Lindsay: Welcome to the Lifting Lindsay podcast.
I'm really excited to be here with you guys today.
This is gonna be a short one.
There's been a few thoughts that have kind of been coming to me
lately as I have found myself, uh, in social eating situations.
But also I am putting together videos for
my Be Strong community about mindful eating, and how to navigate social
situations where you really can't control the foods that are presented
and, and how to healthily mind and body navigate those kind of situations.
And so I actually talked about this in my last video that I recorded for them.
I thought I would just kind of open the discussion up in my, in this podcast too.
Tell me if this sounds familiar.
People may see that you're on a health and fitness journey, and at social,
uh, situations where there's food, they kind of pay attention to what you're
eating, or maybe they watch closely
what you're putting on your plate and how much of it you're eating and
they're just keeping this eye on you kind of thing or so it appears, right?
When I did one-on-one coaching, this was probably one of my top
10 questions that I got the most.
And it was from women
who either every other week or weekly had a family dinner.
Let's say it was the Sunday, it seemed to always be like a Sunday type of
family dinner, and there was always somebody in the family that made
them feel uncomfortable about food choices for one reason or another.
I'm sure as I'm talking, some of you are nodding your head like, yeah,
I've been in that situation before.
Or, yeah, there's that one person in my life who always has to
make a comment about my food.
Sometimes when people bring up questions about our food,
they're actually not judging us.
And sometimes they are judging us.
But I'm gonna challenge you on this one, and I'm going to say it doesn't matter.
It doesn't whether they're judging you, or whether they're just curious.
Either way, it doesn't matter.
It shouldn't take more brain space and brain power than it is from you.
I'm a health and fitness coach, nutritionalist.
I go to a party, like a, a church party or a neighborhood party or a
family party, and you better believe people are looking at my plate.
And you better believe I get comments and I get questions.
One of the comments that I have gotten a few times are, keep
in mind, these people are just seeing what I'm eating at a party.
What I eat at a party is not a good representation of what
I eat consistently day to day.
It is not.
Because when I go to a party, I can't control the options that are given me.
I fall back on my system of mindful eating.
I gauge my hunger.
I eat slowly.
I drink a lot of water, and I eat until full and satisfied.
About a seven on the hunger, fullness scale.
I eat till about a seven.
I'm satisfied.
And then I stop, and I don't always finish what's on my plate.
So I get two comments.
I get one of people seeing what I put on my plate and then make the
assumption or comment, oh, see, you can just eat whatever and look like that.
Okay?
That's like watching somebody buy a boat and say, see, they just
spend their money on everything.
You actually have no clue how they spend their money.
You have no clue about what's coming in, how they're managing it.
All you're doing is seeing one purchase and you're jumping to some wild
conclusion that you know all of these things that you actually don't know.
So I, I get those comments.
I think, I think earlier on a few years ago, that would've brought out the sassy
Lindsay and I would've been like, well, let me just actually explain to you, no.
What you're seeing is, and I would probably waste my time
and breath needing to explain.
I've moved past it.
I'm like, you know, I'm a mom of three.
I'm a business owner.
I'm tired.
I, I only have so much mental bandwidth here and I'm not gonna
waste it on this conversation.
Now.
Now if I feel, if I get the feeling that it's genuine and that they're like.
it just kinda seems like you eat whatever, because I've gotten a lot of different
types of comments and sometimes if I feel a little bit more energy towards the
conversation, I may say, do you know what?
This actually isn't how I eat all the time, but these are the options.
People have brought food, they've served.
I'm gonna be a gracious receiver.
I'm gonna take part and, um, I'll eat until satisfied and
then I kind of stop from there.
Or I have some people who watch what, you know, I leave on my plate and
that's what they decide to focus on.
They're like, oh, see, you barely touched your plate.
You just peck like a bird.
Well, no wonder you're so skinny, right?
So I get all sorts of comments.
I could spend a lot of energy trying to decipher who's judging me, who's not.
The truth is, I don't really care.
I don't really care.
I can't waste my time and mental energy trying to justify my life.
I don't feel any need to either.
I love my life.
I have a healthy life.
I have a healthy mindset around food.
