You’re not a failure, you’re caught in a stupid binary system that says you are either eating “clean” or you are eating dirty. I really think there is a third way: just eat what you crave. At the beginning, yes — you may crave fast-food (and who doesn’t? It’s delicious) but I think you’ll find that if you just stick with eating what your body tells you it wants, you’ll find that you’ll be craving an orange here, roasted chicken there, and then maybe even a salad.

If you get off the clean/dirty rollercoaster and give yourself enough time just to eat what you crave, you’ll likely end up in the middle of this spectrum: for me, this has meant weeks of croissants for breakfast, and then no breakfast other than coffee, and then oatmeal with berries and flaxseed. It’s meant cheeseburgers for dinner sometimes, but then salmon and greens, and then a baked potato with butter and cottage cheese, then a homemade vegetable curry.

I provide these examples not because I think they’re meaningful for any reason other than to illustrate that eventually, it seems, your body craves something in the middle of the clean/dirty cycle. Am I losing weight? No. But am I gaining? No.

The decision to eat what I crave has freed me up to concentrate on something that our bodies really do need: to move. Not to pummel ourselves with punishing routines, but to walk, to stretch, to splash around. Again: does this make me lose weight? No. But it makes my body able to to take me where I want to go — to sit for long drives, to give my dog the walk she deserves, etc.

It’s also freed me financially. Long ago I decided, No more money to anything or anyone that is selling a body transformation or weight loss. I do pay my pilates instructor — but she hasn’t promised me a bunch of b.s. Rather, she has promised a strong spine and the ability to live pain free.

Again, I don’t bring up my examples for any reason other than I think it’s so important to simply get out of the trap.

Be kind to yourself, traceybyfire