Welcome back to our “Best of the Vlog” series. In this fan favorite, I explain how to navigate the boundary between sticking with what you wrote the night before and knowing when to give. Sometimes, when life gets lifey, a flex may be necessary. In this vlog, I tell you how to know when that’s okay.
Some Choices May Make Sense
I’ve got a great question from Susan. She writes, “I’m 72 and retired. I can’t always write down my food precisely the night before because I don’t know where I’ll be the next day. Being retired for me and my husband means spontaneity. We take many unplanned trips, so I don’t know where I’ll be eating. I do no flour, no sugar, and no artificial sweeteners, and I do not eat between meals. Today I was at a bunch and had a veggie omelette without cheese and fruit. I wasn’t hungry at lunchtime. If I’m done eating at 11 is it okay to wait til 5 pm to eat again?
I think it’s important to talk about sane choices. Within the Bright Line framework, there may be choices driven by our saboteur, and they lead us off track. But there are also choices related to the ebb and flow of life. And these may be the sanest choices in the circumstances.
The Mom (or Dad) Exception
I often talk about the Mom Exception. If you’ve committed to grilled chicken with sliced peppers and onions for dinner, but then you have to spend the afternoon at urgent care with your kid who has an ear infection, you’re not going to want to start slicing onions when you get home at 7 pm. You’re more likely to grab frozen broccoli from the freezer and microwave it. And that’s fine.
On the other hand, on an average day, if you think, “I don’t feel like peppers and onions, I think I’ll have broccoli,” that’s not a good reason to switch. Do you see the difference?
Managing Sundays
So, Susan, I have two things to say to you. First, in what you wrote, I didn’t hear any red flags. Your plan sounds very sane. When I don’t know what my day will bring, I write down BLM—Bright Line Meal.
I experience this frequently on Sundays. Sundays are family days for me. I don’t know if we’ll be going out for brunch or dinner, or just staying home. I’ll have my usual breakfast, then a Bright Line meal for lunch and dinner. I write that down and that’s my commitment—to stay Bright no matter what.
How to Determine the Sane Choice
The other thing I want to tell you is this: you will be able to tell if you’re going off track. In Boot Camp, we talk about the four questions (PHEW) to ask yourself to know if something is not working:
- P: Do I have Peace about it?
- H: Is it Healthy?
- E: Is it Escalating?
- W: Is it messing with my Weight?
If it’s a sane choice, it won’t escalate, and you’ll have peace with it. You’ll make adjustments when called for, and you won’t procrastinate in writing down your food ahead of time just because you don’t feel like it.
Is Two Meals a Day Okay?
And about doing two meals a day if you get a late start—that’s fine, if it works for you. However, if the next day, your saboteur is thinking, “I only got two meals yesterday, so I’ll eat more today,” it’s not working. If you find yourself very hungry that night and eat off your food plan, it’s not working. But if you don’t think about food the rest of the day and the next day you go back to your usual plan, then it’s working for you. Ask yourself the four questions, and see how it looks.
I encourage everyone to make sane choices. Bright Line is prescribed and laid out, but it’s not a club to beat yourself over the head with. If you’re doing something that’s working—keep doing it. It might be a sane choice for you. And that’s totally fine.
Sane Choices was originally published on November 1, 2017: https://www.brightlineeating.com/blog/sane-choices
