It’s Thanksgiving week and it’s time to get ready for the big meal! This week we are going to get the plan together so we can enjoy the food AND not overeat. We’re going to have fun and eat good food and still stay on our weight loss plan. But how do we do it?
This is a busy week and you have a lot to do, so I’m gonna make this quick and simple. There are three things you can do to prepare yourself for your Thanksgiving festivities and if you do them all, you’ll be well-equipped to stay in control and keep to your plan. You get to eat the food you want without the guilty hangover from stuffing yourself. Ready?
- Show up to Thanksgiving dinner hungry.
The primary rules for weight loss still apply – you only eat when you’re physically hungry and you stop when you’re gently full. If you snack all day until dinner, it will be disappointing when you want to enjoy dinner and realize you aren’t really hungry. Plan ahead so you’ve stopped eating hours before dinner time and then you can eat without worrying whether it’s ok to eat the meal or not.
2. When you get ready to make your plate, DON’T get in line.
No, I don’t mean to be last in line to get your food. But before you go to prepare your plate, walk around the table and look at all the options. Desserts too – there might be something you really want to leave space in your stomach for! Look at everything – which options do you love? Which can you leave behind without a lot of drama? Chances are that you want certain foods more than others. Rank the importance of the foods mentally. The ones at the top of the list get space on your plate and the less attractive ones don’t. This way, you have a plan for what makes it onto your plate before you go through the line and add some of everything.
Haven’t you ever gotten to the end of a buffet line and realized that you really want to add the food at the end of the line but you didn’t leave enough room on your plate? Then you have a mountain of food with food piled on top of food and you think you have to eat it all because you served it to yourself. We were taught at a young age not to waste food, so reprogramming that thinking is needed – but you’re probably not going to do it all at once, so start with serving yourself ONLY the food you absolutely want to eat.
3. Serve small portions
You will want to eat multiple foods from the options offered and you don’t want a food mountain on your plate, so unless you plan to eat mostly one or two foods, take only a spoonful of each food you want to taste. This way you get to taste everything, and when you’re politely full, you can stop eating without worrying that you have to throw away and “waste” a lot of food. We learn at a young age that wasting food is a sin, so rather than fix this programming right now (we’ll do that later), take less food so you don’t have much to toss. Just remember one thing: You aren’t the garbage can, so don’t eat extra food when you could toss it. Better in the trash can than on your body!
Last thing (and this may be the most important): Practice visualizing what you will do when you get to the Thanksgiving meal. Your tendency will be to eat the way you have for every Thanksgiving you have in the past, so if you’re going to do it differently you’ll need to practice. The good news is that your brain doesn’t know the difference between practice in your mind and the actual event, so you can prepare before the meal by rehearsing in your mind as many times as you can before Thanksgiving Day arrives!
You can do this! Take these tips and get ready, then go have a happy Thanksgiving. Enjoy your family, the food, and whatever traditions you love most.
I also have good news and extra help for those of you who want it – the Mindful Eating Meditation mini course is out! It’s a little gift for you that I’ve created to help you get through the challenge and stress of changing your mind around food and eating. I’ve put together a collection of short meditations (less than 5 minutes apiece!) to help you find hunger, comfortable fullness, deal with food cravings and urges, and stop stress eating before it happens. I created this mini-course for my weight loss clients who found it SO helpful. I want you to get a chance to have it without the investment of the full weight loss course. The full value of this mini-course is $500, but I’ve decided to offer it for much less to get you this help over the holidays. Go to www.drandreachristianparks.com and click on courses to get this gift to support yourself through the holidays – right now it’s only $59!
Do you have a few more minutes to support yourself? Want help with the visualization exercise? Go to this week’s video help!
