2689: Unpacking Diet Culture to Simplify Your Life by Courtney Carver of Be More With Less on Embracing Self-Love

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[00:00:39] This is Optimal Health Daily, unpacking Diet Culture to simplify your life by Courtney Carver

[00:00:45] of BeMoreWith Less.com. And I'm Dr. Neal Malik, reading you some of the most popular health and fitness

[00:00:51] blogs out there with permission from the websites of course and always with my commentary at the end.

[00:00:59] Now today's author is a popular minimalist and frequently narrated on my brother's show, Optimal

[00:01:04] Living Daily. So if you like today's content definitely subscribe to that show too. Again,

[00:01:10] that's Optimal Living Daily. All right, and with that let's get right to our post today as we

[00:01:16] maximize your life. Unpacking Diet Culture to simplify your life by Courtney Carver of BeMoreWith Less.com.

[00:01:30] Raise your hand if you've tried every diet under the sun, South Beach,

[00:01:34] slim fast, weight watchers, atkins, uterus system, Jenny Craig,

[00:01:40] High fat, low fat, low carb, high protein, the blood type diet,

[00:01:46] now raise your hand or nod your head if you've ever measured your worth by your body weight or body size,

[00:01:53] or felt measured by others in a negative way because of it. I remember this one time in my early

[00:01:59] 20s. I thought I looked okay. I had been counting points at Weight Watchers and being really careful

[00:02:04] about what I ate. I was working for a small business and I was the only woman who worked there.

[00:02:10] Someone called in to check on an order and I asked them who was helping them. The customer on

[00:02:15] phone said, I can't remember the name. It was the Chubby Girl. It took a minute for me to understand.

[00:02:23] I was the only girl. I was the Chubby Girl? Just by the fact that I still so clearly

[00:02:29] remember that conversation that couldn't have lasted more than 90 seconds reminds me that this

[00:02:35] is worth some of my attention. Most of us have many similar stories from the past that still have

[00:02:41] impact many years later. But isn't it important to be healthy? If you are still here,

[00:02:48] I'm right here with you. I'm not judging you or trying to fix you. Just working on my self-out

[00:02:54] loud, thinking that we might have something in common when it comes to dieting, food and body

[00:02:59] image. I mentioned that I stopped weighing myself last year. I've stopped dieting too. In fact,

[00:03:05] after my multiple sclerosis diagnosis back in 2006, I began to eat for health instead of

[00:03:12] weight loss. Well that's been a good shift overall. I still have to watch the way I think and talk

[00:03:18] about food. Even though being healthy is my priority, I'm sure I'm holding on to some unhealthy

[00:03:24] messages and patterns. Am I really avoiding that cupcake because I think I'll be healthier if I don't

[00:03:30] eat it or am I bouncing back to old internal messaging that cupcakes are bad? Am I cutting sugar

[00:03:37] and dairy from my diet because it makes me feel better or because I know that weight loss will

[00:03:42] be likely secondary benefit. Am I doing whole-thirty because I think it will help identify food

[00:03:48] that doesn't work well for me? Or is it because I feel like I'm a better person because I made

[00:03:52] it through 30 days without cheating? I still believe that food is a powerful part of the healing process,

[00:03:58] and now I know that how we think about food is part of it too. On the soul and wit podcast,

[00:04:06] I talked with my daughter Bailey about dieting and diet culture and how my dieting affected her

[00:04:12] as she was growing up. We also discussed disorder eating what the word flattering really means

[00:04:18] and ways we confite diet culture and resources to help. The definition of diet culture

[00:04:25] at first I planned to just talk about giving up my scale but the more I learn about diet culture,

[00:04:31] the more I realize I have to break this down too. It's all connected and if I'm not aware of it,

[00:04:37] I'll keep getting sucked in bringing others down with me. Here's how Christy Harrison, an anti-diat

[00:04:43] register dietitian and certified intuitive eating counselor defines diet culture.

[00:04:49] Diet culture is a system of beliefs that worships thinness and equates it to health and moral

[00:04:56] virtue, which means you can spend your whole life thinking you're irreparably broken just because

[00:05:01] you don't look like the impossibly thin ideal. Diet culture promotes weight loss as it means

[00:05:08] of attaining higher status, which means you feel compelled to spend a massive amount of time,

[00:05:13] energy and money trying to shrink your body even though the research is very clear that

[00:05:18] almost no one can sustain intentional weight loss for more than a few years.

