Today is Day 27 in the series 31 Days of Loving Yourself Thin, and here’s something that gave me a laugh today – a couple days ago on Thursday (day 25), I asked you the question, “what do you really want from food?” There was an exercise that went along with that question, and at the end I said that the next day would be a continuation of that exercise. Here’s the funny part – I didn’t post it on Day 26!

Something cool about this is that I’m not criticizing myself for messing up. Why? Because it’s already done, and like we learned on Day 12, criticism just doesn’t work. Whether you criticize yourself for overeating, for gaining weight, or for not trying to lose weight , you just won’t get positive results. If you did, then all of the self-criticism that you’ve indulged in would have made you a perfect specimen by now!

Let’s move on and do the second part of that exercise today. As a refresher, on Thursday you ended up with a list of all of the things that you want food to give you. For example, you might want food to give you:------------------------------------------------------------------------------

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• Excitement (because you eat out of boredom)
• Comfort (because you eat when you’re anxious)
• Happiness (because you eat when you’re unhappy)
• Love (because you feel unloved)

There are no right or wrong answers here. Whatever you have on your list is what you are trying to get by using food, and that is your experience so it cannot be “wrong”.

Here is your exercise for today: for each item you have listed, write down 5 ways that you can meet this need without food. For example, if you eat because you are bored and you are looking for food to give you excitement (through it’s flavor or by getting a sugar high), what can you change in your life to bring excitement and passion into it? Are you stifled at work, do you need more of a challenge? Have you always wanted to go back to school but haven’t done it yet? Or, maybe you want food to give you peace of mind: how can you get peace of mind without using food? Do you believe in a higher power? Could you look at ways to develop your spirituality, could you start meditating perhaps?

When it comes right down to it, food is just food; just material that is meant to be ingested when you are physically hungry in order to provide vitamins and nutrients to the body for energy. It is meant to fuel your body, nothing more. That doesn’t mean that you cannot enjoy your meals, but food cannot give you love, it is an inanimate object. Now, what some food (refined sugar, for example) can do is create chemical reactions in the brain that make you feel good, that give you the feeling of love; but that isn’t love, just like the feeling heroin users get isn’t love.

If you truly want to not only lose weight but keep it off, I am convinced that the major part of the work lies in getting to the bottom of why you are overeating. Once you do that, it will be so much easier to create a healthy lifestyle consisting of healthy eating and exercise. By loving yourself right now as you are, you can love yourself through your discoveries of what makes you tick and without self-criticism, make some positive, lasting changes in your life.

To finish up, go to the mirror, look yourself deep in the eyes, and repeat 10 times, “I love you as you are now. I now have a better understanding of why you overeat. I love you even if you overeat and no matter what you weigh. I love you and support you in healing your relationship with food”. Write down anything further that comes up for you today in your journal or notebook to help you better understand just what is motivating you to overeat and use food.

You can find the introduction to this series of exercises here. If you haven’t read it yet please do, as it gives you the foundation and focus of the 31 Days of Loving Yourself Thin. You could also read Day 14, which is a review day.