I am going to begin this post with the same message I begin my workshops with: "Everything I say (write) comes from a space of love... loving support. No words out of my mouth are critical of anything or anyone. We all have to start from the space we are in; the current life space we are in and the space we make choices from." Change starts with you and it is all about you making the choices in your life that are good, right, correct for your health and healing. No one else can make those choices for you.
I was recently peeking at a book on yoga, diet, and change: The Yoga of Eating: Transcending Diets and Dogma to Nourish the Natural Self. The book introduction read like this: The Yoga of Eating is a practical and inspiring manual that offers original insights on the physical and spiritual functions of sugar, fat, meat, and other foods; fasting, dieting, processing, willpower, and the deeper principles of self-nurture. This book appeals to a higher authority—your own body—and shows how to access and trust the wisdom your body has to offer.
I remember writing a post about yoga's impact on our food and lifestyle choices...
I always look at the reviews, positive and negative. I like to get an idea of what people thought about the book. One of the level 1 reviews made this comment: "I was expecting diet plans, recipes, etc. to plan a yoga diet - nothing here."
As a health coach who wants to instill the philosophy of self-responsibility around their health, I have always suggested that individuals make their own daily menu plans. Make these plans based upon the principles of whole food eating and tossing in a bit of local and seasonal flair!
As a health coach, I find that to create meal plans for clients is:
Hard to do as it is time consuming task and what I might tell someone to eat may not be anything they ever intend to eat, ever! So time is spent putting together 3 meal a day plans that might get a glance and not be used, ever. This is because the suggested foods do not appeal to the person using it. This is time not well spent for me or my client.
Does not teach self-responsibility, making your change your own. If I create your meal plans, what happens when you are sick of them (assuming you even use them)? When you get sick of them, you go right back to life as it was before we crossed paths AND back to the same meals and eating habits that caused the problem(s) in the first place. When you work to create your own new plan, it is your plan. You can own the changes you created in your life and your new lifestyle choices.
What I might suggest for food is not necessarily things you like, things that are local (growing in your own food shed), or foods that are seasonal for you.
On a global scale, local and seasonal eating helps to create sustainable communities around our food and is much gentler on the earth. (No cross country or cross ocean transportation of food and all that goes along with this... there is so much more on the social, environmental, and political issues around food and the human consumption of that food. This is another blog post OR watch some movies and read some books on the politics of food!)
Instead of meal plans that sound good to me and my eating habits, take the principals of whole food eating and make your own plans based around local, seasonal, and whole foods. You will then be making lifestyle changes that will stay with you for life!
These meal plans will nourish your body cells, heal disease, balance body weight, and help you to feel fantastic!
Does life get better than this?
Whole Food Learning Resources:
