Hey there, it's Susan Peirce Thompson and welcome to the Weekly Vlog. Flo wrote in a great question. She says, “What do you mean?” Oh! and let me just say stay to the end of this vlog because I've got a scholarship announcement for you. Okay? Flo says, “What do you mean when you say there are no Bright Line Eating® police? And do what gives you peace? These sound like invitations to tinker with the Bright Lines. What would each of these sayings look like in making food choices, and do they apply in weight loss as well as in Maintenance?” Oh my goodness, Flo, these are great questions. Yeah, so let me break down both of these sayings for you. I do say them an awful lot. An awful lot.
First of all, I just want to say that I sympathize with a Part of you that's thinking that these sound like invitations to walk off the path into some unknown territory that sounds maybe scary or unwise. Yeah, right? The Part of you that's feeling that way is the Food Controller Part. The Food Controller Part loves the Bright Line Eating structure. The Food Controller Part feels so supported by Bright Line Eating, feels like it's finally found a formula, a structure, a process, a system that's really clear, that's laid out that works fine, and that this job that it's had of trying to get the food in order, trying to get the weight to come off, trying to get it all to line up and add up and work finally is happening, is working. The Food Controller often is really skeptical, fearful, terrified, suspicious, and downright rejecting of anything that sounds like it's not by the book. That's not on the plan because the plan works, right? First of all, the first thing I just want to say is that there are no Bright Line Eating police. If you just want to J-F-T-F-P and follow the fabulous plan exactly as it's laid out, no one's going to fault you for that. There are no Bright Line Eating police, meaning stick with the plan exactly as it's laid out. If you want to just stick with the plan and also do what gives you peace in the sense of just follow the friggin’ plan if that's what's going to give you peace, right? Both of those sayings can be applied to exactly and precisely following the fabulous plan, exactly the way it's laid out.
I just want to also say that for your own best health and healthy cortisol levels and well-being and growth, ultimately as a human being, you are going to want to ideally, eventually transition from running your Bright Line Eating program, from the energy of your Food Controller to running your Bright Line Eating program from your highest self, your authentic self, right? In Internal Family Systems, the system that has all these terms, the authentic self, the highest self, and the parts from that perspective, there isn't necessarily much difference in doing it from your highest self. Your highest self might just be choosing to follow the plan because it knows that that's in your best interests, right? It's just that motivation or that energy is going to come with less fear, less gripping. It is just going to come with less fear and less gripping, right? That's good for you overall, right? It doesn't necessarily mean that you are going to tinker with the Bright Lines anymore, but you gave really specific questions here.
Let me break it down for you. What does it mean? What are some examples of there are no Bright Line Eating police. Let me give you an example. Someone doesn't like to eat three meals a day. Someone comes into Bright Line Eating, has been eating twice a day, finds that it works for them, and wants to know if it's okay to just break the food plan up into two meals a day instead of three. Well, if you look at the Bright Line Eating plan, the Bright Lines themselves say eat only meals, no snacking and no grazing. Then the food plan gives three meals per day. And so, when I say there are no Bright Line Eating police, what I mean by that in this case would be no one's going to come knock on your door and arrest you in a Bright Line Eating sense. If you decide to do two meals a day, eating two meals a day would be an example of doing what's in alignment with you. It doesn't matter if someone else would think that that's a good choice or not a good choice. You need to examine your own motives.
Here we're going to bring in the other saying and do what gives you peace. If it works for you and you have peace around it, then it's fine. Let me give you an example of do what gives you peace when it comes to eating out at a Thai restaurant with a friend on a Friday night. I could imagine the saying, do what gives you peace going either way with that one, do what gives you peace. Maybe it would mean don't go eat out at the Thai restaurant with the friend because you can feel that you're not going to have peace around it, that it's going to be a difficult restaurant meal for you to navigate, that you're going to meet with the friend a little late, that that just makes you nervous that you might not last until the mealtime. You can feel that it's just going to make you a little crazy in the head and you just decide not to do it. Maybe you decide to eat your meal in advance and ask your friend if you can meet up for a cup of tea at a cafe afterwards, right? Or it could be that this occasion of eating out at a Thai restaurant, it's within the Boot Camp parameters of the first 30 days. I've given the suggestion of not eating out in the first 30 days, but a friend is coming into town, they've invited you to Thai food on a Friday night and you think you're going to be fine navigating that restaurant. You've looked up the menu, you know what you would order, the vegetables, the protein, they've got what you need. You've called and they've said they can make the food without sugar, and you feel like you have peace about going and you want to go. As a matter of fact, it would be less peaceful to not go because a Part of you would be really resentful at missing out on that meal with a friend, right? Do what gives you peace, go and have the meal even though you're two weeks into your Bright Line Eating journey and it's still within the 30 days, right? Do what gives you peace. Go have the meal. This saying, do what gives you peace. It doesn't actually invite you to deviate from the Bright Lines or not. It's actually literally just saying, do what gives you peace.
