Eating Peace: How do you end eating battles?

I received a powerful question the other day about ending eating arguments.

These would be those ones inside your own head.

Eat it! Don’t eat it! I’ll eat it! You shouldn’t eat it! Stop eating it! You ate it! You’re wrong! This sucks! You’re fat! You’ll GET fat! You’ll die of a disease! I can’t! I can! I need more! I need less! Too much! Not enough!

Those eating wars, fights, arguments, concerns, worries that happen on the inside of you.

The person asked me….

….”If I’ve tried everything, and I mean EVERYTHING under the sun known to humankind, to stop being out of balance with eating, food, my weight, my obsessive thoughts….

….what could I possibly have missed? 

Why would I want to take any of your programs?”

She went on to tell me she is 52 years old, and spent a lifetime working on this issue.

She began at age 8 when her mom and a doctor put her on a diet (taking a pill and restricting her food).

Like so many of us smart, educated, well-read people, she also knew practically enough to have a degree in nutritional science (no offense to those who actually have it, I know it’s expert work).

She had been to Overeater’s Anonymous and Weight Watchers, and Jenny Craig, and Fat Camps, and done low carb and raw diet (she actually enjoyed it quite a bit, but went off it one day).

She had studied the 12 steps deeply enough to attend AA meetings without feeling like an outsider even though she didn’t think of herself as an alcoholic. She could relate to “addict”.

She had also engaged in therapy with someone she trusted, to study her own emotional experience around eating.

But she still ate too much, and ate the “wrong” things.

She always failed.

What else was there left to do?

She asked me.

So.

What’s my honest answer?

Just Stop…..and get mega tons of support as you do it.

Stop trying to know, or find the answer, or do it all alone….and make THAT a practice in itself.

Then I shared with her a turning point for me that occurred with two things colliding together around the same time.

1. A commitment to no longer hurt myself. And if I did, I would keep walking the path of Not Hurting Myself. This was stoppingfor me.
2. If I thought I couldn’t stand it, or my love for myself was threatened (by over-eating, or under-eating) I would be absolutely and completely vulnerable and honest. I would reveal my humanness. I would reveal my shame (if I had it). I would ask for help, if that’s what was required. I would do my part. I would hold still, all alone, and wait for someone to come help, if that was required.

I know these are two pretty huge and gigantic, profound stands.

But they aren’t really.

The short versions could look like this:

1. Stop before you break the dish
2. Cry out for help (knowing it’s there) and shout, “I’m wanting to break the dish, help me!”

Notice.

There is no plan for what the outcome is, in either one of these energies.

No set idea for which way it will go.

No ideal weight, no special result, no serious rules to follow.

Except: 

1. Stop hurting yourself,
2. See what’s really true.

To get to that inner place of what I like to call Open Hands (no fighting) feels very hard.

At least it appears to be hard.

It appears to require some kind of intention, or ability to achieve it.

But is that true?

Are you sure?

Are you sure you need to find these things, and you’ve lost them? Or you came into this world with them missing?

Are you sure you’ve tried absolutely everything, and it’s completely hopeless?

Because I felt that way hundreds of times, as I look back on my experience of raging eating pain…..

…..but I’m still here.

I’m not only here, I’m writing about healing from eating. I’m living in my 25^th year since the last binge-eating episode. I am not destroying anything with eating, or trying to destroy or change something.

My life, however, looks very normal and not that exciting or unusual, when it comes to food and eating.

For example, the other day, I felt like eating ice cream and it was pretty late at night.

We had some kind of chocolate chip flavor in our freezer. I took a bite after dishing it out in a pretty little crystal bowl.

I tasted it.

Not that good.

I opened up the fridge and found chocolate syrup in a container on the door, I didn’t even know we had it in there.

I put it on the ice cream, remembering childhood days of this same canned syrup and ice cream and peanut butter.

But it still didn’t taste that great.

So I ate another bite, as if checking, but then rinsed it into the sink.

Slowly.

It wasn’t a sudden smack of “NO! I won’t! OMG!”

It was just….oh. Ha ha.

Almost like a little mini attempt for something, then discovery of the truth.

It’s not even good. I don’t like the taste in my mouth. Maybe I like the texture and the coolness and gooey-ness, but not the actual taste.

There was no willpower or controlling the ice cream necessary.

I realized I was quite thirsty, and very tired.

What I really wanted, was to drink a big huge glass of water, put away the project I had been working on, and go to sleep.

What I really wanted was to feel the absolute quiet of this moment, at 11:00 at night, at the end of a huge day with many clients and creativity and plans for an upcoming retreat on December 12th.

What I really knew was true, was that nothing was required, and I could have what I wanted instantly….now.

Silence.

Rest.

So how do we do it?

What would that even look like, in a program of study like Eating Peace?

What it looks like is practicing together, which is amazing, and enlightening, and supportive.

