Hot Chocolate Habit
by Katie Brown
February 2013. Sounds like forever ago, but feels like yesterday that I did my first Experience at Inner Bliss.
The Experience asks us to step away from processed foods, dairy, bread/pasta, alcohol, and limit our caffeine intake to one caffeinated beverage a day. Not as a way to be restrictive but as a way to really become the witness to our habits and how they make us feel in our bodies.
I quickly realized that I had to face my coffee habit head on.
And my coffee habit was like a dragon with two heads, one being the coffee itself and the other being the Hot Chocolate Marshmallow Lovers packet that I would put into my coffee each morning. Yep, you read that correctly. An entire packet of hot chocolate with those freeze dried marshmallows that can probably last for eternity on a shelf.
I picked up this habit at my very first job in 2002, both the coffee and the makeshift Mocha I would make with the packet. I was so proud that I was saving money by not going to Starbucks every morning and spending $5.00 on a mocha when I could make my own!
For 11 years I drank at least one makeshift Mocha. Every. Single. Day.
Fast forward to February 2013, I registered for my first Experience and was committing to drinking just one cup of black coffee a day. With nothing in it. I was going to need a really sharp sword to defeat that caffeine, sugar dragon.
But with the support of the Experience, the commitment I made to myself and to the community, I NEVER went back to drinking anything in my coffee again.
Since 2013, I've had one cup of black coffee each morning. No hot chocolate, no cream, no sugar.
I never realized how terrible I felt until I stepped away from drinking it. The sugar crashes subsided and I wasn't frantically eating more garbage to combat the sugar dragon that had a strong hold on me.
As I approach the 10 year mark of that transformative shift in my Hot Chocolate Habit, I feel that the time has come for me to take a look at my coffee habit. I have ignored that for long enough.
I'm not sure if it's serving me or not. So in order to find out, for this 5 Day Mini Experience, I am stepping away from my morning coffee and am committing to hot water and lemon.
Drinking a cup of coffee might be a habit that is serving me or I may discover it's a habit I'm ready to let go of.
The Experience offers an expansive opportunity to really look at the choices we make each day. In how we nourish ourselves, where we put our time and energy and how we feel when we get quiet and listen to our bodies.
Each Experience that I commit to, I seem to find a dragon to slay that creates a sustainable change for me.
What dragon are you ready to slay?
Let's do it together!
Join Jackie and I for a 5 Day Mini Experience starting Monday November 28th.
