It started with a sweet date - project body week 11

It's amazing ...

If you haven't read last week's post about simply telling myself a totally different right life story and then living it, then jump back to project me day 598.

Now that you've caught up, here we are one week later and for the first time in 10 weeks of project body, I can honestly say I was kind to my body this whole week.

Okay, there's a lot to being kind to a body: food, fitness, rest, it's even goes down to making sure I moisturise my body, even on the most rushed and frustrating days.

But this week is about eating. It's about waking up one morning and telling myself that I have always had great respect for my body and how I feed it. And I feed it well.

It all started with a date. Well a double date actually. I started with a date with the team from my project body partners from Ofra?Cosmetics. That whole lunch meeting, we chatted about all the alternatives and?substitutes as healthy options and how it's possible to change a lifestyle without missing out on too much. One of the tips that I was most excited to try was substituting dates for sweets.

So I woke up with the mantra/affirmation/positive thought/brainwashing that I always lived healthy and the days flowed from one day to the next with healthy but totally fulfilling meals. It started a trend and I am not very adventurous, especially since Mr Unexpected has a sweet tooth of sorts. Baked dates and almonds ... okay, I haven't perfected it yet and had us both crunching on burned dates, but the potential is there. That's a perfect sweet replacement and we both love it.

Eating out was a breeze and I even managed to feel totally comfortable sipping on herbal tea while my friends around me were drinking beer and booze. I also had a primary school mini reunion and where all the girls were eating cheesecake and I was quite content knowing that there's a cheesecake recipe at home waiting for me. I don't have to not ever have the yum stuff, but I eat the unhealthy option. No one tried to force a spoonful down my throat and I had a good week settling into my brainwashing.
I also had the most fabulous time at Thava?Indian Restaurant with Mr Unexpected. It's amazing because we had some tough stuff to talk about and that's usually the time I?overindulge, but I felt as though I was having the healthiest meal. I'm slowly learning that it takes a bit of savvy to source the best places to eat out and still feel totally healthy. Thava is that option for me. It's also my escape from the world and the place I feel most comfortable. I needed that ... I also needed the most delicious chicken korma this side of the world.

Beef and barley stew (that was a little too watery)! Custard with sugar replacement & low fat milk (that was a touch lumpy) and chicken in herbs, garlic and lemon (that was raw when it first hit the plates).

Great start don't y0u think ... hehehehe!

Despite a very stressful week I didn't fall into my usual patterns of needing comfort food. I just did something different. I still focused on food but now I have a whole lot of recipes that I intend to try out in the next few weeks. There's a healthy bread, a gluten-free pie crust and beef stock that I have floating around in my head. I also have to impress Mr Unexpected by the healthy yet yummy options (which I'm getting right so far ... even the lumpy custard) and I'm hoping that we'll both get excited enough that by this time next week will have ventured to a farmer's market and the grocery cupboard will resemble my healthy lifestyle more and more.

The project body message doesn't have to be anything to do with the changes I am making. Rather let it be that it took me 10 weeks of being conscious that something had to change, but with checking back once a week and finding one little reason to not beat myself up, here I am ...