As I meditated just now, the phrase –“Low Stakes Writing” — floated into my head. That’s what my blog is. This practice I’ve developed recently when I decided I was going to publish everyday, for 30 days, a blog post as a way to teach my nervous system that it isn’t so high-stakes to write, finish and publish. Now on Day 29 out of this 30-Day Challenge (using Austin Kleon’s printed template), I have taught myself that showing up to write daily IS possible. Even when you think you don’t have anything to say or share. Even when you don’t feel like showing up. Even when that voice tells you to *just F&ck it — you can skip a day.
That voice is that bad friend who whispers for you to cut school, to go buy that ecourse you can’t afford, to go down an endless doom scroll of nonstop bad news. To skip your workout class, to forget about the novel, to stay up just a little longer. To drink several nights in a row even though wine makes you wake up in the middle of the night sweating.
Of course, there are times when you do need to listen to that “f&ck it” voice especially when you’re driving yourself too hard and need to relax and restore. Or if you’re listening to all the voices out there telling you who or what you ought to be or do. The art is finding that right balance of productivity and restoration time. Finding your authentic self.
Structure and Accountability
It helps so much to have structure and accountability. I feel so much gratitude for all my sources of accountability in my life. I meet writing friends to write and meditate (some daily, some weekly, some monthly via Zoom). I meet a friend regularly to go to the gym. I go with my partner daily to strength train. I’m also grateful for resources such as Jia Jiang’s Sisyphi camps, to work on cultivating good habits.
And beginning today, I decided to bring back structure around my mental and metabolic health by starting a 30-Day Fasting Reset, following Dr. Mindy Pelz’s book, Fast Like a Girl. Today is Day 1 and I just feel so held knowing I’m now under the umbrella of a more structured plan. Because I am postmenopausal now at age 51, I decided to mix the 30-Day Fasting Reset, the advanced version (since I’m pretty familiar with fasting) with the brain health version that helps with mood regulation such as anxiety and depression, as well as memory loss).
My 30-Day Fasting Reset Schedule
So this means I’ll be following this schedule that I adapted:
POWER PHASE 1 – Ketobiotic Food
Day 1-5: Autophagy Fasting (17 hours)
Days 6-7: Dopamine Fasting (48 hour fast)
Days 8-10: Autophagy Fasting (17 hours)
MANIFESTATION PHASE – Hormone Feasting Food
Days: 11-15: Intermittent Fasting (15 hours)
POWER PHASE 2 – Ketobiotic Food
Day 16: Gut-Reset Fast (24 hours)
Days 17-19: Autophagy Fasting (17 hours)
NURTURE PHASE – Hormone Feasting Food
Days 20-30: Intermittent Fasting (13 hours)
Here’s what I recorded so far today.
- Day 1 (9-11-23):
- Fasting glucose this AM: 99 mg/dL
- Ketones (BHB): 0.2 mmol/L
- Black coffee.
- Got hungry and broke fast at 16 hours (11am first meal, dinner last night around 7pm). Ate arugula salad with leftover chicken thighs with skin, whole avocado, olive oil, pumpkin seeds, saurkraut and leftover low carb dressing made with olive oil, soy sauce, wasabi.
- Felt extremely nourished and satisfied!
I love the reminder Dr. Mindy Pelz says in her book as she prepares you to undergo her 30-Day Fasting Reset:
Have compassion for yourself. Don’t beat yourself up for making a mistake or slipping one day. That sort of negative walk will only discourage you. This should be fun. Be curious about what your body will do during each fasting length…Experiment with what you like to break your fast with the most. The body will heal more quickly when you approach this process with joy and excitement for the journey.
Reparenting My Inner Rebel Child: An Act of Self-Love
I’m really excited to get back on track again. Even though I’ve been eating different versions of low-carb keto, more or less, since 2014 (when I first discovered it when my partner got cancer, now in remission) when stress increases in my life and I start to feel overwhelmed, I can easily fall back into unhealthy eating and too much drinking, so having structure, like following a plan like Dr Mindy’s book is like self-love and self-care, basically me reparenting my rebel child self who wants to stay up all night, spend money and eat and drink all the things.
But mental and metabolic health is my top priority in life, so I’m gonna do what it takes to make sure health is my biggest wealth as I move towards the finish line that we all will face. I want to live to my full potential while on this earth, be a better human, and do the things I want to do, like write.
So here we go: This is me reparenting me.
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