Have you often wondered why you’re eating, or why you ate the food you ate, or why you ate the way you ate?
If you’ve experienced compulsion with food, you’ve certainly wondered these things many times.
The answer to this question, for me, has really become quite simple.
The reason I’m eating (or doing anything compulsive that I really don’t want to do, or isn’t healthy for me) is because I am AFRAID!
I’ve felt threatened by something.
I’m nervous.
This might have happened many years ago, or very recently.
But my view of a relationship, a task, a request, an activity, a dynamic about life and the world….
….is fearful.
Here’s an amazing question to ask that can really help uncover the truth of what you’re thinking and believing when you feel like doing something (in this case eating).
Most of us who eat or do compulsive things for emotional reasons are trying very hard to adapt to difficult situations.
Maybe there’s a particular experience you feel really, really vulnerable about.
Like….please, I don’t ever want this to happen.
For me, one of my vulnerable spots was that I don’t want to be rejected. I don’t someone to feel complete lack of forgiveness towards me. I don’t want to have no recourse, or be unable to make it up to them, if I do something “wrong”.
Very, very stressful.
It went back a long, long way into my history.
It felt like a core, gut feeling I had for my entire life.
If you give yourself the attention, the care, the compassion to look at your own places of vulnerability….
….maybe even the “special” two or three you repeat over and over….
….you may find something amazing happen.
You stop craving food. You stop feeling so compulsive.
Ask this one question when you feel like overeating, or doing something to soothe yourself emotionally that isn’t really that good for you (drinking, smoking, hooking up, spending).
When your heart breaks….cry. When words return, The Work.
Yesterday, I did not hear the news until late evening that a terrible massacre had occurred.
I stood at my kitchen counter for a moment, watching a very short news brief on my laptop to understand what my daughter just told me. My heart swelled and broke and tears came.
Our in-person monthly deep dive group had already met for three hours in the afternoon for our final meeting before summer break (we begin again Oct. 23rd in Seattle for 9 months).
I had been moved and touched by peoples’ work during our group. Many of them had written on their bodies. They were feeling ugly, angry with their appearance, disgusted, frightened, aging, incapable of change.
And then, later, this terrible news.
I let it sink into me, and throughout the evening, let The Work do itself within before I began to write.
This tragedy is horrifying, disgusting, violent, wrong, confusing, frightening. Some of the very same words I wrote about it were the very same words I had heard earlier about the body.
Question Four of The Work is: Who would you be without your thought? Who would you be without the thought that what you see is incapable of change, or permanently disgusting, or love is not possible in the presence of it? Who would you be without thinking your body is horrible looking, ugly, something to look away from?
What about other ugly things? Like human violence?
People in the group yesterday noticed how difficult it was to feel, or imagine in any way whatsoever who they’d be….
….without the belief their body was imperfect, wrong, preventing them from getting something they wanted, a barrier to happiness, fat, or ugly.
Sometimes….it is not easy to find who we would be without the feeling of hatred, rage, misery, disgust, or fear about something we see in reality.
It feels like denial.
As someone in the group yesterday said, with deep grief and pain (about her body)….
….”But. This problem is REAL.”
No one has to drop any thoughts. No one has to make themselves NOT think something they ARE actually thinking is absolutely true.
But here’s what I notice about reality.
It is unconditional. As in….there are no conditions. It is what it is.
It does not really care what we think. Reality moves as it moves, it unfolds the way it unfolds. It doesn’t really wait to see if we’re OK with it or not.
I notice Reality doesn’t ask me for my vote.
I can feel enraged, bitter, despairing and hateful about what goes on in Reality, in my life, in this body, with my appearance….
….or I can question my thoughts about it compassionately.
I can fight what is, or the other choice I’ve often made (thinking it gave me some power) is I can refuse to respond, in stubborn defiance.
I can use what I see as proof that Planet Earth is screwed up, or this body is screwed up, or that my mind is screwed up….
