Level 1/ Days 1-3: Learning & Re-Learning

Workout & Nutrition:

• Meta Level 1, Days #1-3
• Re-Learning a Healthy Food Relationship (Un-Learning Emotional Eating)

Thoughts:

I am feeling the burn every day from Level 1. Honestly I'm a little surprised because it's not like I had been working out recently and in fact my bootcamp/mat/pds workouts are longer than meta. And yet, my legs have been wonderfully sore these last three days. Makes me very happy to know how effective Meta is! It is a really wonderful thing to have experience under my belt from last year when I made it to level 8. It's really great to know that challenges that once seemed impossible are doable when taken one day at a time. It's powerful to know my personal best is what is required to succeed and not perfection. It is just amazing how our brains form such deep grooves from our habits because on day one I found myself yet again thinking "oh this is too hard, I'm too out of shape, I'll never get better at this, I should find an easier workout"...thank goodness I've learned through experience that none of these things are true! It's one thing to take somebody's word at try to internalize it as truth, but it's such a different thing to be able to learn based on our own experiences.

My un-learning emotional eating is continuing to go well thankfully and this is something I'm so pleased about. I want to be clear that I am not at the point where I eat only when I'm hungry and stop the instant I'm full. But I would say I'm probably 75-80% there which blows my mind considering how many years upon years I've been eating for every reason there is to eat other than hunger (stress, boredom, lonliness, fear, anxiety, depression, avoidance/procrastination). I am still dealing with bouts of depression because I'm allowing my feelings to be, rather than suppressing them with food. However, I don't think the depression is that much more than when I was suppressing my feelings with food. And again, I know I'm moving in the right direction moving away from emotional eating and I am simply going on faith here that I will learn how to better deal with things and that better things are in my future. I feel like since I'm living more in truth, and therefore with a clearer head, that hopefully better solutions will come.

Things I'm Continuing to Re- Learn:

1. My Personal best is good enough- It does not matter if I can only do ten reps at a time on certain exercises. Just keep going because I will improve from wherever I'm starting and will without a doubt continue to improve, but I must keep going forward.
2. Take Things one day at a time- It is ridiculously easy to get overwhelmed, so please allow each day's challenges to be taken one day at a time. Each day will amount to something once enough time passes. But again, I must keep going forward to see that come to fruition.
3. I Am indeed stronger than I know- Sometimes I have to allow my brain to stay out of the way because it tries to convince me that things are too difficult. And yet, if I ignore my brain I find that the workout or particular leg move is already over and I can't believe I made it through.
4. Remebering the workout is only 1 hour a day- How short an hour is for all the payback that this program delivers! This is applicable when I don't want to do the left leg (it's only ten minutes more) or I don't want to do the cardio (it's merely 30 minutes).
5. Keep Questioning my beliefs and use my thoughts to my advantage-Today I thought to myself "I am too tired to do the cardio" (this was 5 minutes into my cardio btw.) So of course my old habits pop into my head, "well you are out of shape and this is a hard workout and you ate poorly today". Then my newer habit popped into my head "yes but lucky for you doing your cardio will give you energy in the long run whereas stopping it will not." yay! can't argue with that one!

Fluctuating Emotions and the Power to Ignore

Foodwise I've been generally keeping up my new habit of recognizing the difference between wanting to eat out of emotion versus wanting to eat out of hunger. I wouldn't say I only eat when I'm hungry and stop the instant I'm full, but I have made in my mind a monumental shift.

I am constantly recognizing that the thing I use food for more than anything is for AVOIDANCE. Even today, I wanted to avoid all sorts of little things in regards to dealing with my life, or life circumstances. And so quickly, like split second I was misinterpreting these signals as hunger. I went to the fridge probably 3 times today, opened it up and remembered, oh yeah this isn't hunger and walked right out of the kitchen. It is such an ingrained thing to think food will solve whatever issue I'm dealing with. In my mind I think, oh as soon as I eat this I will feel...energized, focus, calm, more put together, settled, and that's why I need to eat before I can deal with (fill in the blank). I don't think any of those things has ever happened after a meal. Quite the opposite actually. I'm inclined to feel sleepier, out of control, and left wondering what happened to the clarity that was supposed to come from that meal? And then I'd search for something else thinking the first meal was the issue, and not the fact that the reason food didn't solve my problem is because hunger wasn't my problem. That's pretty big to me that I've made it to that next step that I recognize my feelings but now instead of eating in spite of those feelings I'm mostly able to walk away from the food.

