Whole30 - Week 1
First off, Happy New Year everyone.
A new year for me usually starts with a little goal-setting for the year, as well as making some commitments. One of these I started last year (to my knowledge) was to do a "reset" of my diet during January to re-establish some good habits and potentially establish a few new ones. I did a "paleo" diet last year and really got a lot out of it.
A few folks I know did Whole30 last year, and I decided last year that I'd do Whole30 for my reset this year. I started on January 5th after serving at the Passion conference. What's been neat is that several friends are also starting the program (either on Jan 1st or on Passion+1 like me), and the encouragement that I've gotten from the Facebook group has been great.
The program is basically "like" paleo but more strict when it comes to a couple of things. First, you can't have any products with added sugar, including any type of sweetener (which forces you to read food labels a LOT). Second, you can't have alcohol at all (in paleo, as long as it's not grain-based you're fine). Pretty simple, right? Honestly, when I started this program I thought "okay - so I've got to stomach unsweetened coffee, but how hard can it be?" (I have found a couple of brands of unsweetened almond milk that serve as my "creamer" - 365 Everyday Value from Whole Foods and Silk Unsweetened (refrigerated) are Whole30 legal).
But when I started, I found out that it was in fact, harder than I expected. Man - sugar is in EVERYTHING and not only that, your body definitely doesn't like it when you take it away. For the first couple of days, I had withdrawal headaches that were pretty bad (including during a movie date watching Unbroken). Once those went away, for a good 2 or 3 days I felt like a slug and all I wanted to do was sleep (and I was getting a good 8 hours per night). There's an article on the Whole30 blog about "what you can expect" during the month - so I knew it was coming and believed that there was a light at the end of the tunnel, but it sometimes doesn't make powering through those hard physical days easy.
Fortunately, my energy has come back now and I ran a little over 7.25 miles on my taper run last night (so all thoughts of "giving up because I have a race next weekend" are gone). However, most folks have told me that this week is actually the hardest week... the "mental week." I got a preview this morning when I woke up with this insane desire to eat pizza dough for breakfast (no idea where that came from). I've heard that folks have had dreams of pizza, pie, bagels, and candy that are vivid... I'm wondering if it will be like a striptease act or something (I'll let you know).
I'm 7 1/2 days into this, but what I've learned so far in Whole30 is exactly how addicting this "added sugar" thing actually is. I watched some food documentaries where you hear left-leaning folks talk about how bad this stuff is and how addicting sugar is... like cocaine (have you seen the picture to the right before?). Even I, honestly, have read some of that stuff and think: "Yeah, too much sugar is not healthy but these folks are a little co-coo" Now, I'm not so sure. After what I've experienced this week I'm pretty sure that sugar may be "like cocaine" in the way it creates addiction... of course with different consequences :-). It's pretty crazy.
On this note of "addiction" to sugar. I've been reading Counterfeit Gods by Tim Keller during the start of this year as well. What I've been experiencing through this cleanse this year has been paralleling a lot with what I'm reading as well as the talks I got to listen to at Passion. The book talks about idolatry (as "counterfeit gods" - things that we make as "ultimate" in the place of Christ), and the hold that these things we lean on instead of Christ have on our lives. They have such a deep hold on our psyche that when we choose, in the power God gives us, to abandon them and put them in their proper subservient place that they don't give up without a fight... as sugar is doing in mine and my friends' lives right now over our Whole30. It's caused me to think about idolatry more deeply than I have in the past... including those things that I passively serve (like the comfort foods that I can't have right now). When you're reading this paragraph, is something coming to mind? Something you think "I can't live without _______." Try giving it up... the degree to which it tries to pull you back into it's force field will tell you to what extent you've made this thing a counterfeit god. I'm hoping that for me, the things I'm giving up on Whole30 don't try that hard... and especially that they won't have much power next year when I do this.
It's true that Whole30 is a physical health and wellness program, but I think that any Christ-follower that has decided to do this program for a month would say that it's spiritual as well. When we give up something that we have been getting comfort from, we have to (if we are to be successful) replace that thing with something else... and hopefully something better. When we replace our dependency on _____ (food, money, success, cute girls say "yes" when we ask them out, etc.) with Christ, HE truly gives us something better... namely intimacy with Him... and that can't be taken away from us or cause us to get fat and unhealthy. Honestly, I'm praying that this result, much more so than health, is the reward that I get from going through this 30 days of sugar-less purgatory :-)
... And I've got a good, Christ-centered, support system. That's helpful too. I hope my blog helps you if you're in the Whole30 program or thinking about it.
