Will Power or Won’t Power

This blog will run for 2 weeks while I search for my creative muse.

Will power-self discipline, the ability to refrain from eating that second helping of chocolate cake. Who ME?? OK, it was in the house and getting older by the day…. I readily admit there are times I use the, ahem, “logic” of what’s the difference if I eat it all now or over a week, I will be consuming it. Doesn’t make sense unless you have been in that position. The real test is the ability to give yourself permission to NOT EAT IT ALL in one sitting. You actually might get through the week without obsessing on that sweetened, delicate morsel of heaven sitting in the refrigerator, calling your name.

Raise your hand if this ever happened to you, past or present—it was the cause of many fights between my brother and me when we were living at our parents, I can’t say when we were kids cause it followed us into college. There is one, let’s say ice cream sandwich-Carvel to be exact, “flying saucer” to be even more specific, the equivalent in Montana is Dairy Queen, but I am here to say, Carvel is better quality, but, I digress. Sitting in class, taking the train and the bus and then walking home, opening the freezer, and WHAT, where is the FLYING SAUCER? Out walks my younger brother, licking his lips, “I ate it”, me-“what do you mean you ate it? That was mine”-him-“nuh uh, didn’t have your name on it”. me-“Maaaaaaaa”.

The good news is that now, as an adult, and it is just my husband and me and, if there is a treat we both really covet, we will share it. Not only is it thoughtful, it is half the calories, and that, is will power.

I liken will power to the cartoons I remember as a child. The character has to make a decision, there is a devil on her one shoulder whispering in the ear,” go ahead, eat it, you know you want to” and on the other shoulder is an angel, whispering in the other ear, “no, don’t do it, you worked so hard to lose those 10 pounds”.

I was reading an article on sparkpeople.com written by a behavioral expert who lost a bunch of weight himself. He says there is guilt and then there is toxic guilt. The toxic guilt is when you pulverize yourself, after the fact, for doing something you know is not good for you. Old fashioned guilt is the kind you feel when you are in the process of contemplating doing something that maybe you really don’t want to do and you are still thinking about doing it. He goes on to say it is when you actually feel the guilt that determines if it is appropriate guilt or toxic guilt. Makes sense.

How did I stray from will power to guilt? Easy, what happens when you lose your will power? Well, you engage in an action that perhaps you didn’t really want to but lost your control and then what happens? Say it with me “I feel guilty”. Then there is shame, I will leave that for another blog but you can read a small blip about both guilt and shame here.

"Guilt says I've done something wrong; shame says there is something wrong with me. Guilt says I've made a mistake; shame says I am a mistake. Guilt says what I did was not good; shame says I am no good." Bradshaw (1988). http://www.noogenesis.com/malama/guilt.html

Going back to the angel and devil sitting on the cartoon character’s shoulder, here are steps that the Dean Anderson of sparkpeople.recommends:

“End the Toxic Guilt Trip: Exercise Your Healthy Lifestyle Conscience
Fortunately, the solution to the problem of toxic guilt is really quite simple, at least in theory. All you have to do are three simple things:
1. When that quiet, nagging voice in your head starts saying that you are about to do something it doesn't approve of, listen to it. Stop what you're doing for a few moments to ask yourself, "Is this what I really want to do?"
2. If you agree with the voice, decide not do the thing in question. If you disagree, decide to do it. And if you're not sure (or if you halfway want to and halfway don't), try to postpone your decision (and action) until you've had a chance to sort things out a little more.
3. After you've made your decision, act! Then take a few more seconds to notice how you feel about what you just did. Nothing fancy here, no psychoanalyzing yourself, no reading yourself the riot act if you didn't do what you wanted. Just note what you decided, what you actually did, and how you felt afterwards. File this in the memory banks for future reference. “
http://www.sparkpeople.com/resource/wellness_articles.asp?id=692

"If you got a traffic ticket would you break every traffic law the rest of the day? Then why toss the whole day over a slice of pizza?" The same goes for your exercise plan. If you can't fit in your full session, why does it make sense to do nothing instead? Wouldn't you want to be 50 or 100 calories instead of zero? Or lose half a pound instead of none?” In other words, you had some “won’t power”, don’t dismiss everything you accomplished. Brush that little negative voice off your shoulder, and tomorrow is another day. Start it with a clean page.
Excerpted from the January 11, 2010 blog From: Spark People Blog

Weekly Humor

Have you any idea how many children it takes to turn off one light in the kitchen? Three. It takes one to say, "What light?" and two more to say, "I didn't turn it on." -- Erma Bombeck