[00:05:23] Diet culture demonizes certain ways of eating while elevating others, which means you're

[00:05:28] forced to be hyper vigilant about your eating, ashamed of making certain food choices and

[00:05:33] distracted from your pleasure, your purpose and your power. Diet culture oppresses people who don't

[00:05:40] match up with its supposed picture of health, which disproportionately harms women,

[00:05:45] trans folks, fems, people in larger bodies, people of color and people with disabilities,

[00:05:53] damaging both their mental and physical health. So not only was I actively participating in

[00:05:58] diet culture with the first three points but were my actions and thoughts of pressing others

[00:06:03] at the same time? Sounds like it. Becoming aware of uncomfortable things isn't easy,

[00:06:09] but it's the only path to real inside out change. My simplicity journey has taken me places

[00:06:16] I never imagined. I expected clutter and debt to be on my path, but never thought things like

[00:06:22] quitting alcohol and examining my relationship with food and diet culture would ever come up.

[00:06:28] I'm not an expert on most things, especially this, but by sharing our experiences and having

[00:06:33] this conversation before I figured it all out, I hoped to learn more. I didn't wait until I was

[00:06:39] clutter free to talk about my issues with clutter, or until I was debt-free to talk about my debt.

[00:06:45] So I'm not waiting until I had this all figured out either. Diet culture is one of those things

[00:06:51] no one was really talking about until recently and it's something that may take a while for us

[00:06:56] to unpack, depending on our history with food, weight, dieting and other things. You know what will

[00:07:03] really simplify your life? Liking yourself. If you are working through this in your own life,

[00:07:09] be gentle with yourself. Like yourself. Not because you lost five pounds or because you made it

[00:07:15] 30 days without sugar, not because your boss praised your work or because you ate a salad for dinner.

[00:07:21] Liking myself, because I'm me instead of because of what I weigh, or how I think I look,

[00:07:27] or how others think I look, has become part of my simplicity journey. It was way easier to

[00:07:33] simplify my kitchen to my closet, but here I am. Liking yourself simply because you are you.

[00:07:39] And if you have a bad day after getting on the scale or internalizing what someone said about how

[00:07:44] you look or because of what you ate, that's okay too. This isn't something that changes overnight.

[00:07:50] Don't look for proof-out side of yourself that you are worth loving. It's not out there.

[00:07:56] It's in you. You just listened to the post titled, Unpacking Diet Culture to simplify your life

[00:08:06] by Courtney Carver of BMoreWithLess.com, and I'll be right back with my commentary.

[00:08:12] Dr. Neal here for my commentary. I just finished reading a book titled,

[00:08:16] When the body says no, understanding the stress disease connection by Dr. Gabor Matei.

[00:08:22] A passage I recently read came to mind as I was reading Courtney's post to you.

[00:08:27] Dr. Matei was discussing the idea of being assertive. He described assertiveness as not just an acceptance

[00:08:35] and awareness of who you are, but instead it is the declaration to ourselves and to the world

[00:08:41] that we are and that we are who we are. Put this means is that we challenge the belief

[00:08:49] that we must justify our current existence or our current place in life. If your body weight is not

[00:08:55] where you would like it to be, please know it can be changed. But understand this one characteristic

[00:09:01] about you doesn't define you as a person. Not achieving your ideal body weight doesn't mean

[00:09:08] you are a failure. There are so many other successes you have achieved in life. You have to remember

[00:09:14] those. You are successful. You just may not be as successful with this one thing. It doesn't mean

[00:09:21] you are a failure. I am good at some things, but definitely not others. I have succeeded in some

[00:09:28] tasks, but failed miserably at others. Those failures do not define me as a person. I don't

[00:09:35] need to justify those failures. Now it doesn't mean I give up on myself either. Rather, after

[00:09:41] the hurt of the failures past because I am human too and those failures hurt, I do my best to learn

[00:09:48] from them and hopefully become a better person as a result of them. This is what Courtney was talking

[00:09:54] about. I am a firm believer that this is one way to achieve the success you hope to achieve,

[00:10:00] whether it's related to how you look your body weight or just success in life overall.

[00:10:07] Alright, that will do it for me for today. I'll be back here tomorrow as usual so see you there

[00:10:12] for your optimal life. awaits.