Fighting Your Elephant

By Melissa Ramos aka Sexy Food Therapy

Being newly single and trying to avoid feeling lonely, I find myself going in overdrive: running around without a moment to breathe, spilling coffee on my white blouse as I’m running late for a meeting, and praying that my car will get to its destination because I don’t the have time to stop and fill up.

Come on Jane Honda, you can make it...

This overdrive makes us run out of fuel and rapes us of the emotional nourishment we need because there just isn’t enough time. And that’s when we find an elephant in the room that we can’t seem to avoid. We feel lonely with impulsive desires for physical comfort and get the urge to throw everything aside because it’s much easier to party with friends and simply forget.

And that’s where a little Sexy Food Therapy comes in. Real, whole, sexy foods can help to partially fill that void through emotionally eating the right way.

COCONUT SPICED SWEET POTATOES

3 sweet potatoes
4-5 cloves garlic
2 tbsp melted coconut oil
2 tsp each of: rosemary & basil
Pinch of cinnamon
1 handful each of: pecans & walnuts
2 tbsp maple syrup
Sea salt & cracked pepper

Preheat oven to 375. Toss potatoes with garlic, oil, herbs and spices leaving out maple syrup and nuts. Roast for 45 minutes turning every so often and once cooked thoroughly, add in maple syrup and nuts and cook for a remaining 10-15 mins.

There’s something about carbs that gives all of us comfort. Sweet potatoes just like squash is incredibly nourishing to the digestive system which may help ease worries and help to build up the kidneys in Chinese Medicine which when out of balance can produce symptoms of adrenal fatigue. But best not to over consume which can lead to indigestion in excess; so always try to balance things out with greens.

So looking over at the unavoidable elephant in my living room, I realize that despite trying to push his bum to move, I see that I’ve completely forgotten about obtaining my own pheromone of personal fulfillment. Somehow, I got so busy that I forgot about the healing power of creative nourishment and made life all work and no play. Not fair...

But through perspective, self love and stopping for a moment to breathe, we might avoid coffee-stained shirts, bouts of self doubt and begin to celebrate the empowering force that singledom can bring. It’s only then, that elephant will decide to walk off into the sunset leaving us looking into the mirror and finding that with confidence, we’re finally happily beside ourselves.