For a long time, I labeled certain habits as unhealthy without really interrogating where that judgment came from. I absorbed ideas quietly, through tone rather than instruction, through implication rather than fact. 

Things you do late at night are bad. Repetition means stagnation. Comfort means avoidance. If something does not push you forward, it must be pulling you back. I did not question those assumptions for years. I just organized my life around them.

The habit I am talking about is one I practiced in private and apologized for in my head every time I did it. A habit that felt grounding, regulating, and deeply personal, but that I had been taught to mistrust because it did not look productive or aspirational.

Letting go of that judgment changed more than my routine. It changed how I listen to myself.

The Habit I Kept Trying to Outgrow

The habit was simple and almost embarrassingly ordinary. Late at night, when the day had worn me down in quiet ways, I would make the same small comfort meal and eat it slowly, usually alone, usually standing in the kitchen with the lights low. 

Nothing curated. Nothing balanced. Just something warm, salty, and familiar enough to settle my body.

For years, I treated this habit like a phase I was supposed to outgrow. Something childish. Something indulgent. I told myself that emotionally healthy people did not need repetition or ritual to calm down. They journaled. They breathed. They went to bed early with clean thoughts.

So I tried to replace it. Herbal tea instead of food. Distraction instead of warmth. Discipline instead of listening. None of it worked as well.

Why I Thought It Was Unhealthy

I thought the habit was unhealthy because it did not fit into any framework I respected at the time. It was not about improvement. It was not optimized. It did not build resilience or discipline in the way those words are usually sold to us.

It happened at night, which already carried a moral weight. It involved food, which came with its own set of rules and judgments. And most importantly, it was soothing, which I had been taught to associate with avoidance rather than regulation.

I confused comfort with weakness and calm with complacency. That confusion kept me from trusting something that was actually helping me..

The Difference Between Numbing and Regulating

This was the distinction I had to learn the hard way. Numbing disconnects you from sensation. Regulating brings you back into it in a controlled way.

This habit never made me feel absent. It made me feel present. I tasted the food. I noticed the temperature. I stayed with myself instead of disappearing into a screen or into overthinking.

If something consistently brings you back into your body rather than pulling you out of it, that is not unhealthy. That is information.

How Shame Kept Me From Seeing the Truth

The shame around this habit was subtle but persistent. I did not talk about it. I framed it as a guilty pleasure instead of what it actually was, which was care.

Shame thrives in secrecy. Once I started being honest with myself about why I did this and how it actually made me feel, the shame had nothing to attach to anymore. The habit did not change. My relationship to it did.

I stopped rushing through it. I stopped justifying it. I let it be what it was meant to be.

The Science I Did Not Need to Validate It

At some point, I looked into why this habit worked so well. Warm food, repetitive actions, familiar flavors, predictable rituals. Nervous system regulation. Sensory grounding. All the words people use when they want to legitimize something.

It was reassuring, but it was not necessary. My body already knew.

I no longer need research to tell me that something works if I can feel it working consistently.

Once I stopped labeling the habit as unhealthy, it stopped feeling compulsive. That surprised me. I had assumed that allowing myself comfort would lead to excess or loss of control.

The opposite happened. The habit became gentler. Less urgent. More intentional. Because it was no longer forbidden, it no longer carried that edge of desperation.

The Quiet Power of Allowing Yourself Comfort

There is something deeply stabilizing about allowing yourself comfort without negotiation. It sends a message inward that you are paying attention, that you trust yourself to respond appropriately to your own needs.

That trust builds confidence in a way no discipline ever did.

I would tell my past self that she is not weak for needing this. That needing grounding does not mean she is failing at regulation. That comfort is not the opposite of strength.

I would tell her to stop trying to earn rest and start responding to her body with curiosity instead of correction.

Outro

I used to think this habit was unhealthy because I had learned to mistrust anything that did not look productive or controlled. I was wrong. The habit was never the problem. The judgment was.

Now, I see it for what it is. A quiet, reliable way of taking care of myself when words and strategies fall short. A form of regulation that does not need validation or explanation.

Not every habit is meant to improve you. Some are meant to keep you steady. And once I learned the difference, I stopped trying to outgrow what was actually holding me together.