What’s In Your Life Charter?

By Barbara Berkeley

I enjoyed Lynn’s last post especially. Not only did it resonate with the essence of maintenance, but it was completely familiar. I suspect we’ve all come to pretty much the same way of feeling about the process of keeping weight off for a lifetime. In my soon-to-be-released book on maintenance, I discuss the usefulness of establishing a “life charter” to help clarify this permanent commitment. After reading Lynn’s blog, and following my challenge to readers to describe their maintenance plans, I realized that I was actually asking you to define your own Life Charter. Essentially, a Life Charter is what Lynn described in her post.

Going a bit further with this idea, I decided to reproduce the section of the book that describes this idea. If you have not already put a clear form to your maintenance pledge, please consider doing so. I think that you will find that, like other pledges, a formal pledge to yourself creates a special commitment.

Establishing A Life Charter (exerpted from Refuse to Regain, Quilldriver Books, 2008)

Let’s call your permanent eating plan your Life Charter. A Life Charter must be based on your beliefs about food and health. Your greatest job as a new maintainer is to create this plan and refine it so that it fits your tastes. This plan is like a government’s constitution. It is based on principles and rules, but should be basic enough that its framework can be easily committed to memory. Portability and ease of use are key. Once you establish your Life Charter, you should be able to consult it mentally to locate the guidelines for any eating situation.

As an example, let me share my own Charter with you. Mine is based on my belief in eating scarcely and in consuming a Primarian diet. It is constructed to keep me at a low, healthy weight based on my belief that lower weights convey the best lifelong health outcomes. My Charter also reflects my belief that healthy nutrition can only work in the setting of a body that runs well, and therefore includes a commitment to exercise.

The primary goal of my Charter is to achieve the longest possible life in the best possible health, hopefully avoiding periods of illness or disability as I age. A secondary goal, important to me personally, is to properly honor the gift of life I have been given and to appreciate the miraculous nature of my body by treating it with utmost respect.

Here is my Life Charter:

1. I eat one major meal per day, and 90% of my diet is Primarian.
2. I eat starches and sugars extremely rarely.
3. I eat one allowable treat daily (more if the scale cooperates).
4. I eat processed foods extremely rarely.
5. I eat no trans fats and very few saturated fats.
6. I honor my body by not allowing junk foods to enter.
7. When I gain weight, I immediately reduce to below Scream Weight (the highest weight I allow myself to get to).
8. I work out vigorously six days per week.

My plan is utterly portable and has become second nature. When I am invited to a wedding, I know that I will be skipping any fatty cuts of meat (saturated fat) and the wedding cake (modern starch and sugar plus saturated fat). I will have eaten lightly for the rest of the day because I will have planned the wedding dinner as my one major meal. If I’m hungry after the party, I know I can have my one allowable treat, usually a good sized dish of low fat ice cream.

What about bread, grains, pasta, corn, rice and potatoes? I am 90% Primarian, which gives me the option to indulge in these very occasionally. The longer I spend as a Primarian, though, the less I want to deviate. I usually am aware that I can have a piece of that bread if I really want it, but I almost always opt out. I think that you will be surprised at how much easier food choice becomes when you have absolute guidelines.

Resolve not to be swayed by what others are eating or by their comments. Just as a vegetarian does not eat roast beef simply because others at the table are chowing down, so you must learn to rely on the wisdom of your Life Charter. Be proud of your plan and make every attempt to follow it staunchly. Many vegetarians avoid meat to protect the rights of animals and to spare them unnecessary suffering. Their motives in following an alternative diet are not questioned, nor should yours be. Remember that you have an equally noble goal: to preserve a human body’s optimal health and function (yours!)

Despite all the ideas about eating I’ve suggested, your Charter may turn out looking very different from mine. I don’t ask you to accept every idea I put forth, but rather to see what works for you and to follow your Charter faithfully, daily, and NOT moderately.