We live in a super fast, busy, and accessible world. It is much easier to describe our eating with one subjective word than with one or two objective sentences. The question is what is better in the long term. Why does it matter at all? A great question. After all, it is just a word, and in practice it describes the situation in the most accurate way.
Or does it?
Words have the power to influence our beliefs, abilities, actions, and our relationships with ourselves and with our surroundings. When we take an eating situation and sum it up with just one word, it becomes difficult, and sometimes impossible, to identify behavior patterns and examine where change is possible. On the other hand, a detailed description of the situation makes it possible to understand where behavior during the day can be adjusted in order to change a challenging situation. For example, I stuffed myself with pizza, versus I ate pizza very quickly in an amount that made me feel bad because I arrived very hungry after a long workday and it was the first food I thought of.
The magic of words
In the book The Four Agreements, the author emphasizes the power of words beyond being just a sound or a written symbol. According to the way a word is used, it can turn our lives into magic or into difficulty. Words can also create compassion and self love toward ourselves, instead of finishing a meal with guilt and stomach pain. Let us do a short exercise. Take one of the words you usually use to describe your eating and replace it with the words unplanned eating. Is there a difference between the sentences? How does that difference feel in your body? How does that difference make you feel toward yourself?
So what do we do?
First, become aware that we live in a society and environment that speak in a certain way. Pay attention to the words that are commonly used in general and when defining eating in particular. Ask yourself whether these are my words or the words of my environment. Do these words describe my experience and allow me to create change, or are they critical and pull me backward? Change. Choose one word that is used regularly and replace it. Every time the familiar word is on the tip of your tongue, pause and choose the new word. Practice. Again and again and again until the new word becomes the normal word. Change becomes a habit only if it is repeated enough times. Believe it is possible. Believe in the power of your word.
Just before a day of independence, you are invited to step into independence from the words that bind you to self criticism and choose words that will allow you to find your personal voice.