New Year, New Intentions
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A couple of weeks ago I was wrapping up with another support group cohort and we were discussing what entering into a new year has looked like for us in seasons past and what we want it to look like this time around. Participants shared stories of adopting new diet plans and work-out routines and setting resolutions for self-improvement and change. They also described how even the best laid plans were often short-lived and the frustration and defeat that inevitably followed as resolutions faded.
We talked about how enticing wellness marketing is, particularly at this time of the year. How it fuels feelings of guilt and shame for participating in holiday food and festivities and then tries to sell us the solution. And while on an intellectual level we might know that the “solution” being sold is unlikely to be any different from any other “solution” we’ve bought into in the past, that have only left us feeling more defeated and discouraged, it can also feel hard to resist.
If post-holiday guilt has got you down, here’s what I want you to know:
You deserve to live your life fully, whatever that means for you. Holiday food can be fun and delicious. It’s OK for eating to look different on some days or weeks. It’s OK that eating may not be particularly balanced for a period of time. Your body can handle it.
Your body will also let you know if/when it does desire perhaps a little more balance with eating. You don’t need a set of rules to do this for you. You haven’t done anything wrong if your body starts to feel a little “off” physically. It’s just information. It’s just your body doing what bodies are designed to do to communicate their needs so we can adjust as needed. And adjusting it so much easier when it’s not something we feel is being forced upon us.
You do not need to re-invent yourself this year. You are good just as you are. Your body is good just as it is.
You do not need to set a new year resolution. Not for self-improvement, not for anything.
There is no new or novel weight loss or lifestyle program that is going to finally deliver to you the results you’ve been looking for from these programs in years past. I promise you. It’s just shiny new packaging with the same disappointing stuff as years past inside, which will almost surely lead you back to the same place you’ve been, probably too many times before. You deserve more.
This doesn’t mean you can’t, or you shouldn’t imagine what you want for yourself or your life as we enter into a new year. It also doesn’t mean that you need to, or you should. January 1 is just another day. You can let it be just another day.
If you are considering and contemplating your new year, here are some questions to reflect on:
Instead of self-improvement, what if you focused on self-care and self-acceptance? What might this look like for you?
For example, instead of trying to shrink your body back into too small clothes, it could mean buying clothes that fit you’re here and now body, just as it is.
It might mean allowing for rest when the world is telling you “should” be doing more. Or, saying no to others to allow time and space to get your own needs met.
Instead of a new diet plan, what if you focused on healing your relationship with food?
What are your biggest challenges with food? What would life be like if you could find a little more peace and ease in these areas? Perhaps practicing a little more permission to eat what you want and loosening the grip on those food rules would be a place to start.
Instead of engaging in movement for the sake of shrinking yourself, what if you focused on discovering joyful movement? Or at least more supportive and sustainable movement?
Think back to a younger you. Were there any activities that you enjoyed? Any movement that you engaged with because you enjoyed the activity rather than for purposed of burning calories or controlling body size? What would it be like to explore something similar?
It’s also OK if you don’t love movement and never have. You aren’t obligated to participate in it. You can also choose to engage with the least amount of the most tolerable movement for any of the mental or physical health benefits you get from it.
Instead of focusing on your body size, first consider what you believe would be different/better about life if your body were smaller, then ask yourself, “what are my other options for achieving or experiencing that?” Maybe this year you try one of those instead.
When I have this conversation with clients they will often say things like, “I want to feel stronger,” or, “I have more confidence when I’m at a lower body weight.” But strength and fitness are not size dependent. Being in a smaller body does not automatically equate to improved fitness. How might you work toward the goal of improving strength without needing to shrink your body first?
The confidence one is a little more (a lot more?) nuanced. But self-confidence is not size dependent either. I recognize that there are advantages that can come with being in a smaller body given the unearned virtue diet culture awards smaller bodies, but given that there is no prove safe or effective way to produce long-term significant weight loss, it’s unhelpful to position that as the only option. In fact, years of diet cycling has probably been more harmful than helpful in the long-term for self-confidence that body size itself. You can also work toward improving self-confidence, and in a way that is likely going to be far more sustainable, without changing your body size first.
What would it be like to tune into your body, its cues, and your innate wisdom and practice tuning out all of the diet culture noise that surrounds us when it comes to making food, movement, and self-care decisions?
This may look like scrolling past or unfollowing unhelpful posts and pages in social media. This may mean taking a media break all together until the wave of new year diet culture begins to recede. This may mean taking the focus off food and movement all together and thinking more about stress management, social connection, and sleep hygiene.
Consider where the enticing New Year, New You messages are coming from and how you might unplug from them for a while and then see, how does it feel?
However you choose to enter into the New Year, know that we are wishing for you peace and joy. And, also know that, if there is any way that we can help, we are here to support you. We do have some exciting plans for programming coming in 2023 so if anti-diet community and connection are on your list of things you’d like to cultivate, make sure you are on our email list to find out when those opportunities launch.
Cheers to making 2023 the year stop allowing diet culture steel our time, energy, and money and invest in food freedom and body peace.