Ep #235: Rebelling Against Yourself

Hi! Quick life update for anyone who is wondering. Last January when I turned 40, I decided to celebrate by doing 40 nights away and I have mentioned it on a few episodes so I wanted to let you know that I did it!

Over the course of the year, I stayed overnight in 13 cities that I’ve never been to and let me tell you, it was a lot of fun, it was such a cool experience but also, it was a lot. I will never do anything like that ever again but I’m so glad I did.

I know it might sound crazy, especially because I love traveling to new places which is why I chose to celebrate turning 40 this way, but about halfway through, I wanted to quit. I didn’t want to do any more planning because I spent so much time with most of the trips figuring out the flights that would work with my work schedule, figuring out the best place to stay based on location and price and reviews, and what I was going to do because I wanted to do all the “must-do” things and try to find any hidden secrets. I was tired of researching and also kinda wanted to be home more but, I wasn’t going to let myself quit. I set a goal, I knew I’d regret it if I didn’t finish it, and I also felt accountable because so many of my friends and family knew about it and were keeping up with my posts on social media about it.

But mostly, it was something I knew I really wanted to do, and that’s what kept me going.

And that is something that is so important for all of us with all of our goals. There are going to be times when we want to quit and times when we’re tired of doing the things we need to do to make it happen but we have to remember why we chose to do it in the first place.

We gotta keep going back to that “why” that’s so compelling for us that giving up and quitting isn’t an option.

That goes for goals like stopping binge eating, like travel goals, career goals, family goals, household goals, anything big or small that you want to accomplish. Even keep going back to the reason why you want to do the laundry, do the dishes, or get your oil changed.

Keep yourself in the game, keep trying, because your why is too important for you not to.

So anyway, I’m pretty proud of myself for setting this 40 nights away goal and achieving it before my 41^stbirthday.

And I’m thankful for all my friends that joined me on those trips so I didn’t have to do it entirely alone. I got to see some friends I hadn’t seen in awhile who lived in those cities I visited, on a couple I had people join me for the whole trip, I’d previously mentioned on here that tour group I went to Ireland with which was awesome, and one trip involved tons of other coaches that I got to see too. It was a perfect mix of traveling alone and with people and it was all so great.

Alright, enough about me. Let’s talk about you and those times when you rebel against yourself.

This is actually a topic that someone on Instagram had asked me about so I wanted to do an episode on it because I know she’s not the only one who experiences this.

It can be so confusing when you’re rebelling against yourself.

With other people it can make sense to rebel when you don’t want someone telling you what to do and you go and do the opposite but with yourself, it’s you telling yourself what to do.

So if it’s you telling yourself what to do, why are you then rebelling? Why are you rebelling against yourself?

Well, I’ve noticed two common reasons why people do this and one is because of how they’re thinking about and how they’re talking to themselves about the thing they’re telling themselves to do and the second is because of how they’re thinking about and talking about the other things in their life.

So let’s talk about the second one first because that’s actually what came up for the woman I was chatting with on Instagram.

And by the way, if you want to find me on instagram my username is stopbingeeatingcoach.

So what was happening with her was that she was very regimented in her own life and she actually liked this most of the time.

I’m like her, I like having my workdays planned so I don’t have to think about what I’m going to do, I just follow my plan, unless of course something happens and my plan changes but it’s not a big deal if that happens, I just assess and re-plan. I like it this way because not only do I not have to make as many decisions in the moment but by planning it out ahead of time, I’m able to schedule priorities and things I want to get done so I don’t forget about them and so I make sure I make time for them.

On the weekends I also like doing that as much as possible but I also like to have unplanned time to do whatever I feel like doing. But even then, I’ll usually have an idea of what I’d like to do so I’m not left having no clue what to fill my time with.

But here’s the difference between me and the person who rebels against themselves.

I’m not dying to let go of control and be completely unrestrained.

That’s because I don’t feel too controlled or retrained in my life.

What happens for some people who do though, is that they feel too controlled and too retrained, like they don’t have their own freedom and eventually their desire for freedom builds into this urge to stop it all.

So they stop using their pre-frontal cortex, their higher brain, to make decisions and just let their lower brain make all the decisions.

