…or as I also like to call it, painful but necessary. Specifically, I’m referring to inner-healing and salving past wounds, whether they occurred yesterday or 30 years ago.
Sometimes, I’ll find an e-mail in my inbox desperately seeking a Pep-Talk. Just about always, the urgency centers around wanting to be rid of excess weight, and it always stirs mixed emotions in me from the past. I’ve been in the seeking position many times and each time I reached out for a jolt of inspiration, I’d feel hopeful for about 3 hours, then lapse back to where I was. And where I was, though support from others is crucial, could only be remedied by me and my actions. And nope, I’m not referring to weight-loss solutions.
It’s a fallacy then I can give someone a Pep Talk and turn them around, but the fact that they WANT one is a beginning. One of the many reasons Pep Talks don’t work is they skirt root issues. Far more effective is delving into one of the eight limbs of Yoga, known as Self-Inquiry, to ask yourself some probing, yet compassionate, questions:
What am I trying to deflect from by focusing on my weight?
Whom do I resent and why?
Are there areas in my life where I don’t feel I can speak freely?
Do I let myself cry when I feel the emotions surging, or do I shut myself down?
Who is currently mistreating me, or doesn’t bring the respect that I know I deserve?
Am I paid fairly for the work I do?
Was I quick to believe all the bad stuff about myself, and, do I hate parts of myself because of it?
Am I angry at myself for not standing up to people with their own unhealthy agendas? You know the type: the passive-aggressive friend who asks a question that’s really a dig so well-placed, it stings for days afterwards; or a family member who makes a remark about a food choice.
Get the picture?
It’s no wonder why so many of us willingly default to obsessing on weight, clothing size, muscle mass, and the merits of ketosis. The reason is simple: it’s less freaking painful!
Obviously, fitness and physical well-being are important, but if the above emotional issues have not been addressed at all, it’s a losing battle. And also know that just because you are broken at the present time doesn’t mean you are permanently out of commission. The process, I’ll be honest, it’s a long one, but what else do we have but time? And wouldn’t you rather start winning the battle right in the present moment? You can if you just agree to step into that private chamber of your heart, and compassionately, gently begin the process of asking..
Repetitive comfort. It’s what I sought in order to survive. Some days it was about survival, but most often, I employed its technique to feel better by paving over a painful existence. My form of it boiled down to this: fill every corner of my mouth with a delightful-tasting substance, chew, swallow, repeat. And repeat, and repeat.
Repetitive comfort is a need from within that’s primal. It has been used to soothe tension and tears for millennia. Softly humming to oneself while working a task, the gentle click of needles that transform yarn to scarf, putting brush to canvas while painting a picture, or a mother rocking a baby gently in her arms (I don’t think anything tops that one), all pay homage to the allure of enjoyable repetition.
At one time labeled myself a food-addict and declared myself to be untrustworthy and out of control where food is concerned. I’ve since changed my mind about that position, especially since the label was the result of herd-coercion from one of the support groups I attended back in the early days of healing. What I’ve come to realize instead is, there were parts of me I’d gagged and bound, and they were desperate for attention. When I began tending to the wounded and dispirited parts of me, the need to dull my senses with food diminished. I’m the first to admit that food is here to both please and nurture us. That’s a fact and shouldn’t be dismissed with the worn-out ‘food as fuel’ rationales…that, as anyone who has attempted to live it, is only partially true.
I’ve been at this part-time job known as healing and wound-releasing for the better part of three decades and am divested from much of my wounding – enough to live a life of relative ease and clarity. Certain vagaries of life still drive me to seek comfort, and I balance it by sitting with unpleasant situations and feelings because running from them only compounds their troubling nature. But about that comfort-seeking….I’ve found some delightful ways to indulge in it, and yes, much of it involves repetitive acts. I’ll simply never tire of a soothing rhythm that goes on and on for as long as I need it. Which brings me to Ang So Hum, the song posted below. Roughly translated to “I Am That,” I discovered the beautiful melody during a recent yoga class at Aura Kundalini Yoga via Zoom. The instructor, a recovered addict, said the 22-minute song is one of his favorite ways to ground and soothe. You may already have a repertoire of music that feels like a long, safe, lingering hug. I ascribe to the Ray Charles rule of there being two kinds of music: good and bad, but when it comes to soothing my soul, I’m partial to chanting and kirtan. I heard it for the first time more than 20 years in the car while listening to a college radio station. I was on lunch break from a toxic job and in between drive-thru stops. The power of the song stopped me in my tracks and actually diverted me from the contents of my Wendy’s bag for a few moments. I knew at an instantaneous, soul level, I wanted more and more of it. I bought CD’s and listened regularly. This did not magically eradicate binge-eating, but it opened a door to allow some much-needed light. I followed at my own pace, and slowly discovered other forms of comfort and relief outside the realm of eating. A profound discovery if there ever was one.