I think anybody who's listened to me for a while knows that.
They get that feeling.
I Try to help other people establish that.
I don't need to sit here and justify what's on my plate
or what's left on my plate.
It is what it is.
I'm not overly eating.
I'm respecting my body.
I'm eating plenty.
I choose not to take part.
But I also choose to kind of look at people with grace.
Much how I would want them to look at me.
I can't control how they look at me, but I can control how I view them.
And in so doing, I can actually bring a peaceful spirit to the environment
and conversation, but beyond whatever I may do for them, I bring peace to
myself by choosing not to get too hung up on people judging me, people
thinking, I can just eat whatever.
Or people thinking, oh, see, she doesn't eat.
I don't, I don't have time.
I'm just gonna share something that happened the other day on, on Instagram.
I usually don't make comments when somebody says something
that I disagree with.
I just move on.
I really do.
But there was this comment that was very, it was, uh, racist.
It was, uh, just weird and uncalled for, and, and I, I should have moved on.
And I didn't, Lindsay was not her best self that day, and I wrote
what I actually thought was like a really well thought out, kind,
response.
And the woman wrote me back and, and she was like, well, what a waste of
your time and energy writing that to me and Vada and how stupid is this?
And, and I thought to myself, she's so right.
I wasted all of my time.
Clearly we are not each other's people.
Clearly there was not going to be understanding.
I do, you know what, and I wanted to write back, but I didn't want to offend her.
But I wanted, I did.
I wanted to be like, thank you.
Oh my goodness.
Thank you so much.
You are right.
I did waste my time.
I should have moved on.
I should have been better.
I told my husband that story and we both just laughed.
He's like, because I'm like, yeah, yeah, you were, you're right.
I'm not gonna get through to you.
And that's okay.
That's okay.
I'm going.
I, I learned my lesson again.
I feel like I'm one of those who my lessons are always on repeat.
I learned my lesson.
I'm gonna take all that mental energy that I put towards that, and I'm gonna
put it towards things that are better.
And I'm gonna encourage you to do that too.
In social settings when people make comments about what's on your plate,
what's not on your plate, whatever.
To choose not to take part, choose not to take part.
It can be really hard when you know you're going to somebody's
house every single week and it's like a touch and go relationship.
It's kind of like a, a hard relationship where maybe there's not safety
and security in that relationship.
Maybe it's a family member, your Mother-in-Law or whatever, and
you're already kind of on edge.
So honestly, anything that that person says in your mind is just gonna
kind of be taken and be confirmation that, see, they're judging me, right?
Because that's kind of the relationship, let's be honest.
So I'm gonna challenge you on that one too.
If you have somebody, and I'm just poor Mother-in-laws, I'm just using them as an
example because sadly it was usually the mom or the mother-in-Law that was looking
at the food and making a lot of comments
to my clients and they're like, how do I handle this?
Like, look it's not about you actually, it's about them.
They are probably having a hard time with maybe accepting and loving their body,
and maybe they kind of know that they're not treating themselves in a healthy way.
Maybe they're not taking time to move and eat more nutrient dense foods
than they are, and they know this.
They know this.
Then they see somebody else who comes in and is trying to make an effort, and it's
almost like they feel threatened by it.
So it's not about you.
You don't have to change.
And you also don't have to change them, and you also don't have to judge them.
You can actually allow them to sit in their discomfort.
And choose not to get in it with them.
Because at the end of the day, you're gonna disappoint somebody, right?
You either disappoint yourself because you watch them or you hear their words, and
so you change what you are going to eat or not eat because of what they've said,
so then you're not living with integrity
to yourself, so therefore you disappoint yourself.
Or maybe you decide to take part in kind of this toxic relationship, and
then you're disappointed with yourself because you know you should not take
part and you can respect them and love them, and allow them to feel whatever
it is that they wanna feel without you
taking part.
Without your peace being disrupted.
That's hard to get to, but it is powerful when you're there and
when you're there, you invite other people to kind of rise up with you.
You really do.
But if, if they say something that threatens you, so you jump in and
feel the need to defend and you don't actually need to take part.
You don't need to.
