7 Strategies to Not Get Stuffed at Holiday Gatherings
Whether it's a birthday, anniversary, Thanksgiving, Christmas, the 4th of July, an office party, or Mother's or Father's Day - most of our celebrations these days are food-focused.
In a previous article I explained how we associate food with love and that is why we tend to stuff ourselves, especially at Thanksgiving.
However Spirit spoke to me this morning and said that it's not just love, but we also associate food with appreciation and celebration. Any holiday or celebration therefore is a severe trigger for those of us who struggle with Emotional Eating and Emotional Stuffing Behaviors. So what on earth do we do about this?
I had a few downloads today about how to heal our relationship with food during Celebrations and Holiday Gatherings. Some of them may surprise you, others may seem pedestrian.
Either way, I encourage you to TRY THEM OUT (at least 3) this Thursday for Thanksgiving, and let me know how it goes for you.
It's all about making sure you're not the stuffed turkey at Thanksgiving this year!
I myself will be attempting to engage in all 7, and I'll let you know what happened for me. Usually I stuff myself sick during the holidays to show I am present and participating, but this time, I personally want to be present to myself and my health WHILE participating with experiencing Love with family and friends.
So here they are:
- Reframe The Meaning of Cravings. We stuff ourselves during holidays and celebrations because we conflate eating food or drinking with Love. Guess what? There's more ways to give, receive and experience love than stuffing yourself. When you next feel the urge to eat more, reframe that urge as a need to experience more Love in that moment - which means, challenge yourself to hug someone, express appreciation, donate something, be affectionate, give a gift, do a random act of kindness or service, tell someone how much they mean to you, pat the cat or the dog, go outside and just appreciate nature for 10 minutes with someone or call someone up to say you were thinking of them.
- Tupperware. We overeat during holiday celebrations because our eyes are bigger than our stomach, and portions go crazy. Bring a no more than 3 cup / 24 oz / 710 ml tupperware to the party and make it your goal to eat only what will fit in that tupperware and it can close. That way you know exactly how much will be going inside you.
- Hijack Your Smell & Salivation Response. We often overeat during the holidays because things smell so good. Bring non-food and non-appetizing things to smell to combat cravings and overeating, such the following oil or candles to sniff: lavender, tea tree, eucalyptus, roses, lilies, jasmine, gardenia, or even vick's vapor rub!
- Managing Seconds, Thirds, and so on. We overeat because it's socially acceptable to keep going back for more food. So to make sure you can have more of something that tasted good but just at a later time, bring extra tupperware containers to put your seconds and thirds to take home later and put them in the FREEZER during your stay, AND into your own freezer when you get home.
- Conscious Display. We overeat because we see the buffet open and easy to access. So, cover up foods with opaque (not see through) covers when not in use. Out of sight, out of mind!
- Taste & Pleasure Binge. We overeat because everything just tasted so good and we just want to repeat the sensual pleasure of it. To counteract this, do an ACV Bomb! Drop a shot of Bragg's Apple Cider Vinegar into a tall glass of water and drink it down. It's great for digestion and can shut down cravings! Or, if it's really bad, just take an ACV shot straight. You may scream, but hey, desperate times call for desperate measures! 🙂
- Plan Out the Event Activities. We often overeat because the only thing to do is eat at a party. How BORING! So instead, have a set time where you and your family / guests move away from the dinner table to engage in non-food, non-drink, and non-eating activities that raise your love vibration higher and higher. And when you raise your vibration, you attract more positive things into your life!
Lacking ideas on what to do other than eat? The following post will be a list of over 27 Non-Food Love and Bliss Raising Activities for Holiday Gatherings. Click here to read it and plan your next holiday party consciously!