Was It Worth It?Mothers day was just this past weekend. Huge shoutout to all you amazing mom’s out there! I think you’re awesome.

Like clockwork, however, the day after mother’s day was quite predictable. I am using this holiday because it just happened but if you want to insert birthday, anniversary, or any other holiday into this blog it is always the same story.

Message after message from clients and followers: “I fell off the wagon.”

What does that mean? Always the same thing.

Cake, cookies, candy, chips, chocolate, deep fried whatever. You know, ‘celebration food’. All consumed despite the best laid intentions.

In this holiday it is often due to guilt from kids. The kids give all of these things as gifts or want to do activities that somehow include every shit ass food listed above, which somehow seems to have become all activities. That is a story for another day.

Other holidays it is family, or friends, or co-workers, or everyone else at the event. The outcome is the same.

The day after.

When everyone is consumed with regret. Feels bad. Feels out of control. Wishes that they didn’t do it. Feel bloated. Sick. Weight is up 3lbs. Brain fog. Overall, terrible.

Then people notice that their motivation is gone. It is HARD to get back to workouts. Hard to eat well. Easy to let slide a few more things. No problem, I will get back at it tomorrow. Which is then reiterated daily until the New Year. Where we feel even worse.

And then we all wonder, ‘how did I get here?’, ‘how did I let this happen?’ Go reread above. That is how.

So I want to ask you and then I want you to go and ask yourself:

Was it worth it?

Was that piece of cake, that chocolate, that donut, that whatever; was that 2 minutes of dopamine coursing through your brain as you did it worth that feeling you had the day after?

Was it better than the feelings of pride and accomplishment and success that you had just before the holiday?

Oh here we go. I can imagine the modern snowflake response now: ‘but you have to live a little!’, ‘it’s important to treat yourself!’, ‘ice cream and wine is my self care,’ ‘eating fixes my stress!’, ‘I didn’t want to disappoint the kids/friends/family/coworkers.’

Okay. Cool.

Looking back, did pleasing all of them make you feel better the next day when you looked in the mirror or stepped on the scale, or pounded some pepto bismol for the heartburn? Did any of them even remember you eating any of those things? You think if you say no then for the next week everyone will be sitting around talking about what an asshole you were for not eating the cake?

The truth is that two days later NO ONE REMEMBERS A FUCKING THING.

No one except you.

Who is sitting there wallowing in guilt and feeling like shit about it.

So, was it worth it?

It’s okay to say no. It’s okay to refrain. It’s okay to tell people AND yourself that this small moment of indulgence isn’t something you’re going to partake in at the moment. IT IS OKAY. IT SHOULD BE NORMAL.

When did it become WEIRD and WRONG to not drink? To not eat chemical shit? To not ingest copious amounts of sugar? When did it become weird and wrong to care about our bodies, to focus on our health, to put our physical home on a pedestal and care for it? I have some ideas but that is a whole book.

One more time I am going to ask you:

Was it worth it?

Next time you have to choose, try and keep all of this in mind. Is 2 minutes of stuffing your face with non-food worth everything that will result?

-Coach Taylor