….but whatever I’m looking at, when I see there’s something at fault, it feels like…
…War.
Who would I be, or WHAT would I be, without the fearful, war-like thinking? What would it FEEL like, without believing everything I think?
Can I look at the thing I supposedly always hate, through the eyes of the Beloved? Can I look through Reality’s eyes that are unconditional, mysterious, and pulsing with life?
Turning the thought around: What I see is not pure ugliness, hopeless, gross, to-be-avoided, unworthy, disgusting, wrong, a mistake, incapable of changing, hideous, impossible.
This is not ever saying anything I see I must accept without question, or think of as good, or think of as friendly, or feel joyful towards it, if I don’t.
“The world is full of suffering, it is also full of overcoming it.” ~ Helen Keller
With my body, if I don’t like living in it, I can move closer to it, become very intimate with it, taste, smell, be with how it moves, what it feels like to eat, notice it, care for it, get to know it instead of ignoring it. I can imagine dropping all my rules and hatred about it and start over, with fresh eyes, from scratch.
I can do this with death, too. I can do this with tragedy, and fear, depression and suffering. I can become intimate with Reality instead of trying to defy it or fight it, hate it or ignore it.
Starting here. With this body. With other people. With events I encounter. With death.
I can question the story of what I think is impossible, even as it hurts.
“What is to give light must endure burning.” ~ Viktor Frankl
Much love, Grace
P.S. there may be room to squeeze you in at Breitenbush in Oregon. Call 503-854-3320 to ask to attend the June 22-26 Retreat: Declare Peace, The Work of Byron Katie.
Tired of the suffering cycle? Nothing left to try…except Inquiry.
Today I can’t wait to be at East West Bookstore in Seattle doing a little mini 3 hour workshop on eating, body image and our relationship to food…..and how to enter peace instead of war.
Doing The Work is of course my favorite tool and method of inquiry for working with stressful beliefs, and naturally inquiry is what we’ll be doing in the workshop.
HOWEVER.
When it comes to addiction, fear, compulsive behavior of any kind….
….when we’re doing things we hate ourselves for later, feeling needy, feeling upset, feeling angry, feeling like we want to escape or attack (the perfect pain points for addictive or compulsive behavior)….
….then it’s often hard to find WHAT it is you’re troubled by?
What would make me troubled enough to overeat when I don’t really want to, or smoke, or drink, or start house-cleaning, or surf the internet, or try to find someone to hook up with?
The thing is, moving into your compulsive favorite thing to do, if you have one (most people do, some are more destructive than others) is a REACTION to a belief you’re thinking.
You’ve already bought the belief.
You already assume it’s true, and it’s frightening, aggravating, infuriating, and it feels hopeless.
So you do the behavior instead (in my case, I ate, and sometimes drank or smoked cigarettes or over-exercised).
It kind of works for a little bit, when you’re hunting down the substance and caught in the energy of your compulsive pattern.
When I went into the addictive behavior, I would not be aware any more of what was bothering me, and instead, I’d be thinking about eating, the food I would buy, the taste, smell and feeling of it as I devoured it. The anticipation was all-consuming and overwhelming. It was mesmerizing. Obsessive. Nothing else existed hardly, except getting my fix.
With such a wild energy taking over, the energy we’re calling “addictive”, it is actually a bit tricky and difficult to put on the brakes and see what’s hidden.
Why?
Because what’s hidden is SO PAINFUL.
I’d rather not take a look at it. Do I have to? Can’t I just eat instead? Or get stoned? Or run 10 miles and beat my body into a pulp of exhaustion? Or have sex in a bathroom with a stranger?
You can. I did.
But it wasn’t ultimately satisfying. It was shameful, embarrassing, I felt horrible later, and it kept me on the cycle I refer to as CRIME – GUILT – PUNISHMENT.
You committed a crime, you’re guilty, you must be punished. You feel horrible and gross, you vow never to do it again, and then….
