“To be free, to be happy and fruitful, can only be attained through sacrifice of many common but overestimated things” –Robert Henri

There it is. To be free requires sacrifice. Freedom is not the choice to do anything one wishes, but the strength to make deliberate choices. When we train clients and talk nutrition many are resistant to adopt new healthier eating habits.
They don’t want to give up the freedom to eat whatever they like. They say things like “I don’t want to give up soda I don’t want to live like that!” as if I were asking them to surrender some inalienable right.
I don’t think the right to bear Mountain Dew  made it in the bill of rights.
If giving up some soda or sweets is stripping your life of the only pleasure you think it possesses its time to pause and reflect. I’m not saying we should abstain from the pleasures of the tasty. But I am saying you DO need to drop the notion that food has a bigger place in your life than it does.
When you gain a real sense of control of your eating. When you eat and know that the food you eat is a deliberate choice, healthy or not, you gain a new sense of power.
When you drink Mountain dew it should be because you have made the choice to, not in submission to a whim craving or peer pressure from your gluttonous co-workers.
When you order a salad, it should be because you want to be healthy, not  because you think it will give you hot-bod validation or because you have friends that read Skinny Bitch and guilt you into it.
The choice to eat healthy or not is only positive if it comes from a place of command. Put food in its place.
Food is above all else, is fuel. It isn’t much more. When you understand and internalize this you no longer submit to cravings or “special occasion” binging. You know, the birthday party, or the wedding, or 4th of july barbeque with phenomenal finger foods that beckon you to surrender your resolve to eat health on account of, ” Its a special occasion, I gotta have a burger!” Such rationalizations will hinder progress. We somehow think that the opportunity to eat junk food at social events has to happen to fully enjoy these holidays. If you want to indulge. Go ahead but don’t do it because you think its part of the “experience”.  Because these “special occasions” are not in short supply and if you eat like they are you’ll be left disappointed.