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September 21, 2005
The Pizza Dilemma
You know that old saying, "I can resist everything except temptation?" Well, I've always thought of it in the context of how hard it is to avoid eating foods that are sub-optimal for my CR plan if they're just lying around. Especially if they're really yummy and they smell good. Pizza from Pinocchio's is a prime example. It is so hard for me to avoid eating it if nurses are eating it at a meeting! And once I've had one slice, it's hard not to have another.
Today I have another pizza type of meeting, and I've been debating whether or not to serve pizza. I'd definitely prefer to avoid temptation all together by staying as far away from pizza as possible. I also feel a touch of guilt in serving food that is high-calorie, nutrient poor, and covered in saturated fat to others who are likely to eat it. So there's an argument for skipping the pizza all together.
However, it is kinda expected that food will be provided at these meetings, and that the food provided will be pizza. Showing up with a large garden salad would just look weird. Several of the nurses have mentioned that the pizza was a nice touch at the last meeting, and that they're looking forward to pizza again at this meeting.
So I'm torn between doing what I feel like I should for my job, and leading myself, not to mention others, into temptation.
I am wondering if it might be character building on some level to spend three meetings in the presence of The Pizza, having decided beforehand not to partake of it. If I could survive this ordeal, what other feats of self-discipline might I be capable of? Maybe I'll take my calories lower. Maybe I'll take up running. Maybe I'll start taking the labels off the cat food cans *before I open them.*
In general, I think it's best to stay out of the way of temptation, especially early in one's CR program when you're just getting into the groove of what works for you. This is not to imply that eating not particularly CR-friendly food is a moral evil. On the contrary, part of my CR practice that I feel helps me succeed is going out about once a week with friends and eating more calories and different foods than usual. It keeps me from feeling deprived, cuts back on the social awkardness factor, and adds some nutrients that might not appear in my quotidian diet.
That being said, I want to be the master of my circumstances, rather than having my circumstances dictate to me what I will eat, how I will feel, and how long I will live. I already have on my calendar a going out for dinner event with a non-CR brother on Friday night, and I am working hard at keeping my calories low so I definitely can not afford two over-calorie days in one week. I no longer find it appealing to fast for a day to get over an over-calorie spell now that I've lost so much weight that I don't get much of a high off of fasting. So I have to choose carefully.
Here's one thing that the people who say that CR is all about self-denial don't understand: it's not about denying yourself pleasure at all. It's about consciously choosing your pleasures so that you achieve the health and longevity goals you want to achieve, while preserving and even increasing the amount of pleasure you get through the act of eating. We enjoy our food so much more than normal people... anyone who has any doubt of this should watch MR bite into my scallops cooked in red wine dish and witness the look of pure ecstacy.
We don't eat foods just because they're put in front of us and they look or smell good. We make conscious choices. It may be more difficult when the food is there and looks and smells really good, and other people are eating large quantities of it and covering themselves in melted mozzarella and tomato sauce. If it fits into the plan to eat the pizza, then it is not a non-CR'd act: it must merely be balanced out by earlier or later meals, and special attention must be paid to get the nutrients that were missing in the pizza meal. But if the slots in the week for over-calorie meals are already taken, it just doesn't make sense to eat the pizza.
The pizza isn't bad, and people who eat pizza aren't moral degenerates. Well, no doubt quite a few moral degenerates eat pizza. But they're not moral degenerates *because* they eat pizza. You get the idea.
It's not always easy to make conscious choices about food instead of eating whatever is put in front of us. It means accepting a certain amount of responsibility for the consequences of one's actions. At an earlier point in my life I would have felt compelled by the very fact that the pizza was there to eat it. Now, I can look at the pizza, know that it's there, understand that it would probably taste really good, but still decide not to eat it. Greater pleasures, such as enjoying years and years of health and youthful beauty and sitting on my Orange Angel's lap await me. It is a well known fact that one frequently has to renounce short term pleasures in order to achieve greater pleasure in the long run. This is just another example.
I can resist the pizza. I am an adult woman, conscious of my choices, empowered by my knowldege, awaiting the dawn of radical anti-aging bio-medicine. I can say, "No, thank you."
At least, I think I can. We'll see. I'll let you know.
Hey, it builds character.
Meanwhile, I met a blog reader! One of my readers just moved to town and lives about five minutes from, so we met for a glass of pinot noir at a bar nearby. He's so cool! It's tons of fun to talk with someone else about CR, life extension, Aubrey de Grey, and related topics. MR and I are hoping to have him over for dinner next week.
In other news, MR cooked an excellent dinner for me last night. He made one of his mother's recipes that included Quorn tenders, light coconut milk, asparagus, yu choi stems (though the original called for peas) basil, Thai fish sauce, and all sorts of other yummy things. It was a high volume, low calorie treat. I really enjoyed it, and of course there's something wonderful about eating food that is lovingly prepared by someone orange. Even as I write this, I am eating my breakfast-salad-for-lunch, which is to MR's breakfast salad as Eve is to Adam.
Okay, lunch break is over. I have been fortified in body and mind by breakfast salad, cottage cheese, the promise of extended life and the love of my Orange One. I am ready to face the pizza.
Posted by april at September 21, 2005 12:02 PM
Comments
When people thought I have an illness because of my weight loss they assumed I had some sort of eating disorder... A skinny person living in the rich country? So naturally people would think that something has to be wrong. Most likely the people that are convinced I have an eating disorder are going to die well before I could even reach 100 anyway, so I can't really prove that what I am doing is a good thing other than show them my test results.
At first I am quite happy to explain the situation and what I am doing and how I got to become quite skinny. But it becomes annoying when after I have explained things to them they still keep on.
One thing that might be common in a person that has an eating disorder is that the person may be in denial that there is a problem. So while I'm saying to people I do not have a problem, they could think that I'm in denial about it ! lol
I was having a conversation with a few people the other day and they were saying how I should be eating a little bit of everything... All foods tey mentioned were foods that are horrible for your health with virtually no good nutrition.
Shouldn't people be happy seeing me induldge in large salads everyday?
Am I supposed to be eating for survival or for pleasure?
I really Enjoy my salads and I get the health benifits from the foods I eat. But they don't see it like that... In their eyes a few pizzas a week, some biscuits and milk chocolate, cakes is a good thing and part of a balanced. But consuming large pizzas a few times a week isn't really going to balance anything out, only lead to an earlier death. That reminds me of how burger king or McDonalds put a leaf of lettuce in their 1000k/cal fatty burgers. It's hardly for nutrition... It's just to make it look pretty.
Posted by: Matt at September 21, 2005 10:04 AM