Just quit it... temporarily

TL;DR. Sometimes, it is helpful to temporarily abstain from something that you take for granted.

Who doesn't know it? The two-pack of Kinder Bueno at the register, the handy Pico Balla pack for a mere 55 cents, or the nostalgic Kinder Ü-Ei that you pack along with you and rejoice in the carefree nature of life for a short time. It is the little things in life. You usually know what is happening around you. You perceive your surroundings with your senses, you think about what you are going to do in the next hours or you panic and try to keep your packed calendar without regard to yourself or others. This happens, at least to me, frequently in auto-pilot and routine is also a great strength we have as humans. It saves an incredible amount of energy when you don't have to make conscious decisions about everything all the time. However, I often don't notice when I unconsciously neglect the vital decisions like eating or drinking. But as mentioned in the last post, I'm a big advocate of tricking myself by taking on small temporary projects.

With the beginning of the new year I have also started my vegetarian time again. In plain language, this means for me that I abstain from eat meat, but not fish, so I could also call it pescetarian time, but the term "vegetarian" already provides clarity for most people, specifically I do not consume any dishes with or from meat. The whole thing started in 2018, when I just aided the hosts to distribute the champagne to toast the new year without further ado later to the chime of the bell. When asked if I had any New Year's resolutions, I just uttered a confused "no" and preferred to focus on not spilling my champagne. If I could live an entire year without resolutions, it would be interesting to see if I could make a resolution that I was likely to keep, but that would make a fundamental shift in my unconscious choices, that is, to actively bring unconscious, routine choices into my consciousness. Finally, I decided to give up meat for three months from January 1, 2018 to March 31, 2018. The following year, this phase went from January 1, 2019 to April 30, 2019, followed by January 1, 2020 to May 31, 2020, and now I expect to remain meat-free from January 1, 2021 to June 30, 2021. A shallow but steady increase of one month per year to reduce meat consumption throughout the year. A standard question I get at least once is "Why are you doing this?" To which my answer is often, "Because I can." Of course, I could have given up sugar, caffeine, or alcohol in 2018, but with sugar in particular, the risk of not sticking it out was too high for me. Plus, there are several positive side effects for me and others that go along with it. Let it be the reduced CO2 emissions I am responsible for, fewer components of medications, especially antibiotics, that I passively ingest through meat, but also the awareness of health that you develop through the new situation in your diet.

The concept of abstaining from something and taking a period of time to do so has been around for a long time. You might know someone who fasts something dear to her/him on the occasion of religious holidays. You don't have to be religious or even adhere to these seasons to do go without something. You can decide overnight that you want to abstain from something that you know is not necessarily good for you. Sweets, alcohol, junk food, sugared sodas, video games, streaming services or animal-based foods are probably among the classics. The underlying principle is always the same. Take something you use too much of, too regularly, altogether too excessively and leave it out for a predetermined period of time. This can be days, weeks or even months. If you are unsure whether you can do it, just start with a small time horizon and slowly feel your way to this conscious change. A particularly positive effect seems to me to be the appreciation that you gain afterwards.

As the former biggest consumer of sweets at the checkout counters of various supermarkets, I can definitely say that this change of focus in my diet has helped me a lot in not always snacking just because my inner bastard wants me to.

Is there anything you abstain from for a period of time? If so, have you noticed any changes in your behavior? Let me know in the comments!