Summer of 2014, just got back from studying a semster in Taiwan.
Ah, Thursdays. I Love Thursdays. You see it’s my Friday. I work four days a as a week as mechanical engineer, but I put in my 40hrs plus those days. It’s not something that came with the job description, it’s something that fits my lifestyle. So, I made it happen. And I made it happen by daring to question the norm and have a few uncomfortable conversations with my bosses.
Why should you care? Well you shouldn’t. None of the things I say here or in my YouTube videos, I say to gain pity or sympathies. I love my life and have a great one, but great ones contains shitty moments as well. And I’m dealing with my own shit, but it’s golden shit necessary for my growth. I say what I say because you just might relate to it or get a new perspective on things. If I can put a seed in the pot you relate to as your mind, then I’m doing what I aim to do. Shake’n bake. Create a reaction within & make you reflect over Your life. ‘Could it be better, have I settled?’
But why do I care? Well, because I know of so many people living crappy lives, feeling like shit. Our western society is creating ideal images of perfect lives, lives everybody is living except for you (watch this). And we don’t dare to admit it, because that’s being vulnerable, and that’s scary as shit. I’ve been there, so I know. But I’ve also experienced the transformations to the better life. But it’s not a one day event, it’s a long stretched out journey called living. I’m not saying it won’t leave out all the shit. You’re still going to need those rubber boots. It’s just better shit, the kind you consciously chose and in some wired way smells kind of good. Like being on the countryside and that nostalgic smell of cow shit brings that huge smile on your face (not realating?!).
“Life is essentially an endless series of problems. The solution to one problem is merely the creation of another…
…To be happy we need something to solve. Happiness is therefore a form of action…
…This is the most simple and basic component of life: our struggles determine our successes…
…Who you are is defined by what you’re willing to struggle for…”
– Mark Manson, the subtle art of not giving a f*ck
Anyways, let’s lay another piece on the my-relationship-to-food- puzzle I started laying a couple of days ago. In short, eating is the absolute best thing I know of but it’s also the single biggest threat to living my potential. It brings me joy, anxiety and it makes me go totally crazy and lose all sense of rationality.
I think about food approximately 95 % of my waken time. I never feel satisfied, I can always eat a little bit more. The only thing making me stop eating is practicing deep self-control or something urgent calls me. Every time I know I should stop eating, is an epic battle to overcome. You know when Frodo is about to throw his ring into the lava in Mount Doom? That’s how I feel every time I should stop eating and put that food back in the fridge. Literally. My precious. ‘Don’t leave me, just a little bit more.’ And the second I actually win, the countdown down to the next meal clearly pop up in my head. Tick-tack.
Overall it’s much better now than it has been in the past, but I’m still choosing to stay home and eat over hanging out with friends at times. I can go dreaming an entire week about having a Saturday evening to myself just eating for hours and hours while watching a good movie. Now the truth is that it’s not always this hard. I’ve found my ways and system for dealing with this. It’s spelled control. I write up everything I eat in an app, and I limit my ability to eat by pushing my meals later to the evening with the promise of eating a lot then. Because if I push it, eventually the natural ending of the saga comes when I have to get some sleep. But this is also the tricky part, often I push it for too long and when it’s time for bed I’ve eaten way too little. And when you workout for at least an hour every day, that’s not god either. One of the biggest reasons I don’t drink alcohol actually is due to the loss of self-control I experience. Hangover days are nothing but non-stop-eating-feasts(miseries). Which this Monday evening reminded me of.
I’ve just came out of a bad period where I tried to loosen up the control and stopped writing down what I ate. That didn’t work. During December I kind of never stopped eating from waking up to going to bed, but at least I gained back some of my weight I’ve lost. The thing is, if you once were a fat kid, you’ll always look at yourself as a fat kid in that mirror. I’m working on it, and it’s getting better. But that mirror still serves best at a Tivoli.
My fear of not having control actually made my Christmas holiday at my family place intentionally only last for three days. Knowing I was in a bad place, and coming home to a never ending deep fridge, that spelled trouble. That’s like telling a drug addict it’s snowing cocaine and he can have as much as he wants. But I cut down on the exposure and I had a great Christmas. The best in years actually. But it sure as heck didn’t come without a struggle.
With my new year’s goals, habits and a deep motivation to sort this out once and for all, 2018 is off to a great start, and I feel more confident than ever that I eventually will have a healthy relationship to food. In my own twisted way. My precious.
There’s a lot more to it that I could say, but I’m going to leave it for now. BUT, before you leave me I just want to say one thing. This does not mean I’m an unhappy person, it’s just one of my struggles. And it forces me to get to know myself and grow out of my problems. My last two years have been the absolute best of my entire life, and it’s just getting better by the day. As I’ve already hinted, I love my life deeply and I feel blessed for every each one of my days that I get to experience. And that’s by choice, because that shit doesn’t happen by itself. It’s called taking responsibility for oneself, and it requires daily action in the right direction.
You have a great evening now and see you tomorrow ,
#throwbackthursday YouTube Video of the day (Which is one of my favourites I did not so long ago):
Asking Random People about Loneliness – Rejection Therapy
Quote of the day:
“To love yourself right now, just as you are, is to give yourself heaven. Don’t wait until you die. If you wait, you die now. If you love, you live now.”
Alan Cohen
/Alexander
