Today I’m sharing my nourishment journal with you. This journal is NOT about tracking calories. So you do not need to write in exact amounts of foods.
It’s about drawing connections between what you’re eating and how it affects your energy, digestion, mood, sleep, etc. And it’s about cultivating gratitude (check the last line of the journal).
NB: If you are triggered by keeping a food journal, or if you’ve had an eating disorder, please do NOT follow this journal. Instead, I would suggest simply keeping a gratitude journal.
Because being HAPPY is a key component of being healthy.
Being stressed about what you eat is NOT a component of being healthy. Not only does stress have a huge impact on your body and mind, but there’s no point being healthy if you’re not happy, right?
So thinking of something each day that you’re grateful for, or that makes you smile, is a fantastic way to start bringing more of that gratitude and happiness in your life.
Our brains are built to focus on the negative. It’s a survival mechanism. If we didn’t focus on what was going to kill us, we would die. So our neuropathways are built around looking for the negative.
But here’s the good news: we can redraw these neuropathways.
Scientists once thought that they were hardwired into our brains, once we set them up in childhood and reinforced them throughout our lives, we had no chance to change the patterns.
But they’re now finding that with concerted effort to do things like meditate on and consciously reinforce the positive aspects of our lives, we can rewire our brains to feel happier and more fulfilled. It’s called neuroplasticity.
It’s like scientific proof of buddhist practice – but you don’t have to follow buddhism to take advantage of the effects. Here’s what I’m going to suggest: practice gratitude.
Nourishment Journal.
Keep track of what you eat and how you feel for just 3 days. Long enough to see patterns, not so long that it gets annoying. You could do this every couple weeks if you want to track long term trends.
Nourishment Journal
Make some pesto pasta.
Bump up the nutrient density of your pasta by making a pesto with parsley! Top it off with some fresh veg to take it up another notch and add some delicious flavor.
If you make some, share a pic on instagram and tag me @heathernicholds!
Get the recipe
Check in with me in the comments below, or with our private Facebook group, to let us know if you have any insights from this, or from your journal. You DO NOT have to share your journal, but if you notice anything that you’d like to share please feel free!