Terry and I love to watch professional football and I love to snack while I watch! So I’ve always made sure we have “football watching snacks.” Our snacks used to always include what the advertisers were able to entice Nelly (my inner child) into buying i.e. chips, dips, beer, pizza AND PLENTY OF IT!

I ask myself why? Why do I have to eat while I watch football? The answer was impressive: Just because we do. Now I’ve known Nelly long enough to know when she’s in the room. An answer like that is obviously one from a child.

I love it when Nelly has my attention because that’s when I get the most wonderful ideas! So I said,

My experiment during the game was most enlightening. Terry got his chips, but I also made deviled eggs and had a lot of fresh vegetables cut up for him too. Nelly and I just had celery. (My surprise was a train ticket to Seattle to see my grandchildren who live up there.) I chose, just celery because I wanted this experiment to be drastic and I wanted to keep my attention on Nelly.

What I discovered was, I really do like to watch a good game of football, but I want to be chewing through the whole thing! I realized when my focus is on the game I’m not paying any attention to what’s in my mouth, so it may as well be paper.

The hardest part of eating just celery was not during the action on the field, but when the food commercials came on! Oh those marketers are good! Just think; they know they’re going to make millions on sales on the Super Bowl game alone. I’m sure they have a financial forecast and it’s all based on your inner child’s buying power.

We're smarter than that now! Here’s an email from one of my subscribers.

Hi Pam,

Essie Mae and I had to run to the drug store today to pick up something for my husband.  The drug store is one of our favorite places to shop - it's where we buy all our tiaras - hair toys, lipstick, nail stuff....  And, it's where we find those great bags of peanut butter M&M's, which we got a coupon for from the store loyalty machine.  You know the one that you flash your card under and it magically spits out "deals" just for YOU!

But, we decided that we are smarter than the marketing people and the advertisers!  We are on to them and we're going to show them that we're not only smarter but stronger and savvy about their lures and traps, the ones particularly geared just for US!

Ha!

Blessings,
Janee and Essie Mae

Also, I’d like to suggest a few rules:

1. During actual “play” if you’re in the habit of having to eat during the whole game like I am, just eat celery and drink water (you can make it festive by using ice in it or having sparkling water). When the commercials come on watch them with new eyes and see how they are written specifically for your inner child! Use the time-outs to really enjoy your treats you’ve made.

2. Try what I call the “vicarious” bite (I talk at length about it in my book The Mouth Trap: the butt stops here!). What you do is watch a pizza or snack commercial but take a bite of celery and using your imagination, blend the chewing that’s going on in your mouth with the action that’s going on in the commercial. You’ll be surprised what you’ll learn.

3. Enjoy the game and stay as alert as the quarterback after the snap. This conscious mindful eating takes practice.

In order to lose unwanted weight, we have to change the behavior that put the weight on. The Super Bowl is the third biggest feast day in America! Guess who’s behind that? But we can have our snacks and eat them too, we just need to be awake and aware when we do and we won’t turn a football game into a feast.

Love,

Go PatHawks or SeaTriots

P.S. To finally manage your weight and learn to eat healthy foods, not just during the Super Bowl, but all the time, you might consider my book The Mouth Trap: the butt stops here!

                                            Enjoy two of my books and save!