If you know me, you know that I love Gwyneth Paltrow. Despite her weird recommendations on goop and extravagant lifestyle, I am OBSESSED with her. I read all of her interviews and often dream about buying the things she recommends. You can tell Gwyneth is living her best life and doesn't care what others think about her.
On top of being a lifestyle mogul, Gwyneth is known for her curated recipes for clean eating and wellness. She already has three cookbooks and sells various supplements on goop. Gwyneth takes "let food be thy medicine" to a whole new level.
So what if I changed my lifestyle to match Gwyneth's? I sat down, did some research and planned out exactly how to be Gwyneth Paltrow for a whole month. She doesn't eat a lot of foods I personally love to indulge in, specifically gluten and sugar, so I knew this could get hard. She also works out regularly.Still, her lifestyle is doable.
But how stressful would it be combined with my college schedule? Would eating this way teach me anything new about my body? What would happen if I drank green smoothies on the reg and filled my body with chia, hemp, flax, and god-knows-how-many-other-kinds-of-seeds? Would I transcend to the fifth dimension, much like Gwyneth clearly has?
Here's what I learned after eating like Gwyneth for a month:
1. Healthy eating is kind of stressful.
I already praise myself for attempting to eat healthy every day. I regularly eat salads and roasted vegetables, but my day usually still consists of a lot of bread. So trying to reduce the amount of bread I ate and fill that hole with more veggies was frustrating. I love veggies, but I just don't think they're filling on their own. Replacing my beloved toast with peanut butter snack with a celery and hummus snack instead wasn't fun. Also, healthy food can be expensive, especially considering that I kept to a low-gluten diet. Gluten-free rolled oats are not cheap, people! Quinoa is not cheap, either. I found myself stressed out over how much money I would need to spend at the grocery store. I felt like I had to focus all of my money on food.
2. Healthy eating made me more creative.
Healthy eating helped me utilize my food board on Pinterest. I made scrambled tofu, gluten-free donuts, chickpea cookies, zoodles, spaghetti squash chow mein, brussel sprout chips, and so much more. I spent a lot of time hunting for new recipes and trying them out, and learned so many tips and tricks for adding more healthy food into my life. As a creative person, it was exciting to bring more excitement into mundane tasks, like for me, cooking.
3. Superfoods are kind of BS.
It's no secret that some foods are better for us and carry multiple benefits for our bodies. Kale is rich in vitamins and minerals and has a great amount of fiber in it. Quinoa is rich in protein and healthy carbohydrates. Avocados are a great source of healthy fat. But, who's to say that I can't get quality nutrition from brown rice, spinach and peanut butter.? As much as I love Gwyneth, goji berries and ashwagandha are expensive and contain the same benefits I could get from fresh produce and dark leafy greens.
4. What the hell is wrong with carbs?
Within every health community, there's a lot of fear around carbs, specifically bread. Yes, too much bread can be a bad thing. But, bread can be healthy, if you're smart about the kind of bread you're buying. Whole grain bread (including Ezekiel) is extremely nutritious for the body. Brown rice has a good dose of fiber in it, and rolled oats are a great source of iron. We need to re-evaluate our relationship with bread as a nation and learn to appreciate it's nutritional properties.
Although I didn't turn into Gwyneth Paltrow, I have a slightly changed view on healthy eating. In the end, eating healthy involves balance, indulgence, lots of water and treating the body right. It's making sure you eat a few veggies every day and making sure that you don't just eat because you're bored. Healthy eating is establishing a good relationship with yourself and the food you put into your body.