The Good, the Bad, and the Nope.

Our society has created this strange, binary system of categorizing our own behaviors.

‘Oh my god, I was so bad this weekend.’

‘I’m totally going to have a cheat day, I’ve been so good this week!’

Be honest- you just read those two sentences and tried to picture what I was talking about. It could be related to diet, exercise, drinking habits, random activities you did while engaging in said drinking habits, or spending money. The list could go on forever.

I really struggle with this concept because the words good and bad are so incredibly subjective and have a thousand different connotations but they’re meant to make us feel either shameful or satisfied, which are just two of the millions of emotions we could have.

When we put our entire lives into two buckets, we limit ourselves to just two paths of thinking and action, and we all know that life has way, WAY more than two paths.

I’ve noticed that this good vs bad idea comes up quite often when people refer to their diet and eating regimens. Let’s say over the last five days, you ate a large amount of vegetables and a low amount of sugar- well that was a good week. If some potato chips made their way in or a late night slice of pizza, they were bad and therefore that means you are bad. And these two descriptors then dictate your future actions for the gym or your weekend activities or what clothes you wear or whatever else you can come up with.

If you haven’t figured it out, I’m a big fan of eating what makes you feel good. This could be a nutritious piece of fruit that gives you energy and makes your body physically feel happy and fulfilled. Maybe you’re like me and when you eat a piece (whole wheel) of gourmet cheese, your soul lights on fire and you feel unending joy. Both of these things can be described as good and for different reasons.

Both reasons are adequate and acceptable because they’re your reasons.

There’s a lot of social shame that happens in regards to eating things that aren’t Sweetgreen or Dig Inn. Personally, I do love Dig Inn, but not because it’s the trendy way to eat healthfully. I love it because they have made eating healthfully a trend, and they do it so well. Their food is locally sourced, their ingredients are clean, and the best part is it tastes SO good. (This isn’t sponsored, I really do feel this way.)

I’ve also been known to shove a ten piece order of Wendy’s nuggets in my mouth at any moment and be pretty happy about that too. However, those nuggets make my stomach feel less than pleased, so I don’t do it very often. Some would say eating the nugs is bad and that I’d need to repent with 7 lashings of kale and 4 hail celeries. I just say it’s a guilty pleasure that I occasionally partake in and then don’t think about again.

Just like everything else in this world, you are the only person who knows what foods are right for you. I can’t tell you what to eat (I never would), and neither can that ad you see on Hulu, or the skinny blond girl who is Photoshopped six ways to Sunday in your latest Instagram obsession. Your insides are going to tell you what’s good or bad and it may not be society’s recommendation. If eating bread makes you super gassy and uncomfortable, yeah, that’s bad. But if eating bread fills your belly and your heart with the light of 1000 suns, that’s good. And maybe that changes every day.

Look, people, I’m going to say this probably in every single post. Balance is the name of the game here, and that internal balance and moderation can only be decided by you. We get one body, one life. Why torture it for someone else’s standards? Why fill it things that make you sad simply because an article somewhere told you that it was a superfood? Try not to limit yourself to the words bad and good. Be kind to yourself and make choices that you feel confident in and let them be your guide to life.