Today is the third day of Lent and my ridiculously difficult resolution (in this Sysco-fed environment especially): I have given up cane sugar (raw, turbinado, refined, powdered, all of it) and artificial sweeteners. Sweet things I can still have: honey, maple syrup, beet sugar, molasses, and fruit. I am hardly destitute.
My first morning, I had two oranges and bowls of yogurt. For lunch (at the NC nature center), I had the scraps of sandwiches (most breads have high fructose corn syrup in them), plain potato chips, and an apple, banana, and apple juice. For dinner, I had pasta with butter and cheese with carrots.
Yesterday, I tried to diversify; I ate a bowl of yogurt with an orange, and then tried to eat Saltines (but they have corn syrup), so instead had some brown rice with butter. For lunch: a rice, lentil, spinach, broccoli, veggie pattie, green pepper, oil & vinegar salad, with some fruit on the side. A snack of an orange. And for dinner, I had a Johnny cake with honey and butter, almonds dipped in honey, and curried cabbage and carrots. It’s not so bad, so far.
I chose to do this particular challenge because I believe in the connections that form in our minds when we deny ourselves something common. This particular choice helps me to be conscious about what I eat, and look at the ingredients that are in it. It’s an exercise in restraint and deliberance. I also believe that our society is both over-caffeinated and over-sugared. Those are our major legal societal intoxicants, because they affect our energy levels so much. Caffeine gives people the false belief that they are able to use a substance to be more energetic when their bodies are telling them it is time to slow down. Sugar is similar, but more complicated. I read somewhere that humans evolved to like the taste of sugar because it is a great short-term energy booster; sugary foods are physiologically cheap calories and there are manifold benefits of eating fruits and sweet vegetables. It seems strange to think that we have gone from one extreme to the next; from sugar in temperate zones being slim-pickins to universal.
I certainly do not think that all stimulants and sweet things are dangerous and avoided at all cost – just that their consumption should be moderated, and new sources for energy explored.
After 3 weeks:
Salad dressing, ketchup, canned fruit, pita bread, salsa, dining hall carrots, and soy sauce are some of the new, surprising things I have found that have sugar or artificial sweeteners in them. I am going strong, and this eating lifestyle is becoming intuitive. I may continue this no-sugar, no-artificial sweeteners streak even after Easter. I feel like I have so much more energy! I have been hyper-focused on my projects, and motivated. From a scientific background, I feel the need to admit that I have also been running and hiking and reveling in the newly warm weather, and those are obviously affecting my energy level toooooo. Yahhoooo!
Vegetables and fruit (BANANA CHIPS) and honey all taste intoxicatingly sweet now. It's pretty intense.