Something I noticed is if I plan to eat something, and then I ask myself what are you going to eat afterwards it also helps me tell if I'm hungry or eating emotionally. If I'm hungry I think I won't want anything after this meal. If I'm emotional, I start going through a list of other things I'll eat as soon as I'm done with the current meal. I also check to see what I plan to do after the meal. I've asked myself several times, are you hungry...yes, are you really hungry...no. But I'm not forcing myself not to eat, and it goes beyond just acknowledging what I'm feeling. I'm actually REALIZING I am not hungry and food will not solve my issue. Does that mean things are peachy keen?...Well, no not exactly. And yet I do believe it's still progress.

I mentioned the other day how stopping eating emotionally is not when you start to feel better, because now I'm dealing with my actual uncomfortable emotions rather than suppressing those emotions with food. And now, I am finding myself sitting here, pacing, scratching my head, shedding a few tears with what I'm to do next. I want someone to rescue me because in this moment it feels like I cannot rescue myself. And yet here I am still standing, still breathing. To my surprise, not stuffing my emotions has not been the end of me. Am I comforted? no. Would food bring me comfort? surprisingly no.

So now I'm looking for that comfort and I'm not yet sure where to find it. I tried praying, and I haven't given up on prayer but when you don't feel any different after you've prayed you wonder if anyone actually hears you...well the point is, thusfar it hasn't brought me the level of comfort I'm looking for. I tried talking to my bf and he supports me the best he can, he really does. He's amazing! But in talking to him I realized too that in my mind I want him to drop everything in his life so he can focus on taking care of me, of rehabilitating me. And that's not really reasonable. So that leaves me with counseling which I've not yet tried but it feels like another obstacle to overcome to find a counselor and the fear of will this actually work or will it make me feel worse comes up.

I feel like I need rehab. I don't know what rehab actually entails but in my mind it entails a supportive counselor who helps you discover how you can help yourself. It's removed from your current life in a peaceful setting so there's a certain degree of not being smack in the middle of your problems. And maybe there's massages? These things don't seem so unreasonable. A counselor, massages, and a peaceful environment.

I'm sorry this one was a bit of a downer. It's not all bad. I'm moving forward, I'm not stuffing myself with food. But now I'm in uncharted territory wondering: if I'm not going to eat to procrastinate dealing with my emotions anymore, how do I actually deal with them?

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Oh my goodness I was so depressed yesterday! I am feeling a ton better today. I ended up killing time at Target yesterday and picked up a book by Joel Osteen called Every Day a Friday. While he is a pastor and I don't have a religious affiliation, I was skimming through the book and found a lot of positive messages in it that were very applicable to me. So I sat reading it and reading it and finally after a while I started to feel little glimmers of hope in me again. It simply helped me remember what hope felt like.

The most powerful message I've gotten from it so far is this. He said something along the lines of: "People are fully entitled to express their opinion." Now I didn't like hearing that because while I feel people are entitled having an opinion I don't like hearing rudeness or having to deal with their opinion if I didn't ask for it. But then he said "And you are fully entitled to ignore them". That was something I'd never really heard before, that my option to ignore them was just as powerful as their option to have a negative judgement. But the way he said it really struck a chord with me. It gave me back a sense of power. I am unhealthily sensitive to others' negative comments or negativity in general. It makes me so mad/sad because I'll think to myself "why are people like that?" But when he said I was fully entitled to ignore it, it just empowered it. It made me feel that I could function even if someone had a negative opinion of me because I have power too, and that's the power to choose that their opinion is irrelevent in my life if it doesn't serve my life. That even though I heard it, doesn't mean it has any power. That even though they may try to burden me with their negativity, that I can say no thank you without saying a word. My power is within me, not within them. I know these sound like logical things, but sometimes a phrase just resonates at a deeper level. And that little phrase made me feel so much better today. Happy Weekend!

