the straight truth and pass the ice cream

Time to talk about food.

It never ceases. Everyone you run into, doing what I do, want to talk about dieting, eating "healthy", new year's resolutions, etc. Not the customers, I mean the product reps, the ad reps, the people from other local orgs I network with. Even coworkers occasionally. They slip in comments in casual small talk conversations about watching what they eat or how we're all avoiding all that candy after the holidays and trying to eat only salads, ha ha, and they just say it inclusively out of habit. And then, they get a bit unsure of themselves, a little uncomfortable. Because all you need to do is to look at me to get a hint that I might not be avoiding that after holiday candy one little bit.

And the truth is, I am not. The reason behind that truth is more my point, though. The idea is, we are all trying to "eat healthy" and workout and lose weight to be "healthy." 95% of people in our culture think about it all the time, many of them completely obsessing, and most of them are disappointed in their own efforts. Its an on-going game - must eat healthy, must eat healthy, must keep weight down, must work out three times this week, ohps didn't do it I suck, must not eat yummy fatty food, must not eat . . .

See, its all about the "must not." And I've watched you people, the 95%, and its clear that the only way to win this quest you are on is to be ever vigilant, to be ever worrying over it and attempting to do what's "good for you" when it comes to food rather than what is pleasurable or enjoyable. Now, don't get me wrong, I understand the pleasure and benefit that comes with being healthier, I've been there, I get what you are saying there. But if I get on that kick with you, it will never ever end. To play this game you have to work to deny yourself things you want pretty much all the time, for the rest of your life. If you get good at it, you might get the prizes of thinness and "health." I put that in quotes because the definition of that is not something I understand, I don't know how that is measurable. But I digress. If you don't play the game particularly well you will continue to deny yourself what you desire as often as you can and make yourself feel like shit when you fail to deny yourself, which piles more unpleasantness on your life.

And it is so assumed that we are all playing this game, that we all need to play this game to be decent people who are not lazy and gross people who can be judged lesser that we all talk about it as if it is a defacto truth, not just one way of looking at things. It is the only acceptable way.

I would like to shed some reality on this. 90% of people that made new year's resolutions to eat healthier or work out more or lose weight will be off the wagon within two months. Period. Maybe it is just our time and our culture, but I strongly suspect that humans suck at self-denial. It seems that whenever white people have been rich enough to have food on demand and lots of it they have gotten fat. I don't know too much about this in the cultures on ancient people of other races, but you can see it in the history of those of European ancestry pretty clearly. As I said, I can't prove it, but I reeeeeeeeally suspect it is true.

It is assumed, though, that we must all subscribe to this idea that will power will cure what ails us and that we all must apply it or are horrible slobs that just don't care about ourselves - how shameful, and embarrassing. But I have recently unsubscribed and I have not yet heard the argument to spur me on to renewing my subscription. Any program of self-denial has little chance of success. Also, I have tried that way of thinking and living before and never, never had success for more than four months. Never.

I suck with a big capital "S" at self-denial. My few attempts at it have born fruit, but they have been terribly short lived and the entire time I am dreaming of only two things that never happen - reaching some "goal weight" and reaching a point when eating and working out like this just feels like my life instead of regime I am on and only kind of enjoying. I cannot subscribe to a belief system that means I will be working hard to deny myself and/or guilt myself for the rest of my life. That's not going to work and I am old enough to know that. And its not just for me that it does not work - over 90% of those who lose weight on diet programs regain it and *more* within two years. Will power is not working, folks. As a nation we are getting fatter and "less healthy" all the time and the cult of will power only gets stronger as well. Does anyone besides me see a correlation?

I have not been able to buy into such an unpleasant belief system that gets me few results beyond feeling more like shit about myself than I already do. That's an awful sales pitch for anything at all. And while I know 99% of the rest of those in my culture are jumping off that cliff, I just can't swallow it any more.

People talk to me about denying themselves this that and the other food and I realize, not only am I not doing so, but I am sick of feeling guilty for not doing so just because everyone else things I should feel ashamed of my inability to do so. I am working hard on not being that lemming because, indeed, that's what it is starting to look like to me from over here. When everyone gets into group mentality and keeps following the leader over the cliff even when it has been proven that it is not producing positive results for the vast majority of people, that's just lemming behavior. And its damned hard to resist, but the alternative is terribly unacceptable to me.

I don't like being obese. I'd like to be thinner and "healthier." But the method is useless to me and its not just me. This way of going about it is fucked up. Its not working. I don't know what the alternative is, I don't have the answers, but until we admit what they are not we are not going to find answers.

So, since I am going to fail anyway, since simple willpower is generally useless in the long term on this issue and I don't yet know the alternative, I am done playing. Yes, I eat ice cream whenever I want. And yes, I did have half a pizza for dinner. Food addiction is a bitch, but I am working on knowing in my bones that it is less painful to allow the addiction we are all never suppose to admit we are powerless before to be seen by others for what it is than to torture and deny myself in an attempt that will only cause more self-loathing and unhappiness.

Doesn't mean I've stopped looking for the answer or wanting it, just means I am admitting that your answer is never going to get me there, its a false solution. Two plus two are just never going to equal five, no matter how many people are brainwashed to believe it is so.