I get asked all the time about how I have such a healthy mindset about food. It truly is hard these days to upkeep, with all the fad diets and new health news out every other day….what’s a girl to do?! I’ll admit, I haven’t always had the mindset that I have know. In my late teens and early twenties, I, like many other young women, saw food as an enemy rather than a friend. I look back at those days now and see how wrong I really was! Food is not, and should never become, an enemy. Our bodies need food like they need air and water. To give your body food is to nourish it, to keep it strong. But how do we find a happy medium? If we eat too much food we become overweight. If we eat too little food we have zero energy and look like a rail. What gives?

Two things that have helped me the most with my relationship food are yoga and travel. I started practicing yoga about eight years ago, but only in the past three years have I really deepened my practice to the point where I practice for the goal of mental clarity rather than calories burned. Yoga stresses compassion. Compassion towards ourselves and every other living being. Our bodies crave compassion and we can give it that in the form of nourishment through whole foods. If we deprive our bodies, we are instead portraying dispassion, the exact opposite of compassion. Being dispassionate towards ourselves results in low energy, fatigue, mood swings and other health problems resulting from being a control freak with our diet.

However, it really took me traveling abroad to gain the final piece to the puzzle. When I first arrived in Paris I was in awe that the women there were so beautiful. Sure, they were beautiful partially because of the designer clothes and expensive make-up, but you could really sense beauty in the way that these women carried themselves. They were strong, confident and not afraid to eat a croissant. Now that’s what I call sexy, n’est pas? French women do not kill themselves at the gym and count every calorie. Rather, they look to eating as a pleasurable activity. You don’t need a lot on your plate to arouse your senses and fill your belly. A little bit of something rich is far better than a lot of something fake.

It is our human capability to fool our own brain. Studies have been shown that if we fake a laugh, the same endorphins are released to our brain that if we laugh for real. In France, I emulated these women. At first I pretended to be like them; to be okay with having a croissant for breakfast and chocolate for dessert. I wanted so badly to feel the self confidence and beauty that they felt and radiated. I did the same yoga they did, walked to the market as they did and ate cheese as they did. Slowly but surely my body caught up to my brain and the habit stuck. I finally realized I wasn’t going to gain weight after eating a single pain au chocolat and a sliver of chocolate cake was way better than a 100 calorie snack pack.