They stop trying to put in effort to make well-thought out decisions that align with their true wants and goals and just go with whatever desire pops into their head.

And because our lower brains are all about seeking pleasure, avoiding pain, and doing what’s easy, eating a lot of food just might be it’s go-to idea.

But for me, after I’ve had a regimented week, I don’t have that same reaction because I’m not thinking about how controlled, regimented, or strict my life is.

I’m thinking that my life is what I want it to be.

I chose to be regimented.

I don’t have to. I could just wing it all the time. I could plan nothing, or almost nothing, and just do what I feel like doing or whatever I remember to do. But I don’t want to do it that way.

And if you don’t either, if you preferred planning and scheduling and being more regimented, then be clear with yourself about why you’ve chosen to live that way.

It can be so easy to feel resentful about having everything planned out and to feel too controlled. But you’re the one doing it.

You’re the one controlling in the first place.

Even when other people and their lives and schedules are involved.

For example, if a person says yes to their kids doing extra curricular activities and sports, and now they have that added to their life and their calendar, they have to recognize that they said yes and know why they’ve chosen to say yes to that so they don’t have to be resentful about it. They could have said no but there was a reason why they said yes. They wanted their kids to do it. And if they didn’t want them to, they could say no. I know plenty of parents to say no to their kids and it’s okay. You have to consider yourself, your time, and your mental health too so if you say yes, make sure you’re a yes for both you and for them, that you also want to put in that time and effort.

So that person is controlling their own time. They’re saying yes to doing things with their time like pick ups and drop offs and watching and waiting.

It wasn’t forced on them. They chose it.

Just like how the things I do for other people isn’t forced on me. I could be resentful of them controlling my time because they asked me to do something for them or, I can remind myself that I chose to do it, that I want to help them, and it makes me feel less controlled and more empowered by my choice to do this.

So when I’m following my regimented day, even things for other people that are on my calendar, and then I’m doing the other things I have planned to do that aren’t very fun, like errands, chores, or other adulting things, I remind myself that I have chosen to do these things and remind myself of the reasons why.

I don’t treat it like I’m being controlled. I treat it like my choice, because it is.

I could just not do any of it or not do any of it now but that’s not what I want because I don’t want the consequences of that.

So I embrace my regimented schedule, or at least accept it, so I’m not dying to get out of it.

So let’s not be resentful of the choices we make and own them instead.

Because when you do, you won’t feel so controlled and therefore, won’t feel the need to let go of control.

You won’t have a build up of restraint that will eventually turn into an urge for freedom.

You have so much freedom already. You’re just not seeing it that way. Especially if you’re exercising your freedom by choosing to do things that you genuinely don’t want to do at all and there is no reason that you like for doing them, and aren’t making time for pleasure as well.

I’ve talked with too many people who fill their time with things that are not priorities, that aren’t fulfilling, and things that they don’t really need to do but think they do. Then they’re left feeling angry about their life.

So please, if you’re going to have a more regimented life, prioritize, find balance between work and pleasure, whatever that looks like for you, it doesn’t have to be 50/50, balance looks different for everyone, and make sure that if you’re doing something that you don’t really want to do, that you have a good reason to do it.

Okay, so if you’re looking at your regimented life differently, embracing it more, accepting it more, then you won’t feel so bound by it, restrained, or controlled and when you don’t, you won’t feel the urge to rebel against it.

We don’t rebel against things that we’re not feeling resistance against and you’re not going to resist against things that you’re choosing to do and want to do, even when it’s things you don’t want to do that you have good reasons to do. Even though you don’t want to, there is still a part of you that does because you don’t want the consequences of not doing it.

You don’t really want to pick up the kids from practice but you want them to get home safely. So you choose to pick them up.

You don’t really want to go to work but, you want to continue having an income. So you choose to go.

So if you’re feeling like your life is being controlled by someone or something else, try to find how and why you’ve chosen to do the things.

Then there’s what you’re thinking about and telling yourself about what it is you want to do, especially what you eat.

I hope that by now you’re making your own eating decisions instead of just doing what someone else tells you.

You can of course do what someone else tells you to do but make sure you’re totally on board and are choosing it, not just doing what they say while silently, or out loud, cursing them while you’re doing it.