….the background underground haunted old pain starts to wake up, since you’re not busy hating yourself as much, and it starts to get louder.
Sooner or later, when it gets too loud to tolerate, you need to do the thing again, the thing that helps you forget about it.
Let me tell you, I am so happy not to be in that severe cycle anymore I kiss the ground with gratitude.
It doesn’t mean I don’t do it in smaller, much more subtle doses. For example, I’ve noticed a tendency to compulsively try to be pleasing to people so they’ll relax, calm down, like me, or become safer for me. This compulsion to be in communication with others in a pleasing way shows up sometimes by me withholding what I really want, or not saying what’s really true. (We’ll talk about that another day).
Here’s what’s important for stopping a cycle of compulsive thinking, and then compulsive acting, that zips you away from seeing what you ultimately really WANT to see, even if it’s painful.
First, decide you want to see what’s going on, what’s hidden. Part of you already DOES want to see it….encourage that part.
Then, notice these two options.
Old Way, Defensive Way, Conditioned Way (called “Believing Your Thoughts”):
You feel something uncomfortable. It’s stressful.
You feel scared you did something wrong, or you’re being rejected or you’re a bad person.
You quick move to the other person or people involved.They’re doing it wrong….not just you. They might be the primary ones to blame.
Run away from those people, they’re bad, OR, Fight those people, they’re bad.
Deal with your anxiety, or the sense you’ve had a close call with something frightening by _____ (fill in the blank with your favorite compulsion: eat, drink, sex, smoke, read, internet, spend)
Forget about it all for awhile. Relief. Oblivion.
New Way, Loving Way, Freedom Way (called “Questioning Your Thoughts”):
You feel something. It’s stressful.
You feel scared you’re doing something wrong, or you’re being rejected, or you’re a bad person—or that someone else is.
Pause. Write down your thoughts. What’s disturbing you?
Do The Work and answer the four questions, innquiring about yourself with curiosity and self-care, and compassion.
Notice that you’re OK without doing anything. See if you can BE. Use your speedy fast mind and your imagination to wonder what it would be like without your story? What if you’re not seeing the whole picture, or the true picture?
Clearly see options for yourself you didn’t see before. Notice how dealing with your internal world is what you always wanted, not to run away from it. Notice how brilliant you’ve been so far with your compulsions, and now, you’re becoming aware of a more expansive view. You are safe.
When you’re finished moving through the steps in the old way, the old pattern, it’s just a matter of time until you DO your compulsive behavior again.
When you’re finished moving through the steps in the new, alternative way, you often take action. You go back to the person you’re most afraid of, and ask them any questions perhaps. You say “no” or you say “yes” with much greater clarity. You no longer feel confusion. You ask for what you need more directly. You get help.
Which way seems like the better one, the more interesting way, the more fun way?
I really had no other option if I wanted to stay alive, than to take the second road, even though part of me wanted to Not Look and thought it was easier following the first road.
It wasn’t.
It was hell.
Who would you be with inquiry, instead of believing your stressful stories?
Caring far more about my thinking, than what I’m eating or not eating, doing or not doing.
“You’re either believing your thoughts, or you’re questioning them.There’s no other choice.” ~ Byron Katie
What would you have, if you had a perfect, thin, strong, young, supple, attractive, athletic body?
What would you have, if your eating woes were gone….or it no longer mattered what you ate?
It’s not a new idea that underlying beliefs, or hidden negative stories, fuel overeating or other compulsions….
….but how do you find out what you’re hiding inside, if it’s HIDDEN?
Here are some ideas, especially one key exercise, you can do to discover unexpected “hidden” reasons you’re doing what you’re doing with food and eating.
Recently in the Eating Peace Core Teleclass I guided everyone through filling out a Judge Your Body worksheet.
The thing about worksheets on the body, is if you pause for two seconds and think about the body, the criticism or worry or judgments of it are…..well….infinite.