Just like people in the medical field practice first aid, or emergency procedures, by repeatedly having fire drills and role-playing.

Rehearsing.

When we’re joined in a group together we practice:

1. stopping what we’re doing that doesn’t work and loving ourselves as we already are, and
2. asking for help if we think we can’t, hearing what others think, sharing

I find, when gathered with one or more people other than myself who are intent upon understanding the joy of silence, of knowing the mystery of oneself (like on a meditation retreat)….

….then I can return to the “regular” world of life and I’m more aware than ever of the silence and peace in doing the laundry, working with others, typing, answering phone calls, shopping at the grocery store, playing music, picking up kids from school.

Or eating.

That’s what Eating Peace is all about.

It’s really Thinking Peace, Feeling Peace, Living Peace.

I know….we aren’t always in the middle of whatever this idea of pure “peace” actually looks like, right?

(Except we are).

So we’re making friends with every feeling, every thought, every encounter we have that doesn’t seem friendly and peaceful.

The ones where food becomes an enemy, or our own minds become our foes.

We’re practicing the feelings of safety, the thoughts of openness, the activities of gentleness and love, the awareness of feeling powerful and clear.

We’re wondering and practicing and rehearsing and feeling what it might be like to be people who are capable of landing and being at peace.

Even with eating.

Because we are capable of it.

Not all of us realize it yet.

We get to really see clearly what the barriers are to peace in our heads, the blocks to freely acting on our own behalf, or to opening up to the help from the universe on this topic.

I do not know how long it will take for anyone to truly discover eating peace.

But what I do know, is that anyone can.

I created Eating Peace as a 3 month program (and then a 3 day retreat as well) to support people who want to investigate eating wars once and for all, and see what’s happening internally that makes eating so troubling.

How do we end eating arguments?

You stop believing your thoughts, and your feelings that drive you to be weird with food.

How do we do that?

Love yourself enough to take a look at what is.

Stop eating out of emotions, feelings, desperation, anger, or sadness.

Share, be honest, tell the truth, slow down.

Amazingly…..it works.

Next week, we begin the very thorough Eating Peace Online program again.

As always, it’s updated and improved (how could it not be updated, as life continues to unfold).

It’s my deepest intention to inspire both myself and you as we remember how to return to experience peace with food.

If you’re wondering how the program actually works, here are the basics:

Tuesdays are Live Presentation Days. You listen, you watch a slide show I’ve put together on all the ways I’ve discovered to interrupt the pattern of thinking and feeling that leads to eating out of balance.

Presentations are 9-10:30 am Pacific Time, and you can just as easily watch the recording. If you participate live, there is no talking-you do it all via your computer and write to me during the live 90 minutes to share your responses, discoveries and feedback. You can ask questions, too.

Wednesdays are inquiry days. We do The Work of Byron Katie, a magnificent way to clearly identify the weird things we’ve learned about the religion of eating, and we dissolve these beliefs through questioning them.

Wednesday inquiry sessions are also 9-10:30 am Pacific Time. For these sessions, you CAN talk if you like (I love it if you do) but you can also listen without speaking.

The exact dates of this exploration of the world of eating are below.

We move through four powerful modules: Thoughts, Feelings, Body, Spirit.

Three sessions for every module, three weeks for every module.

Twelve weeks in total. It’s more than three whole months of support, learning, sharing, watching.

You’ll have exercises and practices that are fun, fascinating and full of curiosity as you live your days noticing and accessing your imagination around eating, food and your body image.

You can do them all, or not. Your choice.

You’ll also be invited to Stop.

Stop overeating, stop undereating, stop believing your thinking (question it instead), stop trying to change your feelings into something better all the time.

If you falter or fail, you’ll still be loved, included, accepted and congratulated for coming back. The only requirement for participating is your desire to participate, your desire for eating peace.

I’m sending out this email today because I realized something the other day, when the wonderful woman asked me why she should sign up for Eating Peace?

I have not shared what it’s really all about.

So now I’m sharing with you, so you get the opportunity at least to decide if you want to investigate in a deeper, more profound way than perhaps you ever have before, and to see what it’s like if you Just Stop.

(No matter how much that freaks you out).

If you don’t stop, you’re still welcome.

I’m in Seattle and I can’t keep you from eating, or not eating, but I can offer you the stepping stones through the darks woods, and what I found worked most beautifully.

Module One: Thinking. (We start with the mind).

ALWAYS 9-10:30 am Pacific Time (check your time zone HERE).

• 11/17 (Weds 11/18 The Work of Byron Katie)
• 11/24 (Weds 11/25 The Work of Byron Katie)
• 12/1 (Weds 12/2 The Work)

Module Two: Feelings (the power of feeling bad, or good)

• 1/12 (1/13 The Work)
• 1/19 (1/20 The Work)
• 1/26 (1/27 The Work)

• 2/2 (2/4 The Work)
• 2/9 (2/10 The Work)
• 2/16 (2/17 The Work)