Those first days of fasting were so tough. I craved my Pepsi so much. Of course, that is the purpose of fasting. Every time I craved that Pepsi I turned to God in prayer.
During that time I discovered a book called "Made to Crave". The title caught my attention because I was fighting my cravings so much and it bothered me that I was so controlled by such a silly craving. This book addressed everything that was bothering me.
It is no secret that everyone has a "drug" of choice. Mine is food. I am a very emotional eater. I always have been. The last couple of years have been especially challenging and the increasing size of my clothing show just how well I have coped. Instead of "satisfying my deepest desire with GOD" (as Lisa talks about in her book), I was trying to fill those desires with food. Epic fail.
After 40 days of no soft drinks, I discovered that I didn't even miss the silly things. I started thinking, "I stopped one bad habit. Why not try another one?"
What was next? Eating out too much. So I announced to the hubs and boys that we were not going to eat out for at least thirty days. They shrugged until... Every Wednesday we have a crazy busy schedule so it has been a given that the boys would grab a $5 Little Caesar's pizza after church while I am in choir practice. With this new announcement they couldn't do this. Even stopping and grabbing our $1 chicken sandwiches in between sports practices was out. It was an adjustment, but we did it.
Since then I have been trying to make other little changes such as eliminating junk from our junk drawer and buying more organic foods. I am learning slowly. I had to print out a chart (below) so I would have a cheat sheet of what was OK to buy organic and not to buy organic.
This is all a process. All I know is I am convinced that we are made to crave God... not food!
3 comments:
I could give up soft drinks, but it would be very, very hard for me to give up chips.
I am convinced that there might not be anything harder for me than to make better food choices. I've been thinking about reading this book as an addition to the better eating/exercise routine I started in January. Did you enjoy the book?
I've seen a lot about this book on the blogosphere, and I got the free download from Amazon for the companion shortened sample, but haven't read it yet. I've heard good things about it.
I lived in New Orleans a long time ago, and gave up chocolate for Lent, which was harder than you might imagine :) Since I've developed tinnitus, I've given up caffeine, most all coffee and tea (just decaf every now and then), and all soft drinks (again, except for an occasional Sprite or root beer, no caffeine). The caffeine is hard to do, you get terrible headaches and withdrawals in the beginning. But once you give them up, it's easy to stay off, I think :)
I want so much to buy organic, but live with someone who insists it is all a marketing ploy. I have to "sneak" organics in from the grocery store :) I think a lot of the rise of autism and certain cancers should be linked to increase use of pesticides and growth hormones. Don't even get me started on that! :)
Ack, I'm rambling, sorry :) I think you're right though, it's all a process, and I'd say you are doing better than most! :)
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