I just saw a post on “The Oatmeal” with a picture of a mug that says “A Nice Big Cup of Nope”. I know we’ve all had those days, or nights, or moments. Even though you want to say “no”, how often do you say “yes” anyway? I tend to do this a lot. Sometimes it is to my detriment because it really isn’t true to what my body and soul need. Sometimes it is to my benefit because I end up doing more than I ever thought possible, simply by saying “yes”.

As I was thinking about this I had a memory of one of my favorite mentors. He taught my favorite classes in medical school. They were the classes that taught me who I wanted to be as a Naturopathic Doctor, not just what I was going to do. One day, he was talking about the concept of “making up for it tomorrow”. You know those stories we tell ourselves. I’ll have the extra piece of pie tonight, but I’m going for a long run in the morning. Or I’ll have that second glass of wine tonight, but I’ll have extra kale tomorrow.

Unfortunately, our bodies don’t get to take the night off from processing whatever we throw at them. If you eat something with a ton of sugar in it, your body still has to process it tonight, no matter what you do tomorrow. An extra glass of wine still taxes your liver tonight, no matter how much liver support you ingest tomorrow.

This is a reminder to myself as much as it is to any of you. Your body will say “yes” to you as long as it possibly can. It will do it’s best to deal with whatever you throw at it….until it can’t. Consider giving your body less to “deal with”, so that, over time, it doesn’t have to give up.

 

(And, yes, now I’m really thinking about a few new ideas for this January Cleanse I’m going to do)