Thanksgiving Prep & Pep Talk

How to make it through the weekend feeling happy, healthy + thankful:

1. Be Grateful:  Shockingly, this day is not all about the food, drinking, or family time– although those things are amazing, and are a fun addition to the day. But, at the core, Thanksgiving is a day (and weekend) to be grateful, to appreciate and to marvel at all the wonderful things that life holds for you.

TO DO: Before your workout Thursday morning (yes, I’m slipping that in there for you), take 15 minutes and write down all of the amazing, wonderful things you have to be thankful for– anything in your life that brings you joy, big or small. Give love. This is an amazing thing to do on a weekly basis.

2. Good Quality Ingredients: You all already know my thoughts on this. Don’t use gross-out processed food ingredients in your dishes. Anything and everything can be made in a real-food way.

TO DO: If you’re cooking a dish, read the ingredient list of all of your supplies. If there is a way to upgrade it and find a ingredient with recognizable and pronounceable ingredients, do so. It’s worth it if you’re planning to have leftovers of the dish, so you can feel good about eating it in the days after.

3. It Ain’t a Free-For-All: Being spontaneous is really fun, but rarely successful from a eating perspective. When left to our own devices with free-range of eating any and everything, most of us get a little too crazy. Which is fun, until we physically feel bad from it.

TO DO: Have a plan for what you’re going to do– from drinking water, your workout, and what you’re going to eat earlier that day. Identify the things you are so excited to have, and those that you really could care less about. You only have a limited amount of room in your stomach anyways, so why waste precious space?

4. It’s Just a Dinner Party: If Thanksgiving gives you anxiety, think about it this way: when you take the hype out about the day for over-eating, in reality, it’s just another dinner party. So treat it like one in your head.

TO DO: Eat some salad and vegetables and some good quality protein (turkey) or other sides of your choice (the ones you love). And then pick 2 special, more indulgent things to go along with it. Mine will be wine and little bite of pumpkin pie. For some, it may be dinner rolls and an after dinner liquor. Whatever it is, love and enjoy it, but don’t forget about the other good things on your plate.

4. Have a plan for Friday, Sat, Sun. And an even bigger one for Monday: What are you going to do when you wake up the next morning? How are you going to eat? How do you want to feel come Monday? How do you want to feel come that next week when we hit December 1st? Let’s break it down: When you indulge and eat more sugar, alcohol or unclean foods, you will automatically crave more of them the next day. So you have more. And then more the next. And before you know it, you don’t feel awesome, you’re tired and you feel fat. AKA, not fun. So think about it ahead of time.

TO DO: Again, don’t wing it. Depending on where you are with your health goals, that may mean factoring in a day or two for leftovers or planning a weekend of relaxing and eating. If that’s right for you, that’s great. For others, that may mean getting up for a fun workout, drinking some green juice and having a turkey salad or turkey soup for lunch the next day instead. You always have a choice.