Good morning!
Hello from St. Pete! My mom’s birthday flowers are still in full bloom. What a beautiful thing to look at as you eat breakfast, no?
Today’s breakfast included blueberry-topped protein oatmeal (oatmeal prepared normally with a scoop of chocolate protein powder stirred in at the end) served with a side of mixed nuts.
My mom and I came up with a genius idea to combat my pecan rampage through the big jar of mixed nuts yesterday. Apparently pecans are my mom’s favorite nut as well and she happened to have a bag of unsalted pecans in the freezer that we dumped into the mixed nut jar. Now pecans are flowing freely again and they’re nice and salty, just the way I like ‘em.
I actually ended up incorporating a few nuts into my bowl of oats for some added texture and crunch.
And now for a topic I’ve been meaning to address for a while…
Sometimes Healthy Living Means Saying No
I often receive comments and emails from you guys praising me for my healthy attitude and my ability to indulge “whenever I want” without a thought otherwise. This makes me happy in that I feel like living a truly healthy life definitely includes indulgences.
But, on the other hand, I get a weird feeling in the pit of my stomach because I feel like I may be misrepresenting myself and healthy living as a whole.
Don’t get me wrong… I eat foods I love every single day and say yes to dessert if it is offered to me, but I think that sometimes, in the healthy living blogging community, people never want to talk about moments when they said “no” or walked away from indulgent food for fear of people saying that they’re “depriving themselves.”
But the truth is healthy living is saying “no” sometimes.
This morning, as I stared into parents’ pantry, Raisinets and peanut butter M&M’s stared back at me and my body and cravings wanted to eat them for breakfast. Saying no to candy in favor of wholesome oatmeal was a healthier decision and one I was happy I made in the end.
But it’s not something I’d normally blog about.
You better believe I say “yes” when I probably should say “no” quite often. I eat a third slice of birthday cake. I opt for the side of fries instead of fruit sometimes.
But not all the time.
I don’t want to misrepresent myself or healthy living on this blog and just felt the need to clarify that sometimes I do say “no.” If I pass on dessert because I ate half a loaf of bread from the bread basket, that isn’t deprivation. That’s me trying to be a little healthier.
I guess another way to view this thought is that healthy living is saying “yes” on occasion. Not all the time. But sometimes.
Sometimes it’s a good idea to pass on another cookie. Sometimes it’s not. It’s all about daily decisions with the end goal of living a healthy and satisfying life.
I just wanted to make sure you guys don’t think I’m out there saying “Bring it on!” to every indulgent meal that comes my way. That’s simply not true… though some days it is. Hello, cake for dinner!
Question of the Day
- If you’re an active blog reader or blogger, do you think there’s apprehension to talk about moments when you “said no” in the healthy living blog community?
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