Healthy Holidays

Bacon cheeseburger and sweet potato fries

Well, here it is. Time once again for gathering with family and friends and... food. Lots and lots of food. So, what's there to do? Wave the white flag and surrender to the delightfully delicious desserts? Stand resolute and rally your willpower and abstain from all holiday treats? I think the answer is somewhere in between diving eyeballs deep into sugar and completely avoiding all caloric temptations. As I often say, have a plan... or failing to plan is planning to fail. 

The key to having a healthy holiday season is keeping the same mentality as you do the remainder of the year. Hopefully it's something like this: Everything is permissible, but not everything is beneficial. Or: Everything in moderation. The former actually comes from the Bible, and I like it-- basically "I can do whatever I want. But not all that I want is good for me."

Stay Focused. What are your ultimate goals? Maintain a healthy weight? Run a marathon? Live a long life? Keep your eyes on the prize, not on the pecan pie. Eat or drink what you want at that holiday gathering, but then step away from the table. Don't throw up your hands after falling off the clean eating wagon and spend the rest of the holiday bingeing.

5k in a Santa costume, anyone?

Find a New Goal. I'm not a fan of New Year's Resolutions for the sake of setting a New Year's Resolution. But I'm a huge fan of setting a goal to make you a better you. Decide now on a new goal-- don't wait for January 1. Figure out some way that you want to make you better and begin taking baby steps toward that goal now. If your goal is to clean up your diet, lose X lbs., or run a marathon, is it going to get you closer or further away from your goal if you gain an extra 5 or 10 lbs over the holiday?

Love Yourself. That's all. Once you truly find a love of an appreciation for yourself, then you can turn that outward and into the lives of the people around you. If you're not happy with yourself there's no one in the world who can make you happy. There's nothing in the world that will bring you peace until you make peace with yourself. I wish I could provide a quick and easy 3 steps to doing this. For me it begins with a relationship with God. He is love. The more connected that I am with Him, the more connected I am to myself and then to others.