About 3 weeks ago I decided I would cut carbs on every day but Sunday (I’m human.) I have no food allergies (thankfully). I’m not grossly overweight. I just like to challenge myself–and here come the holidays marching two by two and with them cookies and little pastries and cakes and more sugar and frankly, my mouth is watering just typing these things…but when I check in…you know…on the inside, I know the food group, let’s call it, “holiday” food is not really consistent with my long term health goals.

So every holiday season I go a bit hog wild when my patients bring me all these wonderful holiday bounties and I devour them, gratefully, without even a thought. With each holiday party I tell myself it’s just the holiday…I’ll go back to normal in January.

And that’s what scares me most. The unconsciousness of it all. The way I just give up on what I know I want. Forgo making healthy choices because I can go back to being “good” when all this holiday stuff is over.

It’s not like I want to go into the history of where each ingredient comes from. I mean. That would be so silly.

So I’m in week three of no carb’s and it’s Sunday, so I’m consciously trying to carb-it-iup! But every choice has me thinking…do I really want that? And it just doesn’t seem like a good trade-off anymore. So I settle on a decaf mocha with rice milk. I am the epitome of excitement…I know…hold me back.

But here comes my ephiphany. Does anyone have that ten pounds that never goes away that has slowly crept up since high school, or since the baby, or since that big promotion? I do. And it never goes away, it’s just that TEN POUNDS…(and I’m lucky because mine has stayed ten…I know lots of folks who are up over 50 and just keep upping the bar on what’s acceptable to them.)

I exercise. I’m not a fanatic, but I do. I eat well…lots of greens…but much like the carbs I was just putting in my mouth without thought, I started wondering if there was an extra “ten pounds” of life that I was ignoring too.

Holy Sh*t did I open up a bag of worms when I asked that question.

Turns out, carbs ARE a lot of life. They are the unconscious addition to life that we just kinda go along with but don’t give real presence to. That we don’t give thought to.

It’s the unconscious way we act or react to our partner. It’s the way we go through life and add and add and add and never really look at how that’s affecting us or those around us.

I’ll give an example. It turns out, when I shined the little “carb” lite on my relationship, that I realized I have expectations that I never voice. And then I get frustrated when my partner doesn’t do this thing that I fantasized about but never actually voiced out loud.

Sometimes I forget I’m not a Disney Princess…and that my partner isn’t mind melded to me.

And I’m pretty conscious when it comes to relationship. So how did something that big slip through my radar? It’s the same as that cookie you said you weren’t going to eat going down your gullet. It’s the same as that hot soft pastry you can’t stop yourself from grabbing.

So in the spirit of the holidays I offer you this gem. Stopping carbs or not…finding the holes in your emotional armor aside…simply try to find out exactly what you want..and move steadily towards that! And when/if you find something no longer serves you..make strides to shifting it so it does.

I leave you with this last example. When I was in corporate America years ago there was no such thing as ergonomics. If your arms hurt from typing your arms hurt from typing. If your back hurt from sitting, it hurt from sitting. Over the years and many injuries later there is a change. There are different types of chairs designed to minimize pain. Different keybords designed to limit carpel-tunnel flare ups. Lots of choices for those who realize they don’t feel good.

You have to know it doesn’t feel good to make it feel differently.

This is sort of an unfinished piece. I’m still figuring it all out. But I can say, after three weeks of not adding more exercise to life, but simply cutting carbs completely 6 days a week, I am back in the skinny jeans I was going to give away because they would never fit, and am very happy there. And I’m also making an concerted effort to voice my needs in this time space reality to my partner…and it’s amazing how well that works!