I don’t like soup.
And I don’t like to chop.
To me, soup is perfectly good food on which someone has dumped a pitcher of water. Ick.
Chopping vegetables is mind-numbingly boring. I am still missing some feeling in my left pointer finger due to a chopping incident. Chopping is not my thing.
My sister enrolled us in a knife skills class after Christmas, so I am feeling a little more powerful about my knifing skills, plus it has made chopping a little more fun. Not necessarily less dangerous. But I now think I look like someone on top chef. (I don’t.)
But back to why I have a big glorious photo of my vegetable soup at the top of this article.
I know vegetable soup is good for me.
It fills me with nutrients.
It’s sheer low calorie volume will help my leptin-resistant tummy feel sated.
My roadblock to eating soup was the thought, “I don’t like soup.”
While true, this thought wasn’t serving me.
So I listened to what I tell my clients: “Try changing what you eat in a playful and curious way.”
I listened to what I tell my kids: Try that spinach. “You may not have liked it in the past, but one of these days you will like it, and that day may be today.”
Why not give soup another try?
So I chopped up a big batch of soup.
And I liked it. (Hey Mikey!)
My soup makes me feel cared for and the spices taste complex (they’re not) and it feels comforting in my stomach.
Who knew?
I love that I can choose what things to like.
I’m not just telling myself to like soup, like an affirmation, I really do like this soup. I come home at lunchtime looking forward to the soup. Out of everything in the refrigerator I could grab, I want the soup.
I wanted to share that with you: The news that you can…
notice the things you want in your life and embrace them as they flash by.
Snag those examples of what you DO want before they fade.
Don’t just assume you don’t like the things you haven’t liked in the past.
Be curious. Be open-minded. Then make a mental note when you prove yourself wrong.
I call it being primed for a new normal.
I didn’t like soup and now I do.
This seems like it could be so applicable in so many areas of life.
I’ve done the same thing with spending time alone.
What do you want to like?
I wake up my kids at 5:55am to get ready for school. They respond in a monotone, “G’morning, Mom.” Their little bodies make their way to the kitchen with feet dragging and shoulders slumped, like walking zombies.
Little hands grab the oatmeal packets, fill the same bowl every day, open the right hand refrigerator door and leave it open while they pour their milk. Door closed. 45 seconds in the microwave.
Spoon to mouth, spoon to mouth, spoon to mouth. Dishes in the dishwasher.
I’m not sure they actually woke up during the whole process.
For sure, they didn’t make a lot of decisions about their morning meal.
And while in a perfect world I would have them eating steel-cut oatmeal with organic berries, there is a lot to be said for eating like a zombie.
At our house there is no deciding if we are having a doughnut versus oatmeal.
I always have oatmeal on hand.
Doughnuts not so much.
Breakfast is an automated process that brings satisfaction without making it a major source of joy for the day.
There ARE other ways to have joy in your life.
Lunch is automated too.
Even their afternoon snack is automated. What goes into the protein shake is different for the football player than the writer, but the usual ingredients are always available.
Automating our eating does take a little planning and preparation in order to have these foods on hand, but even the shopping becomes automatic after a while.
It’s nice not to have to think so much about food all the time.
It’s nice to take away some of the choices and struggle.
If it sounds like I am suggesting that you eat unconsciously all the time, that’s not my intent.
What I am suggesting is that every snack and meal doesn’t have to be a party in your mouth.
I am all about mindfully enjoying the incredible flavors and textures and aromas of the food that nourishes you.
Just not all the time.
It doesn’t have to be a spiritual experience every time a lettuce leaf enters your mouth.
If you are overeating because you are eating unconsciously, blindly popping chips into your mouth as you watch Netflix, that’s the time to make sure you wake up and taste what you are eating.
Feel your body and how that food makes you feel.
Does it make you sluggish? Give you energy? Sustain you for 3 hours? Give you a touch of gas?
Get super conscious.
While tuned in, it’s easier to change to foods you like, give you satisfaction, AND fuel your body the way you want.
Plan what you are going to eat.
Then repeat it enough times so you don’t have to think about it
That’s when it becomes unconscious. Automatic.
Automatically eating healthy food…
It’s just what you do.
It’s just who you are.
You don’t have to eat the same thing every day the rest of your life, but you will have a default that satisfies you.
You will have a default that serves you.
And like most defaults, it will make the special taste even more… well, special.
PS – I do know that oatmeal in a packet might not be some people’s idea of healthy, but as we are moving away from sugary Fruit Loops, I’m happy. Some people would be delighted with Fruit Loops if they are trying to steer their children away from pixie sticks for breakfast. (You think I jest.) It’s all relative.
You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting –
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.
Sometimes it feels like life doesn’t give us any choices.
And yet, we always have choices.
“Let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.”
Listen close.
Honor it.
That is your compass.
If it feels like love… if it feels like freedom… you know that is the choice to make.
And when the world calls to you, be quiet enough to hear it.