Happy is the Driver and the Side Effect

I stole that line from a post I made on the HappyEaters.com forum the other day. I think the topic under consideration was something about how one chooses to eat what they choose to eat. I love the Happy Eaters forum because there are lots of different voices all ending up in the same place - being happy around food, which is a place that is not as easy to get to as it might be for many - including yours truly for many years.

If you have angst around food, you will stress about what you eat, how you eat, why you don't stop when you want, etc...and then you are not happy...vicious cycle. If you can get happy around food, then it doesn't really matter how, why , what - it's all good - and you are still happy. Another comment I made was - "my body is a genius, it's about time I started listening to it." When we listen to what our bodies' really want, our food choices are smarter, our bodies feel better, it's easy to be happy about all that. When we are happy about that, it's easy to listen to our bodies...you get my drift, right?

So how do I get on this merry-go-round? Well, since you can't change your body instamatically, change what you can - your attitude - that's all happy is, an attitude. Decide to be happy where you are - smile more - did you know your face can help to change your brain? Smile more, act happy more, start listening to your body more...baby steps. Congratulate yourself on your successes and you will see. It will snowball! When happy is the driver, happy is the side effect. When you are happy, everything else falls into place. If something comes along taking a shot at your happy, then focus on something that lines up with your happy. It's your happy! Defend it! You can do that. You can think about anything at all that makes you happy, it doesn't have to be around food. If you have a hard time getting there, then issue an order to your subconscious - I want to feel happy around food. Set it and forget it, and focus on whatever makes you happy. Do that for 30 days and tell me things aren't better - I won't believe you!

I'm smiling - are you?

St Nick

Today is St Nicholas Day, and Saturday we had our annual St Nick party here - I have lost count but I think it may have been the 7th one? Not sure - anyway - it was so much fun, and as a bonus, my 19 year old daughter even came! She has never come to one of these, in the early days she would always arrange a sleepover at a friend's house and last year she was away at college. This year, she attend college in town. She doesn't live here, but she's pretty close by. It was fun to have her here.

I employed a new strategy, well, it's not really new...I have known about it for a long time, but finally employed it Saturday....having a glass of water between glasses of wine. Only ended up having 2 glasses of wine, which is a little below my usual for a party, and finished off with 2 cups of decaf pumpkin spice coffee with frothed cream and stevia - mmmmmmm - introduced a couple of folks to that lovely treat. Got the coffee online at Gloriajeans.com since our local market only had caffeinated pumpkin spice variety.

I just looked out my back window and was stopped by the beautiful snow globe type snow that is falling out there on top of the blanket of about 7 inches of new snow. The yard lights and plant pots (which didn't get put away before our first snow of the season) are all wearing caps of snow - it looks a little Dr Suessian out there. I love it! Winter is really beautiful! But I am glad we are going to Florida on Saturday for 8 days! Hooray!

Have a great day!