Body Clutter (Book #106)

Body Clutter: Love Your Body, Love Yourself (Marla Cilley, Leanne Ely, 2005) is by the FlyLady, who's best known for her system, complete with lots of motivational cheering, for de-cluttering and cleaning your house. Body Clutter applies the same basic principles to eating and exercising. It's less about a diet system than about adjusting your attitude to deal with whatever fears and needs make it hard for you to change your eating and exercise habits. It also stresses the problem of perfectionism--we expect too much of ourselves, try too ambitious a plan, and then give up completely and pig out on junk food as soon as we fail to live up to one part of our perfectionist scheme. And I recognize that in myself. As in, I do it all the time: "Oh, well, I had a regular coke instead of diet or water at lunch, guess I might as well have a big bag of potato chips and another coke for my afternoon snack!" Instead, we're supposed to forgive ourselves, love ourselves, and make gradual changes--baby steps.

The book is really too rah-rah motivational, emotional, and downright girly for cynical tomboy me, but that insight about perfectionism hits home. I'm trying to make some lifestyle changes, and I think the lessons in this book will help me stick with them.