Cake is good.

I went a little crazy with the treats this weekend. We had family in town celebrating birthdays, and I bought one of those huge, yummy Costco birthday cakes (I am keeping that place in business.). So I ate cake and ice cream, had some guacamole with chips, a few Cadbury chocolate eggs, and popcorn. But did I die? No. Did I ruin everything? No. Did I gain 10 pounds? No. But if I keep that up I will! So that was just my indulgence weekend, and I shall be a good girl for a while now. You can indulge every once in a while. It’s not going to undo all the good. But I am facing the truth of what Coach Robin says, “You can’t outtrain a bad diet.” That was how I approached life before. “It doesn’t matter if I eat this entire pizza and wash it down with a little Sprite followed by some ice cream and chocolate sauce. Tomorrow I’m going to run 10 miles.” The hard, cold truth is that I never got as strong doing that as I am already, after a couple of months of Crossfit and good eating.

Food in our society is really baffling. I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately. Even though most of us have seen or read things like, Fast Food Nation, Supersize Me, and The Omnivore’s Dilemma, our eating habits don’t drastically change. Our culture is set up to make terrible eating habits easier than good ones. Ninety percent of the food in a grocery store is junk. Half of the things that we think of as healthy are not really healthy at all. Bread, cheese, pasta, rice. It’s processed beyond recognition. And I don’t even know how to prepare the most nutrient dense foods like kale or swiss chard. I eat what is convenient or sweet rather than what is good for my body.

Apparently, most people’s diets consist of about 20 main foods. The funny thing is that those 20 main foods are usually not the 20 BEST foods. For me, I was definitely eating more cold cereal and bread than spinach and carrots. And I thought that was pretty good. At least it wasn’t French fries and Coke. But now changing my own diet for 24 days has really made the whole food awareness thing personal for me. I felt better, less bloated, and less stuffy in my sinuses. I had more energy, slept better, and got stronger. I’ve had a little food epiphany. Eat food that makes my body feel good! Make eating a response to physical stimuli rather than psychological stimuli. We are a culture of psychological eating. Does not compute.

With that said. I still admit that cake is good. I’m going to keep eating it. Maybe just once in a while instead of after every meal!