Why Am I So Defensive About What I Eat?
Why Am I So Defensive About What I Eat?
Okay! This week I’m sharing a simple exercise that you can use to examine that lovely trait: Defensiveness and we’ll answer the question: Why am I so defensive about what I eat? It’ll also help you with the close cousin to defensiveness: Making Excuses. This exercise will help you take the first step to feeling more confident about your actions and less reactive to the comments and questions of others. Sound good? Then read on.
Often we get blindsided by certain comments or expressions or situations in general and, if we’re not grounded we can find ourselves reacting and feeling anxious and behaving as though we have to “prove” that we are right or that we are decent people or that the other person is wrong.
This tactic only ever makes us feel vulnerable, insecure and small. And it is an experience that will inevitably lead us to use our food coping strategy either by getting angry with ourselves and restricting or by feeling small and powerless and binging to numb out and nurture ourselves. Either way we lose. So, let’s do some reconnaissance this week on this pattern.
Notice:
- When you feel like you’re put on the defensive (you’re being attacked or judged by others).
- When you’re suddenly anxious or feeling insecure with someone.
- When you feel like to have to have the “right” answer on the fly.
- When you hear yourself explaining your reasons for certain choices or actions or beliefs in a tone other than peaceful and chill.
- When you hear yourself justifying your behaviour; arguing about your rightness; rather than just acknowledging it didn’t work for the other person or that you dropped the ball, forgot, or chose not to follow through.