I used to hear people say “listen to your body”. Listen to your body; it will tell you what it needs. And for years and years, I never understood what that meant.
I guess I never really took the time to be in tune with my body. We understand hunger pains and we were taught you’re hungry so therefore you should eat.
But once you start researching and learning more about how the body works you find out that hunger pains don’t necessarily mean you need food. Maybe you just need water. You trained your body to eat at certain times so it is going to react at certain times.
As I got better over the last five years or so “listening” to my body, I’ve learned so much. It was a process. I learned to remove specific items from my diet and I watched how my body reacted to those items being removed.
Listening To Your Body
I learned to “listen” to my body when it came to eating at specific times. One thing I learned years ago but lost sight of for a long time was the fact that my body did great with restricted foods and restricted eating times.
One of the first successful eating plans that I participated in when I was in my late 20s was carb-restricted and eating time-restricted. No surprise, I easily lost a chunk of weight.
But I lost sight of my successes. I got tired of eating extremely restricted foods and eventually, I slowly gained the weight back.
Fast forward 25 – 30 years and I’m just now trying to get back into that rhythm of not eating past 6 o’clock at night. Of eating highly restrictive time frames such as one meal a day. I’m also restricting carbs in large amounts.
If I eat outside of these restrictions I’ve put on myself I immediately gain weight. I have learned through listening to my body the framework that works for me.
Now the kicker is, how do you teach that to those around you who try to sabotage you or guilt you into eating specific foods just because they brought it home – even though they know you’re not supposed to eat whatever it is?
That has been a challenge to me for years and I struggle with it all the time. But I guess that is for another day and another blog post.
I guess the answer to all of this is that it is a conscientious act to truly watch, feel, and hear what your body is telling you.
Now, I tell my husband and son that same thing when they complain about stomach issues. Your body is trying to tell you something – Listen to it!
How Do You handle It?
What have you learned over the years of listening to your body? What works for you? What are your triggers and how do you handle them?
Please share below. I’m truly interested in the responses.
Hi! I’m Chris! Just a Midlife Wife sharing about life’s journey; screaming and kicking through it while supposedly aging gracefully…
Focusing on healthy living, low carb & keto, things I am loving right now, and life in general.