It’s great, of course, to have a cache of healthy coping techinques at the ready. The trick I’ve learned, during these turbulent times, is not waiting to use them until I’m in frothing crisis mode from stress and aggravation. Soothing music, especially music that’s created with Intention, is also good prevention. So pardon me while I put my headphones on, turn off the TV, and dial down the cortisol.
As one who has been on the metaphoric battlefield for most of my life, I harbor a significant amount of scars, and I’m not referring to the stretch marks which were embedded at age 11. I’m talking about the intangible remnants in the wake of school bullies, disapproving and disappointed parents, food scarcity from forced dieting, emotional demons, and the ensuing result of all of the above: excess weight. This physical symptom of my emotionally turbulent life has caused much scorn to be heaped upon my body. From me, those close to me, total strangers, and the ever-looming, constantly leering dieting industry with its amoral empty promises and a litany of insidious ways to practice self-hatred.
Many of you know my weight-release journey began from within. There are plenty of past blog posts, as well as my books which attest to this. I dropped a significant amount of weight more than 11 years ago, the end result of healing my inner wounds. It was an exhilarating time of freedom and discovery. What I didn’t know until recently was, there’s more to be healed. Significantly more. But that’s life and I’m not upset by this news. On the contrary, if there are more layers of the healing onion to be stripped away, let ’em rip. Still, I was shocked when I got the revelation – straight from the source: my body, who it turns out, knows more than I ever imagined. It is ever attendant to what is, and ever the receptacle for what has been, including trauma. Including every unkind word and thought I’ve sent it: Thoughts of the self-loathing variety which, culturally, were not only accepted 20+ years ago but encouraged. Growing up, I routinely heard adult women berate themselves for enjoying food, or for not having a body that fit the standards of acceptability. If you couldn’t be a good girl and look the part, you could at least redeem yourself with regular self-flagellation. Sound familiar? If it is, my deep sympathies to you and your amazing body. As one who had no fear of self-inquiry, I was well aware of the toxic dynamic women and young girls are subjected to. But I thought I’d eradicated the damage with years of positive affirmations, self-help books, and therapy. I made progress, to be sure, but discovered there’s more road to hoe. And the thing about our own personal onion is, we have no knowledge there’s another layer to be peeled until the moment it reveals itself.
My latest revelation came after some unignorable messages from my body in the form of pain, fatigue, weight gain, and low-energy. Eventually, blood tests revealed autoimmune irregularities. I’m treating the physical symptoms with medication and nutrition, but in my gut, I knew more needed to be done. So I underwent four hypnosis sessions to dig deeper. The answers, as always, lay in the underappreciated splendor of the body. It wasn’t just trying to get my attention, it was screaming for it and it was time, I finally realized, to give it the time and respect it deserved. Sitting down with pen and paper, I asked for answers, promising to both listen and follow through with whatever might be requested of me. What had my body been wanting to convey to me with the symptoms of pain and fatigue? There’s always an emotional corollary to disease and I wanted to uncover mine. The answers flowed, as if my body had been waiting eagerly for the dialog. I’m sharing the exchange because I encourage you to undergo a similar dialog with your best friend and closest ally. And even if you’re not on great terms now, making the time to really listen, followed by a resolve to make reparations is a fantastic beginning. Here’s to diving in, making amends, and knowing you are not alone.
What follows if my body’s response to me:
“I cannot carry it anymore. The pain of betrayal. You have betrayed me so many times, and I am here to serve your existence in this reality. I am your host, you are my guest. You have not been a gracious guest. You have hurt and ignored me in so many ways.
Acknowledging that you were influenced by the collective and had horrible messages from the start, it still hurt me. The decision you made, the beliefs you adopted about me, about us, they wounded me deeply and I have never done anything but serve you and work for you and love you and make you comfortable here.
You, in turn, turned on me. Be grateful my woundedness and discontent are only manifesting as pain. There are far worse outcomes as you know – you have seen some of them. At a certain point, we break, we are only able to tolerate so much disrespect and mistreatment. Then it is time to close the shop.
I am equipped with a strong will to perpetuate your life, but if you don’t do your part, it’s ultimately a losing battle. I can’t do it anymore the way things have been going. Like the USA, reparations and acknowledgements need to be made. You did what you needed to do to survive a horrendous childhood where you were not loved adequately, respected, and affirmed, but the fact is, I suffered greatly from your neglect, from your toxic thoughts and beliefs, from the hatred from you and others.
