Renewing Your Mind

Everyday life offers varying degrees of stress. Not everyone deals with it in the same way. Working a full-time, juggling my writing with my editing business, family, friends, and responsibilities blend into an interesting concoction. When the pressure is on, it's easy to turn to food to make my life easier, satisfying or comforting. The truth is, this is the kind of thinking that helped me pack on the extra weight I'm battling to shed.

It goes back to your mind. Change your thinking, and you can change your habits. I'm still counting calories to keep myself accountable, and my clothes fit better. I have a ways to go, but I didn't put it on overnight and I know it won't come off overnight. It's a process either way.

Sweets abound at my office. When things get hectic, bothersome, overwhelming...you get the idea, the habit to go into a feeding frenzy prevails. At first, it was hard for me to stand on the outside looking in. The chocolate especially tried to lure me in as a participant, but I'd made a commitment not to eat refined sugar for six weeks, and renewed that commitment for a second six weeks. Instead of falling prey to the call of the sweet tooth, I prepare a snack such as an apple cut up in cubes and sprinkled with walnuts, some Bing cherries or other fruit. SURPRISE! It satisfies.

Now that I've refrained for as long as I have, I've noticed I don't hit the wall with the rest of my co-workers. Hmmmm, could that have something to do with the change of diet? I use to do most of my writing in the morning because I was too exhausted in the evening. Now, I have enough energy to write either time.

Yes, it's a change of habit--making new ones, but it all starts with renewing your mind.