6 Loving Ways to Handle Holiday Overeating

Eeep! Despite our awesome knowledge and best intentions about mindfully eating healthily for our dosha, sometimes during the holidays, we just overeat.

Or, we just eat a lot of sweets.

Or, maybe a lot of cheese.

Or maybe the olive and pickle platter (salt) is our downfall.

Each person will have some kind of tantalizing vice they can’t wait to get their mitts on during the holidays.

Um, I’m not going to take that away from you; nor am I going to make you feel bad about it.

That goes for you, too. If you overeat or eat the wrong things, please do not judge or scold yourself. You were probably having fun. You were probably momentarily swept away by celebrating love, generosity, laughter, spirit, and joy—which is not a bad thing!

Heck, even if you snuck some extra chocolates at the snack area (by the printer?) at work, I only hope that you savored every single one of them as they melted in your mouth. And I hope you said to yourself, DANG, that was good.” Because THAT is mindful eating.

I am not going to list '10 Ayurvedic Tips to Losing Holiday Pounds'.  Nope. That’s not how I roll here.

What if you just sit and notice how you feel instead of super-fast trying to fix it?  That is, being in your body and experiencing it.

What if we told ourselves, 'Well, these are not the results I wanted obviously, but man that was fun. And! I know myself and the tools I have to get back to balance. On we go…'

Our knee-jerk reaction often is, “Gah! Get these pounds off and fast! Like, in 2 days!” But that’s such a tough message to send ourselves and makes us just feel…BAD.

No sense in that. Be kinder. If we feel extra heaviness, of course, we want to get back to feeling lighter, but let us do so in loving kindness to ourselves.

Here are Monica B’s gentle loving tips about overeating during the holidays:

1. I hope you pay enough attention to savor it all.
2. No judging.
3. You can fast or eat lightly until you are hungry again.
4. You can move your body a little extra.
5. If you indulge one day, have much less the next day. (Keeps the balance!)
6. If you indulge for an entire week, put a special focus on mindful eating and moving your body for the next week or two.

And a Monica B full-on confession: I plan on eating those green cornflake wreaths made with marshmallows and decorated with red hots. They might be the most un-Ayurvedic thing I could put in my body. Green food coloring, people!

My mom makes them with love. I look forward to them. I eat them once a year and I love the sh*t out of every bite.

I’ll stay balanced because 90% of what I eat is high quality and balancing for my dosha, so these sugary little doodads won’t have a long-term effect. But I will freak out (every time) when my poop is green.