Feeling Steady With Your Anchor Foods

Turning to our anchor foods after the holidays can be a gentle reminder to our body and mind to come back home to what feels best.

Just last week, I was out for a walk with my friend and neighbour, and she shared that she was still having a hard time feeling good in her body after the holidays.

She is usually quite conscious in her food choices, but the winter break threw a wrench in the works and she said she was finding it difficult to come back to normal eating.

Even though she normally minimizes gluten, dairy and sugar, because that’s what works best for her, the opportunities to eat more of those things over the holidays were plentiful. Each opportunity was actually creating more cravings for those very same things, creating a vicious cycle. And the result? She just wasn’t feeling that great.

She was wondering how to get out of the cravings and back into her “normal” conscious food choices, because she know she feels better eating that way.

Can you relate?

In my case, I could totally relate as I have been there before MANY times. The situation is somewhat different for me now because I have gained much more personal information about how food makes me feel. I’ve tracked my food, energy and mood to come up with a list of foods that I know make me feel good.

When I eat these foods, I feel balanced. I don’t experience any dips in energy or mood, and I am more likely to make better (more helpful) choices at my next meal.

I call these my anchor foods.

Anchor Foods

If you look up the word anchor, one of the definitions is “a person or a thing that provides stability or confidence in an otherwise uncertain situation.”

That’s exactly what my anchor foods are to me: stability in an otherwise uncertain situation. They bring me back home, so to speak.

I discovered them when I started working with a holistic nutritionist back in 2016. Through tracking and journalling, I created a list of foods that I love to eat (and that love me back).

Anchor foods turned into anchor meals, and now whenever I need a reminder to be eating more consciously, I know where to turn.

These are the foods that will hold me steady.

These are the foods that are both satisfying to eat and give me the stable energy I need to get through the next part of the day.

Finding Your Anchor Foods

Do you want to know what your anchor foods and meals are? It may take some time and commitment, but you can definitely create your own list! Here are a few steps to get you started.

1. Track your food and mood

If you already have some idea as to how your food impacts your mood and energy, you may not have to go through this step. It is a very enlightening experience to go through, though!

Start by setting up a basic document on your computer, phone or in a paper journal. Simply note what you eat for each meal and then reflect on how you feel over the next few hours (or days).

Write down anything that seems relevant, whether it’s positive or negative. You might notice that you were hungry two hours later, or that you had a headache. Or maybe you felt energetic and stable (hint, that’s the feeling you’re aiming for!).

In doing this tracking work, you may notice that there are side effects up to 3 or 4 days later, so pay attention to that as well.

Here is a small list of some side effects that we can experience after eating certain foods:

itchy skin
bumps on skin or on back of tongue
sore throat
acid reflux
puffy skin, face or eyes
bloated tummy
sore and inflamed joints
acne
headaches
constipation
diarrhea
gas
mood swings
shaky or edgy feelings
anxiety
sluggishness or fatigue (need a nap)
poor concentration

2. Make some lists

As you begin to distinguish your your good-feeling days from the not-so-great days, look at the foods and meals you ate and start to compile your lists. I personally have 3 lists:

GREAT: foods that make me feel amazing (calm sense of health and wellness, with lots of energy and no side effects at all)

NEUTRAL: foods that make me feel ok and I digest them ok

BLEH: foods that don’t make me feel my best and maybe give me some side effects (event though they may be foods I enjoy!)

3. Add to your lists

As you continue tracking your food and mood/energy, add to your lists. Once you’ve gone through a couple of weeks or a month of tracking, you will have some fairly comprehensive lists of foods that make you feel amazing, ok and not that great.

Side note: Just because there are foods on your “not that great” list, doesn’t mean you can’t eat them anymore. You can eat anything you like! But now you’ll be making more of a conscious decision, knowing what to expect afterward.

For example, I love pancakes on the weekend, but when mixed with maple syrup and coffee, I know that my moods can start to swing (as can my husband’s!). I’ll still choose to eat pancakes from time to time, but maybe I’ll use some grated apple and yogurt as a topping with a wee bit of maple syrup – I am Canadian after all! – and opt for tea instead of coffee.

4. Create your anchor meals

Focus on the “amazing” list and see what meal ideas pop out for you.

What’s your anchor breakfast? What keeps you feeling great all morning right up until lunchtime?

What’s your anchor lunch that doesn’t give you that 3pm crash?

What’s your anchor supper that is satisfying but light enough to go to bed comfortably?

What are the meals that give you a calm sense of health and wellness, with lots of energy and no side effects?

You can have multiple anchor meals if you choose, but I personally just have one or two menus per meal.

For example, my anchor breakfast is: gluten-free oatmeal cooked in water with cinnamon, half an apple and a couple of raisins, topped with some pecan pieces, almond butter and hemp seeds. I know when I have this breakfast that I will be deeply satisfied and full of energy until lunchtime. (There’s a photo of it at the top of this post, served in my first-ever pottery bowl creation. I swear it tastes even better in this bowl!)

5. Use your anchor meals

Now that you have your anchor meals, remember them! Write them down or commit them to memory. Use them anytime you need to go back to basics and reset your taste buds to the foods you know work best for you, your body and your mind.

This isn’t something that can be figured out overnight. It takes time, commitment and compassionate self-awareness to get your anchor foods and meals sorted.

Sometimes it can be helpful to have someone supporting you and encouraging you through the process; that’s what I had when I was working with a holistic nutritionist. She was there to point out things that weren’t necessarily obvious to me in my tracking. I found her insight immensely valuable. For this reason, I have included anchor food work in Flourish, my eight-week wellness program with 1-on-1 mentoring.

Flourishing in your life starts with flourishing in your body and mind.

That’s why we start with food and movement in week one of the program and it’s something that continues throughout the whole month, even as we go through other topics. It’s the foundation for everything!

Now that you have the tools to find your anchor foods and meals, I encourage you to explore your food/mood/energy to see what works best for you. Once you’ve established your anchor foods, you’ll naturally be drawn to them because you know it’s what’s best for your body and mind.