Exercise is not a punishment for the food you ate.
There, I said it.
It’s the holiday season and you are most likely being bombarded with special tasty foods. In addition your social media is probably flooded with memes about how much exercise equals each of those special treats. Add to that all your well meaning family members assessing and making comments about your body.
Whew! That is a LOT to navigate!
We live in a society rife with fat shaming. We live in fear that we might be just one macaroon away from a life of ridicule. Thin privilege is a real thing. If you are living in a bigger body you are most likely really aware of this. You might feel that your food and exercise choices are being watched carefully. So, enjoying a treat here and there during the holidays might also elicit a bit of stress and anxiety. As a way to deal with these treats many of us look for ways to make them OK. We try and earn them.
Maybe we know how many miles we will have to run to eat a slice of pie.
Maybe we have added extra workouts during the week to sweat off the calories we drank at that holiday party.
Maybe we break into a cold sweat just thinking about how to add up what we ate to fit into our macros!
This is just terrible math. Calorie calculations have been shown to be 25-40% wrong. How our bodies burn calories is different from person to person. And the whole idea just seems like a misogynistic way to keep women focused and worried about their bodies instead of doing their lives work, connecting with the people around them and living in their power.
How you look is the least interesting thing about you mama.
And...exercise should make your life better. It should make you feel strong and proud and capable. It shouldn’t be a punishment for your food choices.
This holiday season we hope you eat in a way that delights you and makes you feel good. We hope you move in a way that empowers you. And we hope you tell your nosy aunt who wants to know if you’ve lost 5lbs that you prefer to talk about more important things than the size of your thighs and your body in none of her business!