So you’re deciding what you want to eat, maybe you’ve made a plan for yourself, but then the time comes to eat that and you rebel against it.

You do the opposite.

Maybe you have a super healthy meal planned and you scrap the whole thing and just eat a bunch of snacks, joy foods, or a meal that’s so different from what you’d planned.

Now, there could be a few different reasons why you do this, reasons like you’re just super tired or stressed and you don’t care anymore. But those are topics for another day.

Here, I want to talk about when you’re purposefully going against what you planned, rebelling in a way like, “I’m gonna do what I want to do.”

You’ve planned for yourself or told yourself what you’re going to eat and now you’re not going to, you’re going to do the opposite because you don’t want to feel controlled.

But controlled by what?

You’re the one who decided to do this. You’re the one who decided to eat this food.

So if you find yourself rebelling against what you’ve decided, take a look at what you’ve decided.

Was that a decision you really wanted to make? Or is it something you thought you should eat?

Also, are you making so many decisions around your eating that you don’t want to make that eventually you get tired of it and rebel against them?

This is why it’s so important to only choose to eat what you genuinely want to eat.

You don’t want to try and control your eating in a way you don’t really want to.

That’s just going to lead you to rebel against it and finally do what you want to do.

Just like with life, I like planning out what I’m going to eat during the weekdays.

I don’t want to get to lunchtime and waste time trying to figure out what I want or what I can make with what I have or get stuck in indecision.

I love that I already know what I’m going to have. Then, all I need to do it cook it and eat it.

And it’s pretty much the same with dinner. I know what I’m going to have and I also already plan options for snacks if I get hungry outside of meal times which most of the time I do.

And then on the weekends I’m usually less planned if I’m spending time with other people but even then, I still have a pretty good idea of how I want to eat because I think about it ahead of time.

And everything I eat, I’m choosing because it’s what I want to eat. And because of this, I don’t feel the need to rebel and go do what I want, I already am.

And most of the time it is what most people would consider to be healthy food and I still don’t feel controlled. I feel empowered because I’m choosing it. I’d only feel controlled if it was something I didn’t want to do but thought I had to and that’s when the urge to rebel comes in.

This happens a lot for people who do weight loss diets. They get so tired of eating how the diet tells them to and their desire to eat how they want to builds up so much that they urge to rebel.

Don’t do that to yourself.

Eat how you want to eat.

And remind yourself that this is a choice you’re making.

And just like I talked about with life stuff, if you want to be spontaneous, be spontaneous. I do that sometimes and it’s great to give myself that freedom in the moment instead of thinking I have to make all my decisions ahead of time. I make a lot of them ahead of time but not them all.

Now, I get that some of you might not trust yourself enough to be spontaneous. So if as you’re working on building that trust, you’re deciding to do a lot of planning, and be more regimented about how you’re eating, own that decision that you’re making to do that.

You don’t have to be more thoughtful because you don’t trust yourself, you’re choosing to be more thoughtful so you can get the outcomes you want.

Again, recognize that you’re choosing to do it this way and also make sure that you like this choice.

When it comes to your eating, only choose to do what you want to do and only eat what you want to eat.

Because you don’t have to eat anything you don’t want to. No one is going to force you.

Even if you have a health issue, you don’t have to follow what the doctor says. There are people who don’t. But you can choose to because you want the outcome that eating that way will provide you. So own your decision and see it as your choice, not as anyone controlling you.

So with all of it, life stuff and eating stuff, do what you aren’t going to want to rebel against.

Again, there may be times when you just don’t feel like it because you’re tired or emotional but I’m talking about feeling so controlled that you’re urging to rebel and do what you want to do.

Feeling controlled is optional.

You can also feel empowered knowing that what you do and how you plan or don’t plan and what you eat is your choice.

And if you want to sometimes not be so regimented, even though you’re a person who likes it most of the time, then allow yourself to be.

I think we would all benefit from a mix of being planned out and being spontaneous, however you want that mix to be whether it is 50/50 or unequal. It’s whatever you want and what works best for you.

Alright, that’s what I have for you today about rebelling against yourself.

I’ll talk to you next time. Bye bye.