Are You Breaking Your Own Heart?

This passage from author and wise woman Anne Lamott really resonates with me:

“Oh my God, what if you wake up some day, and you’re 65, or 75, and you never got your memoir or novel written; or you didn’t go swimming in warm pools and oceans all those years because your thighs were jiggly and you had a nice big comfortable tummy; or you were just so strung out on perfectionism and people-pleasing that you forgot to have a big juicy creative life, of imagination and radical silliness and staring off into space like when you were a kid? It’s going to break your heart. Don’t let this happen.”

In the past, I’ve shared how I let my so-called inadequacies and imperfections stop me from fully living.

I let the size of my body dictate the size of my life.

It breaks my heart when I think about how much time, energy and life force we waste berating ourselves for not having a better body and obsessing about how to fix it.

I often wonder, if we weren’t thinking about this, what would we be thinking about?

Where would we be putting all our energy?

How different would our lives be?

How different would the world be?

My highest intention is to help end this needless suffering so none of us dies wishing we would have gone swimming.

Pick a New Direction
I’ve seen with myself and with my clients that it is possible to replace criticism with compassion, judgment with curiosity, loathing with loving, rejection with acceptance, playing small with living big.

As Anne Lamott says, it all starts with the willingness to...

“Pick a new direction, one you wouldn’t mind ending up at, and aim for that. Shoot the moon.”

My Two Thanksgiving Wishes for You...

I have two Thanksgiving wishes for you...
 
1. Slow Down
Years ago, I spent hours with two other women preparing a delicious Thanksgiving feast, only to watch our guests scarf it down in less than 15 minutes, then leave the table. Barely a sentence was spoken throughout the entire meal.

They grabbed dessert and headed back to the TV leaving the cooks behind as we stared at our half-empty plates.

I was disappointed and, well, really annoyed.

My first wish for you this Thanksgiving is to slow down.

Savor every moment and morsel.

Linger over your meal enjoying good conversation with your table mates. Truly taste and savor each and every bite.

My family has a fun tradition of posing questions to the entire table then taking turns answering them. Everyone participates, from ages 6 to 80.

Questions range from “What movie character would you like to be?” and “If you could be any flavor of ice cream, what would you be and why? to "What was your best day ever?”

By slowing down, you will experience greater pleasure and satisfaction and feel much more energized and connected to your body and your loved ones.

2. Write a Thank You Letter…to Your Body

Many of us spend an inordinate amount of time criticizing our body. 

Doing so causes unnecessary stress and suffering. It drains your energy and life force.

My second wish for you is that you begin to adopt a policy of kindness, compassion and acceptance toward your body.

As you count your blessing this Thanksgiving, take time to write a thank you letter to your body. Tell it absolutely everything you’re grateful for.

For example, thank your…

• heart for beating on its own and for feeling all kinds of love

• legs for enabling you to walk, run, dance, hike or ski

• arms for carrying your child or hugging a loved one

• eyes for seeing all the beauty and goodness in the world

• nose for smelling blooming flowers, baking bread, brewing coffee and freshly cut grass

• hands for performing millions of tiny miracles throughout the day, from tying shoes and texting friends to scratching your dog's belly and selecting a perfectly ripe avocado

This simple yet powerful act can put you on the path to creating a more loving, relaxed and peaceful relationship with your body.

For more tips on cultivating an attitude of gratitude, head on over to here.

How Do You Control Your Appetite?

Naturally, after bragging about how I never get sick to a gym mate, I was struck down with a nasty flu bug. My long list of symptoms included zero appetite. Not only was I not hungry, everything I ate tasted awful. 

After nearly two weeks, I knew I was on the road to recovery when I woke up one morning with a voracious appetite. It felt so good to feel hungry and get pleasure from food again.

Controlling Appetite
My experience prompted me to reflect on the importance of appetite. 

Every day, we're bombarded with messages about how to control, suppress or conquer our appetite. Thus, it's no surprise that many of us view our appetite as the enemy, something that can't be trusted, something to fear, something that must be controlled.

When you think about it, however, your appetite is essential for life. It keeps you alive by telling you it's time to eat. Fighting it simply goes against the laws of nature. 

Fighting your appetite also leads to cravings, binge eating and overeating. And, fighting anything puts your body in the physiologic stress response, which increases cortisol, a hormone that, when constantly elevated, contributes to adverse health conditions.

Yet, so many of us have been trained to believe that having an appetite is bad and that controlling it is good. 

In Caroline Knapp's book, Appetites, she speaks of our culturally conditioned suspicion that "hungers themselves are somehow invalid or wrong, that indulgences must be earned and paid for, that the satisfaction of appetites often comes with a bill...

...appetites are at best risky, at worst impermissible...yielding to hunger may be permissible under certain conditions, but most likely it's something to be Earned or Monitored and Controlled. A controlled appetite, prerequisite for slenderness, connotes beauty, desirability, worthiness."

Your Appetite: Friend or Foe?
How would you describe your relationship with your appetite?

Is it your friend or foe? Do you trust it, fight it, ignore it, override it? 

Do you feel anxious when it calls, powerful when you restrain it, or weak when you cave into it?

Finding Your Natural Appetite
It is possible to cultivate a natural, easy and life-affirming relationship with your appetite. Doing so requires tuning into the wisdom of your body and trusting it to guide you—not some external forces or a belief that wanting to eat says anything about who you are as a person.