The heart loves, but moods have no loyalty. Moods should be
heard but never danced to.
—Hugh Prather
How many times have you not exercised or not eaten well because you weren’t in the mood? Moods are fickle creatures, they soon pass. If you dance to their tune and base your decisions on them, they often leave damage in their
wake.
To overcome emotional overeating, you need to learn not to give into and overeat because of your moods. You can acknowledge them and then go about the business of living. If you give in to every whim and mood, you won’t have much
to show for your efforts.
If you’re facing a task (like exercise) that you’d rather not do, a good strategy is to tell yourself you’re going to do it for 10 minutes. That will get you started and after that time, you will feel more motivated to continue and you will probably do more than 10 minutes.
As far as feelings go, many people expect to feel positive all the time. Some even feel guilty for having negative feelings. Some people think they’re not spiritual for having such feelings. It’s important to accept, acknowledge, and honor all your feelings, even the negative ones, for this is part of being human, but there is a point where continually indulging negative or dour moods often does more harm than good, as it often leads to out
of control eating and other forms of acting out.
