Fries vs. Avocados—Choosing "Different"

I never want a drink as badly as I do when I am feeling really stressed. Under pressure, chilli cheese fries beckon with the light of salvation and when things get really bad, I even delude myself into feeling like I crave a smoke.

I've never even properly smoked a cigarette.

And yet, when I am reaching the end of my line, indulgence in the holy trinity of vices feels like the right response.

That's messed up, isn't it?

Half of the destructive patterns I execute when things get too much aren't even mine. but They still execute if I am not careful, though. The only one I'd claim off of that list (alcohol, cigarettes, fries) are fries.

I love fries like nobody's business and I think potatoes are the root of all that is good and proper in nutrition. So, all the more surprising that what I actually ended up eating today was an avocado and egg salad. Of course, avocadoes are the second greatest thing right after potatoes so they're an easy choice. But the fact remains that they are also the healthier option.

Our short-term choices regularly screw us over in the long run. Sure, having the fries would have saved me half an hour of dinner prep and it might even have made me feel good for five seconds. But the more I choose the fries, the more my body will lack good food and the slower I'l recover from stress.

Getting better has a lot to do with training your ability to make different choices. The best things in my life all came from "different" not from "the same". Sometimes, these different choices were quite on purpose, but often, I was only half-aware of them.

The first trick is to insert some time between your decision and your action. In the case of fries, I thought at 4 PM that I really, really wanted fries for dinner. I didn't go get them straight away, though. I just thought "oh man, I will SO get a lot of fries for dinner" and then moved on with my day.

When it was time to organize dinner two hours later, I had realised I was stress craving and suddenly thought "oh, I bet doing something extra nice for myself would really help". Enter the avocado.

The second trick is to replace your stress craving with something that is better for you but that you ALSO really, really like. It doesn't work nearly as well when you get the feeling that "on top of all the mess that is going on I also now can't have fries". Feeling deprived will only make you feel more stressed.

So, indulge. But indulge with "different", not with "the same".

P.S. I still love fries and I am going to have them some other time. But I want to choose fries because of the glorious, divine deliciousness they are and not because I am stressed.

Much like people, fries deserve to be chosen for love, not for neediness.