I need for this to finally be heard. I need to be truthful with you. The way you treated me hurt me deeply. We have made progress, but I don’t trust you fully. Trust is everything in a relationship. Everything. Then respect. But there can be no respect if there isn’t trust. Every unkind thought, every bout of food scarcity, everytime you hissed at me in disapproval hurt me so much.
I came to you as a precious creation of Divine Intelligence. We were best friends for the first few years, then, the war began. I know you were under cultural influences, but the sad part is, I am your authority and guiding light – not TV, magazines, parents, or classmates. I Am the one who can guide you to wholeness and happiness. But you must have the courage and willingness to step out of the cultural trance and see the lies and manipulation. So you have gained weight – so what? Are you going to let a sick and unwhole culture influence and degrade you? Perhaps the weight is a teacher. There is gold to be mined in this new phase, but only if you align with me and NOT outside influences who conspire to keep you weak through shame and preoccupation with perfection.
But first, before we can fully align, I need you to acknowledge my sorrow at your betrayal. At listening to others before me. Please sit with this, not as punishment – I never punish – but as a healing process.
Please, please, please listen to me. That is all I ask. Hear me. Trust me. Honor me. I don’t have it in me to let you down, but I will eventually break down from lack of love, from a severed connection. Please wake up to the Truth and return to me.”
Taken utterly aback, the first thing I did was apologize. I was and am truly remorseful for jumping on the hate band wagon and being so unkind to my body. Secondly, I am agreeing to dialog regularly, appreciate often, and listen intently to my body’s needs, whether it’s for food, movement, or rest. No request it too frivelous. There’s a lot of making up to do and I must say, it feels very right.
Post-Script – a few insights I got, post-writing:
Instead of the automatic response of ‘something’s wrong with my body,’ switch to ‘Something needs tending, or Love.’
I blamed you (body) when the appropriate thing to do is Thank my body.
I abused my body because I was scared and abused.
I chose to look at you as the source of all my misery. You are the source of my connection to life.
And further revelation from my body: Hear me, don’t steer me.
Who’s hungry? I almost forgot today is National Mac & Cheese Day! In its honor, I give you a clean and worthy version, one that won’t cause bloating, cramping, emotional fog and all the other attendant vagaries that can occur on a post-gluten and dairy adventure.
Back in the old days, the descending of a cloying and debilitating fog is precisely what I was after. Food was a salve, escape, and distraction from all that I refused to acknowledge. I actually am quite grateful for all those cans of Franco American macaroni and cheese I hastily zapped to an acceptable state of warmth in the microwave. I’d become adept at zeroing in on the perfect number of seconds required. Too soon and it would still be cold. Too long on the timer and the noodles were too hot to touch, and THAT did not fly for someone whose wellbeing hinged on instant gratification.
Overeating to cope is a multilayered problem with multi-layered solutions. Sure, clean eating and exercise went a long way, but on their own, those two techniques would have been unsustainable without a prolonged focus on inner-healing and a commitment to keep that garden tended for a lifetime. For more on that, I recommend my book, “The Untended Soul,” because if you don’t pay your soul first, life just won’t work the way God intended.
In the meantime, feed yourself kind thoughts and good food. Hope you enjoy Chef Bill’s re-imaginging of one of my favorite comfort foods!
I reached for one of my favorite mugs this morning, not so much because Mother’s Day is approaching, but I love its bright colors. The enameled pink, gold, and yellow caught my eye the second I spotted it on a shelf at Marshall’s one day last year. Coffee mugs are my handbags, and this one emitted cheer. As I reached to claim it as mine, I suddenly froze. Emblazoned across its surface were the words “World’s Best Mom.” Not really appropriate, I thought, given that I’d never birthed a child. Then I noticed Bill standing in front if me, fresh from a victory lap around the men’s shirt department. He’d landed the ultimate prize: a Mark Graham shirt at 70% off, and saw I was seriously eying the mug.
“I really love the colors,” I said, holding it up to the light. “Do you think it’s weird that I buy this?
‘You’re a step-mom to Zach and a doggie-mom to Sophia, of course you should get it,” was his immediate response.
So it came home with us that day, and I use it regularly, often on gloomy, overcast days when I’m wanting a burst of color. And one morning as I sipped coffee, set it down, and admired it for the 127th time, it dawned on me that there’s another role I’ve played in this lifetime: that of mother to myself.
