Life is uncertain, so eat dessert first.
That was the motto on a T-shirt I used to wear to group meetings when our organization was being downsized. It always lightened the mood somewhat…it reminded us that even though the situation was scary, we didn’t have to let it take over our whole lives.
Now please don’t misunderstand me. I wasn’t advocating drowning our worries in overeating, over-drinking, smoking, or other destructive behaviors. It was just a reminder to balance the stress with some good healthy fun.
I was reminded of of that time recently when I read that a local restaurant is promoting giant flamboyant cupcakes as a way to cheer people up and make them feel better.
They vary the cupcakes daily and have such exotic offerings as vanilla strawberry creme cake with marzipan creme filling, Boston creme pie, gingerbread with mango butter cream,…and on and on. Apparently the customers love them, and the newspaper article was enticing, except for one thing. The article showed a picture of the owner holding one of the cupcakes. I wouldn’t have recognized her. When I saw her a few times years ago, she looked healthy and fit, but in the new picture she was clearly obese. Smiling, yes, but definitely obese, with all the risks that carries of diabetes and heart trouble. So, the question today is, do we have to eat to excess to reduce our stress and lighten our mood? Years ago I would have had to say yes, but finally solved the problem by developing other activities that I liked even better than eating. It took quite a lot of searching and experimenting, but the freedom and joy was well worth the effort.
So do I really believe we should eat dessert first? Yes, with two qualifications:
- Expand our definition of dessert to include more than rich, sweet food…include activities that are good for the body, mind and spirit, not just ones that stimulate our taste buds.
- Integrate our longterm plans into our fun activities. Some of the happiest moments occur when I’m engrossed in a fulfilling project or planning some change in my life. That counts as dessert, too.
What about you? What stress-management techniques do you use? Are they on the whole healthy? How do you put more dessert, i.e., more joy into your life? Please share your thoughts and experience in the comments section.
Fudge sundae photo by roboppy via Flickr. Creative Commons license.
Cupcake picture by QuintanaRoo via Flickr. Creative Commons license.
Thanks to bikehikebabe and doclind for commenting on last week’s post.
The fat person says,”I don’t want to be fat.” The not-fat person says, “I will not be fat.”
The best way for stress-management is exercise which also keeps one not-fat.
bikehikebabe,
Or, to put it more positively, the not-so-fat person says I want to be healthy and fit.
I don’t mind being a little overweight but I get really annoyed when I feel the need to smoke more then few cigarettes a week.
Maybe it is because I choose to believe that smoking is more stupid than eating, maybe because I have given up many bad habits at least in their addiction extreme that I feel that restricting my eating habits more than I do is to surrender to the normalcy of life.
I don’t know why I can balance easily the ingredients of my diet but choose to eat what I want as long as my body feels good.
Thinking about really controlling my eating makes me feel I join the club of the dieting slavery and I decided to avoid it.
Dina,
I completely understand your aversion to diet slavery. What freed me from the diet trap was a guy who said he never weighed himself because it just made him think about food and gain weight. But if he got involved in other things he had no problem. Oh, yeah. It took me a long time to find things that gave me more pleasure than overeating, but it worked. My approach now is like yours, eat healthy food that makes me feel good and don’t worry about it.
The main reason I wrote this post was the restaurant’s emphasis on the size of the cupcakes. Apparently in the past French women had no problem with weight because they savored their food and ate smaller portions. What I hear now is they’re going the same route as we are–having more hurried meals and increasing the portion sizes. It’s not at all clear they’re enjoying their meals more.
🙂 Anyway, I’m a great advocate of healthy pleasures. Thanks for coming by! I appreciate your taking the time to comment.