Now, I can kind of hear in the background, Flo, that you might be coming from a long lineage or a long experience with food addiction where you don't trust your motivations or your mind to know what's going to give you peace, right? Where the impulses that are generated inside of you frequently lead you astray. The whole notion of checking in with yourself and using that as the compass feels like a flawed notion, like right off the bat. I just want to say I relate to that. That's why having a plan that's laid out as clearly as Bright Line Eating is so valuable. And again, you don't need to deviate from it in the slightest. If what gives you peace is just following the plan exactly as it's laid out, then just do that.
We also say there are no Bright Line Eating police to people who have broken their Bright Lines and who feel like they might receive some form of judgment or being ostracized in some way from our community because they've broken their Bright Lines. When we say there are no Bright Line Eating police, part of what we're saying also is that we're not judging you. We're loving you and supporting you. We want you to Rezoom™. We want to help you Rezoom, and you're good with us, we're good with you. Whatever you've done, however you feel about it, bring it here and let us love you so we can help you be unstoppaBLE™ and have a Bright meal again and a Bright day. That's what we want for you. If you can't have a Bright meal and a Bright day, there are no Bright Line Eating police, we're really not judging you.
Finally, Flo, your question about do these sayings apply equally in the Weight-Loss phase as the Maintenance phase? I would say not really. I think that the earlier you are in your Bright Line Eating journey, the more I recommend that you just follow the Bright Line Eating plan exactly as it's laid out, and maybe don't be considering what gives you peace or not as much because again, it can be really hard to tell when your brain is completely hijacked by the way you've been eating, probably your whole adult life, maybe even back into childhood as well. It can be hard to tell what's going to give you peace. Just surrendering all your notions about what works or doesn't work for you and just following the plan exactly as it's laid out for a good while is probably wise. But that doesn't mean that they would never apply. These sayings might indeed kick in like the example I gave about the two meals thing for someone right from the beginning. They might be very apropos, but the longer you get into Maintenance, the more your brain is healed, the more you have experience with what really does or doesn't lead to your exaltation or abasement, your happiness or grief, your sense of freedom or your sense of mental imprisonment in food chatter. The more you understand that for yourself, the more these sayings will become very, very helpful.
Flo, I hope that that's reassurance. You don't need to tinker or deviate in any which way. The more you can settle into your highest self and trust the better. If you want to just stick with the fabulous plan, by all means, just do that. That's the weekly vlog and I've got an announcement for you. Okay? Not signing off yet.
Here's the deal. These days, roughly three times a year when we launch the Bright Line Eating Boot Camp, right before we launch it, we offer scholarships. Right now, we're offering 20 full scholarships for the upcoming Boot Camp, and right now we're accepting applications. The application window is very limited. We're accepting applications from May 15th to May 19th, 2024. This is for the Boot Camp that starts on June 13th, 2024. There's a link that you can click right here on this page where you can apply for a scholarship. There's a video there that explains more about that. If you're watching this video or listening on the podcast and it's outside of those dates, I just want to say that these days, this is what we do. We offer scholarships right before each time we launch the Boot Camp. If it's nowhere close to 2024, you might want to write into customer support. Contact us and ask,” Hey, do you still offer those scholarships? Roughly when might be the next time that you're offering them?” You can just check in with us and see if we still do it. Scholarship applications are being accepted now. There we go. Now that is the weekly vlog, and I'll see you next week.