For the purposes of eating peace, we look in a concentrated way at appearance and all the associations we make with needing to look a certain way and how the mind concludes that we’re doing something wrong, we’re ugly, we need to fix our eating or exercise program. Obviously.
Astonishing how quickly the mind directs attention to solving the problem. Let’s fix this! Go! Go! Go!
It races off to find a solution without even taking a look at the original concept: this is wrong.
Now, here’s where it can get even more interesting.
Take a dive into WHY you need this body to look NOT like this, but another way, and actually allow yourself to see what it is you truly want.
Why did I want a thin body (or, to be attractive)? What would it give me? What would I have, if I had that Other Better Body?
It’s OK to admit your desires without embarrassment or shame.
What do you see your mind has locked in on, without discernment, without question, without inquiring, believing the assumption hook-line-and-sinker?
You need to be thin (thinner). You are fat. That cellulite is ugly. That belly is disgusting. I need these to change because other people think these same thoughts about me when they see me. And then, I am rejected. I am not picked. I am alone. I am abandoned.
Is any of this true?
Yes, oh yes, oh yes. It would be better to have thin, smooth, flat, long, tight, strong thighs. Says the mind, the eyeballs looking with the view of “corrective lenses”.
But are you absolutely sure what you’re thinking is accurate and true?
I always found I was so convinced people would like me, find me appealing, attractive, interesting. Almost like my survival depended on it. I would be abandoned without looking amazing. My mom, my dad, my grandparents all agreed. I heard them say things when I was young. They even talked about themselves negatively. I can tell this thin-thing is important. And I want their love!
There’s a book for this, written by a sage and wise woman Byron Katie: “I Need Your Love–Is That True?”
People in the Eating Peace Core class said….but….wait a second.
If I don’t think I’m ugly, or fat, or need to do something….
….then I will never, ever change!!
It’s true, in my experience, that I’ve been drawn to look at my mind and my beliefs because of noticing that when I thought them, I suffered. I would perhaps never have done The Work without suffering, I don’t know for sure—I do see that conflict, sadness, agony, hatred, judgment and criticism felt painful, and I wanted to stop feeling like it was all unbearable, intolerable, not worth living through.
But here’s a great question:
Are you SURE you need to hate yourself, or your body, in order to assist it to change? Are you sure you need to judge, despise, and criticize yourself the second you see your thighs in a window (that’s how fast it happens, when you’re conditioned deeply)?
Are you sure you actually need what you think a great body would get you (their love and adoration)?
I thought a great body would get me romance, acceptance, attention, maybe even fame.
News Flash: it didn’t.
How do you react when you believe your body size and shape, if it were “right”, would bring you happiness?
You make sure you do everything humanly possible to keep your body in “admirable” shape. Without addressing your deepest fears and suffering, or conflicted thoughts. It’s a lot of work.
So who would you be without your belief system about thinness, fatness, needing to limit eating, needing to control yourself, needing to fix who you really are?
Hold very still as you contemplate this answer.
Who is asking this question? Who is doing the looking at the body? Have you noticed the body doesn’t look back at you? It’s just there, being itself. YOU are the one who is looking. An observer.
Can you look with the eyes of a three-year old who doesn’t have all these judgments piled on yet? How about with the eyes of someone loving, supportive, kind, attentive, and gentle? How does God look at this body? How does Reality see these thighs? Can you look, just for a second, without your bitter judgment?
You CAN. Because it’s just as possible for you as the critical way. And it feels much better. It feels secure, patient, solid, unconditional.
How do you think your eating will change more easily…..if you HATE the way you look, or LOVE the way you look?
Watch my video telling what happened for me when I did The Work on my ugly, cellulite-filled, repulsive thighs.
Are you sure if you think you’re beautiful, no matter how imperfect, and accepting….that you’ll never be thin?
Well you might as well at least try seeing with different eyes. Note to self: looking with criticism and hatred hasn’t worked so far to make you change.