Because you're not going to kind of join them or change your feelings,
or your nutrition because of them.
And guess what?
That's okay.
That is 100% okay.
Sometimes in order for us to choose our future self, we have to disappoint a lot
of people and we're disappointing them
not because we're being rude, not because and we're meaning to, it's
just they may feel discomfort when they see us stepping into a powerful self.
Making choices, making commitments, keeping them, getting healthier,
getting stronger, really feeling a lot of confidence because we
are making and keeping commitments and promises to ourselves.
And that's gonna disrupt some people and their emotions and that's gonna be okay.
That's okay.
We don't need to change them.
We don't need to waste any time thinking about that.
We just need to choose our future self.
So I've explained this before, that we have our past self, we have our present
self, and we have our future self.
We have these three different versions of ourselves.
Now, the past self, the only thing that we can really do is learn from them.
The future self is who do we really want to become?
What do we want to have?
Who do we want to be?
And the problem is when we disconnect our present self with our future
self, we, we disconnect by making choices today that doesn't set
our future self up for success.
That's what that disconnecting ourselves, our present from
our future self looks like.
So either you disappoint yourself and your future self, or you disappoint
this random person or family member who's not so random at a social event.
You know, at the end of the day, I don't wanna disappoint
myself at the end of the day.
I'm the last person whose voice I hear.
At the end of the day, I'm the person who I, who I actually have to live with.
It's me.
I'm the last person I wanna disappoint.
So next time you're in a social situation, and somebody decides to
look at your food and make a comment.
One, don't jump to the conclusion that they're judging you.
Maybe they're genuinely curious.
Even if they are judging you, who cares, that story doesn't serve
you, it doesn't serve them, it doesn't serve the relationship.
A better story that's gonna serve you is they're curious.
So you can answer their question.
Just say, I'm focusing on my health and fitness, and I love fueling my
workouts, and so this is how I eat.
And it doesn't have to be any further than that.
You don't have to convince them that your goals are worthy.
If you feel like you have to convince other people, you're probably
not bought into your own goals.
You're probably still trying to convince yourself.
'cause when you really are secure in your goals and in your choices, it
doesn't matter what anybody else thinks.
You don't have to convince anybody.
You can explain, oh, this is why I'm doing it.
I'm really excited about it.
They don't need to be excited for you.
It kind, it's nice when they are, but not everybody's going
to be, and that's actually okay.
You don't need them validating your choices when intrinsically
you are validating yourself.
Right?
The validation comes from within.
You don't need it to come extrinsically.
That is really powerful.
So don't look at them like they're judging you.
Choose to look at them as they're curious.
Don't feel the need to have to get them on board with your goals, 'cause whether
they are or not, it doesn't matter.
It doesn't.
You need to be on board.
That's it.
You need to be on board with your future self.
And then when it's somebody like a Mother-in-Law or whatever, don't
get pulled into the emotions that actually may not even be there.
Your mother-in-law too may just be curious or like I said, she.
It may bring out some of her own insecurities.
It's probably, no, it is about her, not you.
It is, or him or whomever it is in your family.
My mother-in-law is great.
Actually.
I don't have this, this issue.
We have a great relationship, but I do have that with issues with
other family members doing that.
So.
Don't get pulled into the toxic cycle.
Don't get, um, don't waste your mental energy and bandwidth.
Don't feel the need that they need, uh, to understand your goals.
They don't.
It's totally okay.
They can be worthy and wonderful goals without anybody understanding them.
As long as you're bought in, that is the most important thing.
So this holiday season, as you find yourself eating with other people a lot,
and your food choices may look similar or may look a little bit different.
It doesn't matter guys.
It doesn't matter.
Okay?
This is about you.
This is about you and your health, and stepping in to your power and setting
your your future self up for success.
Thank you so much for joining me today on The Lifting Lindsay podcast.
If you have any questions, I'm always open.
You can send me a DM on Instagram at Lifting Lindsay.
You can also go to BeStrong.LiftingLindsay.com to
sign up for my training app, and my Be Strong community where we talk
about these things all the time.
We're giving each other support on both the physical and the
mental aspects of fitness.
We would love for you to join us.
You guys have a wonderful week.