Cheers.
A new year for me usually starts with a little goal-setting for the year, as well as making some commitments. One of these I started last year (to my knowledge) was to do a "reset" of my diet during January to re-establish some good habits and potentially establish a few new ones. I did a "paleo" diet last year and really got a lot out of it.
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The program is basically "like" paleo but more strict when it comes to a couple of things. First, you can't have any products with added sugar, including any type of sweetener (which forces you to read food labels a LOT). Second, you can't have alcohol at all (in paleo, as long as it's not grain-based you're fine). Pretty simple, right? Honestly, when I started this program I thought "okay - so I've got to stomach unsweetened coffee, but how hard can it be?" (I have found a couple of brands of unsweetened almond milk that serve as my "creamer" - 365 Everyday Value from Whole Foods and Silk Unsweetened (refrigerated) are Whole30 legal).
But when I started, I found out that it was in fact, harder than I expected. Man - sugar is in EVERYTHING and not only that, your body definitely doesn't like it when you take it away. For the first couple of days, I had withdrawal headaches that were pretty bad (including during a movie date watching Unbroken). Once those went away, for a good 2 or 3 days I felt like a slug and all I wanted to do was sleep (and I was getting a good 8 hours per night). There's an article on the Whole30 blog about "what you can expect" during the month - so I knew it was coming and believed that there was a light at the end of the tunnel, but it sometimes doesn't make powering through those hard physical days easy.
Fortunately, my energy has come back now and I ran a little over 7.25 miles on my taper run last night (so all thoughts of "giving up because I have a race next weekend" are gone). However, most folks have told me that this week is actually the hardest week... the "mental week." I got a preview this morning when I woke up with this insane desire to eat pizza dough for breakfast (no idea where that came from). I've heard that folks have had dreams of pizza, pie, bagels, and candy that are vivid... I'm wondering if it will be like a striptease act or something (I'll let you know).
I'm 7 1/2 days into this, but what I've learned so far in Whole30 is exactly how addicting this "added sugar" thing actually is. I watched some food documentaries where you hear left-leaning folks talk about how bad this stuff is and how addicting sugar is... like cocaine (have you seen the picture to the right before?). Even I, honestly, have read some of that stuff and think: "Yeah, too much sugar is not healthy but these folks are a little co-coo" Now, I'm not so sure. After what I've experienced this week I'm pretty sure that sugar may be "like cocaine" in the way it creates addiction... of course with different consequences :-). It's pretty crazy.On this note of "addiction" to sugar. I've been reading Counterfeit Gods by Tim Keller during the start of this year as well. What I've been experiencing through this cleanse this year has been paralleling a lot with what I'm reading as well as the talks I got to listen to at Passion. The book talks about idolatry (as "counterfeit gods" - things that we make as "ultimate" in the place of Christ), and the hold that these things we lean on instead of Christ have on our lives. They have such a deep hold on our psyche that when we choose, in the power God gives us, to abandon them and put them in their proper subservient place that they don't give up without a fight... as sugar is doing in mine and my friends' lives right now over our Whole30. It's caused me to think about idolatry more deeply than I have in the past... including those things that I passively serve (like the comfort foods that I can't have right now). When you're reading this paragraph, is something coming to mind? Something you think "I can't live without _______." Try giving it up... the degree to which it tries to pull you back into it's force field will tell you to what extent you've made this thing a counterfeit god. I'm hoping that for me, the things I'm giving up on Whole30 don't try that hard... and especially that they won't have much power next year when I do this.
It's true that Whole30 is a physical health and wellness program, but I think that any Christ-follower that has decided to do this program for a month would say that it's spiritual as well. When we give up something that we have been getting comfort from, we have to (if we are to be successful) replace that thing with something else... and hopefully something better. When we replace our dependency on _____ (food, money, success, cute girls say "yes" when we ask them out, etc.) with Christ, HE truly gives us something better... namely intimacy with Him... and that can't be taken away from us or cause us to get fat and unhealthy. Honestly, I'm praying that this result, much more so than health, is the reward that I get from going through this 30 days of sugar-less purgatory :-)
... And I've got a good, Christ-centered, support system. That's helpful too. I hope my blog helps you if you're in the Whole30 program or thinking about it.
Cheers.
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