Having a Cold Changed my Eating Habits

So this past week has been very interesting foodwise, borderline revolutionary but it's only been a week so we'll see if that revoluion leads to a permanent evolution. Anyway, basically I caught a cold, and in spite of that my body wanted to move through the stretching and limber movements of the method and so I moved. Then I got my period and this month had no pains! And so...I moved some more. These 2 obstacles have derailed my efforts in the past, but this time my body and carried me through. Now for the food...

My cold had the side effect of suppressing my appetite, not to unhealthy levels but to normal levels. It seemed to suppress my brain as well to a more calm attitude surrounding food. It started a week ago, on Friday when I received a complimentary app, meal w/side and dessert from one of my favorite restaurants...free food! And the thing was that as much as I wanted to eat this yummy food, my body didn't want too. It felt full before it felt stuffed. And let me clarify that the vast majority of the time I can feel stuffed with a pregnant looking belly and still not feel full or satiated.

So, this pattern continued over the course of the days that I had a cold. Then the cold healed and I was left with this experience of what it feels like to eat, to feel full, and to stop thinking/stop obsessing about food all day til my next meal. Now it wasn't as easy as when I had a cold, but it was probably about 50% there. The other 50% came from me talking myself through these situations.

For example, I passed by a bag of chips, my biggest source of quick and empty calories and a definite trigger food where if I see it I'm compelled to eat it. My first instinct was to grab some chips, literally without any conscious thought. But then I asked myself, "is that what i want... yes" came the answer. Suspecting this wasn't true I asked myself, "is that what you really want, because if it is you can have some... no". "what do you really want...i dont' know, but not food." Wow, when does that ever happen?

Even though I've recognized for a long time that I'm an emotional eater and stress eater, I was able to take to to the next level by actually rejecting the food. I had a couple other thoughts as well that I've realized.

1) When I stop emotionally eating it is uncomfortable not because I'm doing the wrong thing, but because I'm not using the food to suppress my uncomfortable feelings. Whereas I want to feel like I'm taking a step forward by not emotionally eating, the discomfort tricks me because the negative feelings makes me seem like I'm taking a step backwards. I realized, however, that those feelings of discomfort are in fact taking a step forward, because now I can actually deal with those feelings. Dealing with the feelings is the next step. The next step after that is the feeling better part (I presume), but in order to get there I realized I am in fact making progress by not suppressing my discomfort.

2) Whereas before I thought eating emotionally made me feel better (because food tastes good) I realized that eating emotionally makes me feel WORSE! I feel physically worse because I've over eaten. But now I'm not only not dealing with my original issues but I now have a weight issue to deal with it on top of that. Emotional eating is not suppressing my problems, and it is not even a neutral event. Emotional eating ONLY has negative side effects. I remember when I first started meta last year and when I was depressed or stressed and didn't want to exercise I would ask myself, "will not exercising make the problem with work/people/etc go away?...no". So somehow it occurred to me to ask the same thing about food, "will eating this help with x,y,z, situation, no" In fact I realized the only problem eating solves is hunger. It serves a wonderful purpose and that is to feed myself, but eating only solves one problem, hunger...it does not solve any other problem and as I stated before only makes my other problems worse because I now have a weight issue to deal with on top of those other things.

3) The last thing was that I refused to diet ever again. I had heard Portia de Rossi say those words"refuse to diet ever again" on a youtube video for her book tour where she talked about her eating disorder. This makes it tricky at first because it feels like if I refuse to diet then where does that leave me if I want to lose weight? But instead, since dieting was truly no longer an option in my mind, it further nudged my brain to say dealing with this eating is not going to be solved with a diet so you've got to figure something else out.

The thing is, it really has been less of a struggle. I'm not fighting myself and wanting to eat in spite of my logical realizations. Instead I find myself surprisingly disappointed at the realization that food will in fact not solve these other problems. At least in the moment I'm disappointed to realize this. At the end of the day, I am soooooo happy to not feel ravenous all day, to not obsess about food all day, and to truly feel a sense of freedom around food I haven't felt since I was a child. I know I've had food epiphany's before so I don't yet know if this is a permanent change. But for now, it feels good to know, not just logically but deep inside me, that food is wonderful, but food is just food and nothing more.