I tend to jump into things as “all or nothing” with no gray area in between which is quite common for those with eating disorders.  Therefore, it has been extremely important for me to learn that the uncomfortable gray area is a wonderful place.

For example,  I’m a Diet Coke drinker – it’s my chosen from of caffeine in the morning and I have been wanting to stop drinking it for a while.  I even went so far as to bet my friend that I could stop drinking the stuff for a month – I won the bet and got a great sushi dinner!  Unfortunately, I was back to the morning fix in no time.  This was my all or nothing way to stop the behavior.  This time, I’ve decided that I won’t make the edict that I stop drinking Diet Coke but I won’t make it easily accessible to me either.  This way, I have to go out of my way to get it in the morning so I can decide if the fix is worth the inconvenience or not.

I’ve found this to be a wonderful solution – allowing myself to have it (if I want to make the effort) seems like a gentler way to stop the habit than a “force quit.”  The gray area is more forgiving and gives me permission to be perfectly flawed!  🙂