A few weeks ago on Monday morning, I woke up feeling “gross.” You know those mornings. For me, it was the Monday after a string of indulgences. Father’s Day/my dad’s birthday (ice cream). First time at a new-ish restaurant in the city (one of everything, please). A doctor’s appointment on Long Island, which meant dinner with my parents after (ridiculous homemade ice cream sandwiches my mom had made for my dad’s birthday back at their house). All amidst a stressful first month at my new job, which meant a couple extra Oreos I had packed for after lunch each day, or Trader Joe’s peanut butter cups kept in the office. On that Monday, I remember waking up, plain and simple, disliking my body.

When I don’t feel good in my body, I can go one of two ways. One is where my old thoughts creep in. How can I fix this quickly? Maybe I’ll just eat a lot of salad and fruit and nuts and avoid bread, etc., etc. However, luckily, after much hard work, I don’t act on these thoughts any more. I no longer revert to depriving myself to feel better about how I look.

The other way I react would be by eating more poorly than I would otherwise. My thought process was that I already don’t like how how I look, so why even bother? This is what led to the aforementioned extra cookies and treats after lunch.

So with all this in mind, on that Monday morning I had a realization. I decided that I’m going to treat my body like it’s something I love – even if in that moment, I don’t. This meant feeding it healthy foods that make me feel good, instead of giving into my negative emotions with comforting cookies that ultimately make me feel even worse. I promised myself that I would adopt this mindset and let it drive my food choices for the rest of the week.

And you know what? It actually worked!! By Tuesday morning, I had made better food choices and felt better about myself than I did just one day earlier. Talk about the least extreme quick fix ever.

Sometimes our minds play mean tricks on us. They tell us that since we overate this past weekend, we now need to do a drastic cleanse. Or that because we feel gross, there’s no point in even trying. There’s a lot of overthinking when it comes to deciding what to eat.

So I’d like to introduce Body Over Mind Nutrition, based on a concept that promotes listening to our bodies instead of the negative thoughts in our head. And treating our bodies well instead of something that we need to punish (with either juice cleanses or extra dessert), due to a certain – often negative – mindset.

It’s a new week. Maybe you had an overindulgent weekend and you’re not feeling up to snuff. I challenge you to play a trick back on your mind, ignore the negative, and feed your body like it’s something you feel awesome about. I wholeheartedly believe you will make smarter, more balanced food choices. Not only salads, not only sweets… Although obviously, I support including both😉