November, and therefore the end of the year, is upon us — the time of the year where we’re (allegedly) statistically more likely to be in a dirty bulk is officially here. For cross-cultural kids like myself (am I actually a CCK — or just a product of globalisation who enjoys appropriating other cultures’ festive eating occasions?) it’s a veritable third of the year with “good” reasons (birthdays, anniversary, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s, Lunar New Year) for eating more than I probably should.
But this isn’t gonna be another run-of-the-mill blog post about how to deny yourself and stick to the straight and narrow. Or, maybe it is a little, but it’s definitely not about denying yourself. Let’s talk about bears. (Wait, wut.)
One of the most common ways that I see people attempt to set corrective behavioural goals is the removal of ‘bad’ habits. Whether this is via perfectly legitimate nutritional strategies such as intermittent fasting (usually described as meals that will not be eaten anymore, e.g. “I will not eat after 6pm” or “I will skip breakfast” etc), paleo/ketogenic diets (i.e. “I will not eat carbs”), or seeking to excise various subpar foods/behaviours (e.g. “I will not drink soda”, “I will not eat fast food”, “I will not gorge on junk food at movies” etc). Which is great, because it means you’re identifying habits that may not be aligned with your goals, but there is another issue with this sort of ‘subtractive’ (vs ‘additive’) phrasing.
There’s this concept called the Ironic Process Theory (also known as the white bear problem — and, yes, every single gif this issue is in fact going to be adorable polar bears) which is described as “the psychological process whereby deliberate attempts to suppress certain thoughts make them more likely to surface”. Basically: if I ask you to NOT think about a white bear, you’re probably gonna find it almost impossible to think of anything but white bears before long. The actual mechanism by which this process happens isn’t super important, but for the curious cats, the TL;DR is that your brain starts to scan for thoughts of white bears in order to sift them out/remove them, which ends up (counterintuitively) bringing them to the forefront of your consciousness. I know, epic fail, brain.
What does all of this have to do with the festive period? Many of you are going to adopt that approach above — making resolutions to not eat (more than a certain amount of) pie, cake, ice cream, mince pies, stuffing, candy canes, what have you. (Although, please don’t waste your calories on those sad stripey sticks?! If you’re gonna eat candy at least eat a damn Snickers bar.) But the more you think about all the things that you can’t eat, the more deprived you’re going to feel, and the harder it’ll feel to stay aboard the strugglebus.
Instead, and this applies not just to the holiday season, but to goal setting in general, I’d suggest turning your focus towards adding some positive habits (with the aim of replacing less appealing habits) instead of simply trying to remove the negative ones. For example, seeking to eat half a dinner plate of high-volume, low-calorie, fibrous produce will usually have the effect of lowering your overall meal’s caloric content, since your stomach is likely to feel filled from the same (or greater!) volume of food, for a fraction of the stored energy. Likewise, thinking about trying to find a single-origin specialty coffee that you might enjoy black will have the calorie-saving side benefit of reducing your intake of liquid calories, without denying you the magical, life-changing happiness that is your daily cuppa joe. This subtle shift could make all the difference in actually enabling you to achieve whatever it is you’re setting out to do.
So, some potential things you can try adding into your routine over the festive period might include: a weekly workout schedule, daily step goal, daily water- or vegetable-intake goals, aiming towards a specific strength goal (if you are likely to be in a slight surplus, you might as well make use of those energy stores!), a meditation goal, or even just spending a specific amount of time outdoors (double whammy of minimising screen time and increasing physical activity). I’m an especially huge fan of putting those full-house glycogen stores to good use and working towards making strength gains, because it helps to remind me that even in periods of excess, food is A Good Thing, not something to be feared, and also reminds me of the way it fuels our bodies. I usually also end up wanting to eat optimally (i.e. less nutritionally void delicious calories, more lean proteins and fibre and healthful carbs and fat) because I know that’ll only help my progress even more, and help to keep me from swan-diving off The Cliffs of Fuck-It.
Hopefully this also helps to allay some of the anxieties that any of you might have had about the upcoming festive season. It’s horrible when it feels like a time to celebrate and surround yourself with loved ones is only going to run contrary to all the effort you’ve been putting into your own health and fitness, and even more so if the holiday period is not a happy time for whatever reason ‘cos then you’re miserable and surrounded by all this food that you can’t eat — seriously, universe? But if not, and if the year end isn’t something you struggle with, then I hope at the very least you enjoyed all the ADORABLE POLAR BEARS. I saved my favourite for last: