Ever since I’ve been married, my husband and I have had the same epic battle about deodorant. He would send me to the store to buy deodorant and I’d buy the wrong one without fail. “You only bought the deodorant—I need the antiperspirant AND deodorant.” I won’t gross you out but this man is known for his epic sweating abilities and if you could power a home on sweat, we could probably have provided enough juice for the entire block. OK—maybe that was gross. There is a point to this story, I swear! When I started on my journey to better health, I started taking a closer look at what I was putting not only in my body but on my body, and that included deodorant. The more I read about what was in most deodorants, the less I wanted to use them. I was also reading stories that told of people who stopped using the traditional deodorants and actually started sweating less and this was my experience as well. But my husband didn’t think this included him and so the months and years went by until one day I just bought him some natural deodorant—that’s right, ONLY deodorant–and asked him to give it a chance. He balked but reluctantly agreed to try it.

The first couple of days, he complained that he smelled, and he was sweating. Personally, I really didn’t notice anything different. I told him to give it a try for a little while longer, and then I forgot about it….until one day we were at the store and I checked to see if he wanted to buy some antiperspirant and he said, actually, he wanted to keep trying the new kind a little while longer. I left it at that. After several weeks, he finally told me—“You were right, I don’t sweat nearly as much as I used to. I don’t know how or why, but it actually works.” I nearly keeled over! You don’t even understand how huge this was! I can refer you back to the beginning of this article about how much he sweats…or rather, used to sweat! After all these years, and many unsuccessful industrial-strength antiperspirants, this was life changing.

So what does all this have to do with changing your diet?? Well, it just got me thinking that since we’re young, we’re taught that we need to wear deodorant, or more specifically, we need to use antiperspirant, and if you still sweated a lot, well, you were just weird. So how about when it comes to your food? How long have you been taught that you have to get your protein and iron from meat, your calcium from dairy and healthy fat from salmon? What if you’ve been fed a line about food just like the deodorant? It’s scary to try something new, but sometimes rejecting what you’ve always known to be true reveals a completely new truth, and that’s pretty groovy. So don’t let the idea of a more plant-based diet get discarded because it’s so different than what you’ve always known. Research it for yourself, give it a try, see how it works for you—you just never know, it could solve a problem you’ve always had because you’ve always followed the path most traveled. Forge your own path today—it might be uncomfortable for a little while but who knows what’s on the other side?

My daughter didn’t always eat chickpeas. I can remember a time, though it’s vague, that anything related to chickpeas wasn’t happening in my house. “I don’t like chickpeas.” It was a fact, at least at that time. Just like these days, she excitedly tells me if there is hummus involved at a get-together. Yep, the same kid who didn’t like chickpeas a couple years ago now loves them—or at least likes them enough to eat them all the time, which is really what matters, right?

Count kale and quinoa among other such victories, I mean, um, advances in my daughter’s tastes. It’s not that she loves these things now, or would choose them over a sweet treat or some tortilla chips, but she will now eat them and I’m about to tell you how it all happened. Here it is….ok, well, I’ve got nothing actually. I’ve really thought about of the one magic trick I used to get my daughter to eat these things, but I couldn’t think of anything I did that sealed the deal. All I could think of is the fact that I didn’t give up. Rather than give up, I just kept making these things in different ways. I didn’t make a big deal about it—I just kept making it. It was slow, but the change happened. And now she eats these things, and sometimes, even loves them—remember I mentioned the hummus? You have no idea how much I wanted her to love hummus. It started off with her only eating my husband’s hummus recipe, and slowly, it changed. She loves hummus now. She’s even been caught sneaking kale while I’m making it (this is her favorite recipe). And quinoa, well she’s just used to it. She eats it, and that works.

Ok, ok, so what else did I do—how did I keep trying? I hid it in food, right? I actually never did. Maybe I didn’t offer up the fact that something contained kale or chickpeas, but I didn’t lie if she asked. I asked her if there was anything I did to get her to eat foods she would stubbornly not eat before, and she couldn’t think of anything either. The change was gradual, in a way. We decided to kick out the old foods and bring in the new foods, but I adapted old recipes, using new ingredients and it just became our normal food. Have you ever heard the story about how to boil a frog (OK, so for the record, I would NEVER boil a frog!)? If you throw a frog in boiling water, it will jump out. But put it in some cool water, and raise the heat so the change is gradual, you’re much more likely to keep that frog in there (again, not that I EVER would). My point is, don’t try to throw your family into a big change and not expect them to jump ship.

So here’s some things you can do to get your kids, or your spouse, or yourself, to stop saying they hate quinoa.

1. Keep trying–A person has to try something an average of 7 times before they like it (except for cupcakes—I always like cupcakes the first time I try them). Your taste buds really do change—I promise! There are some things you’ll never like, but you’ll be surprised what starts to sound delicious when you cut out the processed foods.
2. Experiment with recipes It turns out quinoa by itself is not at all tasty! But try this recipe, and you have a family-pleasing and very quick meal. Don’t try just one recipe and when it’s not a hit, give up on a food altogether. Experimentation is fun (unless it’s with drugs…not cool!).
3. Expect a revolt When you mess with people’s food, it’s personal! Don’t expect your family, or you, to love the change—we fear change! Don’t be disappointed when they turn up their noses at your loving creation. Trust me–I’ve tried guilt, threats, sweet-talking…just brush it off and try something else next time.
4. Don’t hide food OK, this might not be popular, but if a person overcomes a new food, they learn that they can like new foods and are more likely to try it again. I’m not saying you have to be totally honest…when my daughter didn’t like chickpeas (or thought she didn’t), when I made her chickpea patties, I called them chickless patties or something like that…she ate them, loved them and then I told her what was in it. It’s semantics. Kale looks surprisingly like basil if chopped small enough. If asked, admit it’s kale, but don’t feel the need to volunteer. Unfortunately, I am not good at hiding, so I usually get caught. Oh well…honesty is the best policy.
5. Limit options You can’t make a new recipe and when it doesn’t go over, whip up a box of mac and cheese when the family doesn’t like it. Parenting 101—the little terrorists will work you over every time—don’t give in to their demands….repeat after me, “We don’t negotiate with terrorists…” So limit options and remember you’re not a short-order cook. Work new foods in slowly. If you serve quinoa for the first time, try to make it a side dish served with some standby favorites so there’s still enough food to fill every one up. You don’t run a marathon without training—start small and work your way up….and don’t forget to stretch.

This past weekend I ran a marathon. Most people would say that is a pretty amazing accomplishment. And it is–it really is! I know I should be proud of myself, but it wasn’t my day and I ran it slower than I have in the past—I just never got into a groove

and the whole time, I was miserable. I wasn’t enjoying the race. I’m sure there’s a part of me that is proud, that recognizes that it’s not about beating a time, it’s not about a pace per minute or where I compare to others—it is that I ran the race! It’s that I finished the race. When I could’ve given up, I didn’t…even though at times it didn’t seem possible to take another step.

A couple days after the race, someone asked me where I placed. Considering the fact that there were tens of thousand of runners, and by no means am I an elite, it seemed a silly question…until I realized that I’d really been allowing my performance as it compared to others to matter more than my overall accomplishment. And I had let it take away from my achievement.

How many other things in our life fall victim to this same treatment? How often do we allow our personal accomplishments to be downplayed because when compared to others, it doesn’t seem so impressive? How often do we let the devil of comparison steal our joy?

I do not want to take away from the fact that it’s important to set goals and to have expectation for ourselves, but not at the expense of recognizing that we have still accomplished some pretty amazing things. But letting ourselves feel like we have failed rather turning around to look how far we’ve come (in some cases, 26.2 miles) does not serve us well…in any part of our lives.

Our diet can feel a lot like this. Maybe we’ve made many positive changes, removed processed foods, switched to organic, fit more veggies in our diet…whatever it may be, sometimes it doesn’t seem like enough. Making improvements in our diet is a journey. It’s a tough journey, much like a race. And it’s our own journey–One that we have to take on our own. We may have to dodge others, get over our own mental barriers, get past that defeated feeling when someone passes us and finally, stop focusing on how far we have to go rather than how far we’ve come. We have to recognize that any race is just made up lots of individual steps. We have a choice after each step on whether we are going to take the next one. It’s the combination of those steps, taken in a generally forward direction that gets us to the finish line. We may take some side steps, whether it be a potty break or a sprint to the sidelines to hug a loved one, but generally, if we keep that forward motion, we will get closer to reaching that moment of knowing that we did it! 

So if you’re feeling like you’re taking more stretch breaks or you’re stopping too often to ever make any progress, look behind you! Maybe you did eat something today that detracted from your journey, but get back on the course because any step forward is a win. And don’t expect you’ll ever finish and retire—life is a journey and the moment we stop lacing up our sneakers and shuffling forward is when the self-discovery ends. For myself, I’m signing up for another race!