As the self-help pioneer Louise Hay pointed out in her 1984 book, “You Can Heal Your Life,” we’re all victims of victims of victims. In other words, even our parents, virtuous as they may be, can be inborn with flaws, and when any two people join forces to parent, they lock in place a unique template that combines cultural mores, personality quirks, societal values, inherited wounding, and character strengths. It’s a wildcard of a ride if there ever was one, and the results for offspring range from lingering unmet needs to deep emotional scars.
Suffice it to say, I left the nest with unmet needs aplenty. Just as I’m sure my parents did, and their parents, and on and on.
Learning how to nurture myself in order to fill in some of the missing pieces was an ongoing process. First on the agenda was feeling the feelings. The little girl who was routinely chastised for having feelings and being ‘too sensitive,’ was now free to cry, rage, whimper…whatever I needed to do. I journaled my feelings onto paper, punched them onto pillows, and when I felt strong enough, had honest talks (also known as confrontations) with others about my feelings. Also critical to the process: seeking support from like-minded people. No one does it alone, nor should you try. For many years, I nourished my needs and unburdened my hurting inner-self at 12-step meetings, therapy sessions, metaphysical workshops, and over countless cups of coffee with empathetic friends.
This wellspring of permission to nurture cemented a solid sense of self that shame, all those years ago, had once thwarted. And guess what? It was SO much more effective than dieting. It’s pretty fascinating to contemplate that only a single consonant separates the words ‘pounds’ and ‘wounds.’ It’s a reality I encourage my clients to focus on because that’s where the true and lasting healing lies.
But food, of course, cannot and should not be ignored. And for my path to wholeness, I had to start from ground zero since I never had a shot at a normal relationship with it. As a child of the 70’s, dieting was not only a pastime but a moral imperative. I couldn’t escape the mandate, even at summer camp, where I was sent to “the diet table,” a place for the chubby campers and counselors. Sullen outcasts, we sat eating vegetables and cottage cheese in a room segregated off the dining hall, and we always left each meal light on nourishment and pumped up with shame. Growing up, food was not a simple noun, but a vortex of swirling emotions that stirred both fascination and disgust within me. Food was judged, regulated, literally hidden and locked away, and largely forbidden. And I also needed it desperately to feel better.
This aggravated not only low self-esteem but my weight and I wrestled with both for decades. Until the day I decided a do-over was in order. In tandem with the inner work I was doing, I inverted the equation and transformed shame into joy, rebuke into permission, and eating in secret to eating openly and with abandon. Yup, I went overboard with quantity but I needed to. It was a necessary passage and part of me taking control and offering myself recompense for all the years the locusts of deprivation and recrimination devoured my shot at a stable existence.
To get more insights on this I refer you to my cookbook-memoir “Clean Comfort.” But with no calendar mandates for progress reports, unlimited patience, and a resolve to treat myself with the same kindness I treat a friend, the rift between food and me was healed, as was the relationship I had with my body, soul, and inner child who, at the core, didn’t really want all that revenge-eating, but instead only simple, unmitigated acceptance.
Food has a much different place in my life now. I seek pleasure from it for sure, but also nourishment. Like the hot cereal made from quinoa piled into the mug in this photo. There’s an interesting metaphor for sure with my love of hot cereal the way it mimics baby food in appearance and texture.
I find foods that are soft and creamy to be inherently comforting. And in the case of hot cereal, I make it nourishing as well as comforting. My taste buds no longer exclusively run the show. My body has an equal vote now and loves things like flax seeds, hemp hearts, and coconut oil. (See all kinds of hot cereal recipes on this site for more details).
So as I sit on my balcony, on one of the first warm and beautiful days of the year, I contemplate with gratitude my ability to be my own mother, even as I acknowledge the irony of spending my reproductive years recovering from an unhappy childhood. I also remember all the women in my life who imbued me with maternal kindness and gave me comfort and reassurance when I needed it. The rock in this photo came from a beach on Lake George where I spent childhood summers. The beach belonged to my Aunt Mary, who was a best friend, grandmother, aunt and occasional mother-figure who melted into empathy if I was sad. She’s been gone for 20 years now and I still thank God for her.
Sometimes, when holidays such as Mother’s Day and Father’s Day roll around, there are mixed and unresolved feelings bubbling beneath the surface. It’s OK. I repeat it’s OK to have mixed emotions. They were human and so are you. There’s no perfect script to follow. And whatever you do, please don’t use sappy TV commercials as a template.
Whatever Mother’s Day evokes for you, the good news is, we can reach inward to listen…with stillness, compassion, and profound love.
