to control a craving is to ensure that it cannot be fulfilled too easily - so do clean out your pantry.
A craving is just a thought. Just because you have a thought does not mean you actually want that piece of chocolate. Our brain likes to test us and it likes to sabotage us. Take 5 slow breaths, just focusing on the inhale-exhale. Once you do that, just tell your brain "No. I'll have my chocolate next week". And 5 more breaths, focusing on the inhale-exhale.
Go drink some water. Hot water? Cold water? Well, try both. But drink a tall glass of water.
Sit on that craving. Instead of trying to run away from it, ask yourself what will happen if you indulge in that craving. Ask yourself if you are truly deprived. You will realise you are anything but and we have access to these goodies all the time. If not today, then next week or whenever. Allow your common sense some time to defeat the craving.
Set yourself a reward. "I am not going to eat sugar this week. When I accomplish that, I am going to eat my favourite ice-cream and I am going to have an extra scoop". And of course, reward yourself!
on calorie counting
Just one samosa a day. That's not much, right? Well, here’s what it can translate to.
Photo by kabir cheema / Unsplash
That's approximately 250 calories. This means over a month, they are eating 7500 extra and over a year that becomes 90,000 Calories.
If nothing changes except for the extra 250 calories a day the 90k calories will translate to almost 12 kilos of fat tissue on the body. Ridiculous!
Calorie counting is useful for us to identify what we are doing, to get a ballpark of our eating habits and routines. But not as a habit to incorporate into daily. So, do try it out if you want to know
what our macronutrient splits are i.e. how much of our diet is carbs, protein and dietary fat?
how many calories are we actually eating?
what is our goal and what is the calorie requirement for that?
So, if you have NEVER had an idea about where things are in your nutrition, calorie counting for a week is a great idea to understand things better.
But keep in mind that it is
inaccurate
tedious
can lead to you obsessing about food
can lead to you bartering i.e. I ran 300 calories worth, I am going to eat a doughnut. Eat that damn doughnut because you want to, not because you ran a doughnut’s worth.
not sustainable at all.
For a better alternative and all that, do read the full post over here.
And that’s it for today. Thank you for reading. And you did share one of these posts with one of your friends, right?
