Blog on Step #2: Seek Help and Support

Blog on Step #2…Seek Help and Support

Seeking Help and Support is step #2 in ending the battle of chronic dieting. It’s also the second step in recovery from an eating disorder. If you’ve been dieting all of your life in order to attain thinness, then you may not be able to achieve body satisfaction and meet the need for self-acceptance alone. If this is you, the greatest gift you can give to yourself is to enlist others…friends, family or professionals to help you achieve healthy body weight (your body’s natural “set point”) without extreme caloric restriction.

Seeking Help and Support might look like:

• Calling a friend when you’re feeling like restricting food, or the opposite, eating past the point of hunger. Sometimes meeting the need for connection takes the place of binging. www.overcomingovereating.com
• Find a “self acceptance” buddy, someone to remind you of all your wonderful qualities that have nothing to do with your body weight, shape or size.
• Be your own “self acceptance” buddy. Make a list of all your unique gifts and qualities that have nothing to do with your weight. Look at all of the ways that you contribute to the lives of others. Don’t forget to list all of the wonderful things your body accomplishes for you every day despite the years of deprivation or over-indulgences. I.e. carrying and birthing a baby, running a 5K, sitting upright at your computer for hours, fighting off a cold, dancing, singing, hugging, etc. You get the picture? Post these on your bathroom mirror so that when the critical voice of dieting tells you “Your thighs are too big”, you are reminded that you are far more than just a body part. www.nourishingconnections.com
• Remind your family and friends that body “trash talking” is no longer on your agenda. It’s so commonplace to put ourselves down and rip others apart piece by piece, that unless you are conscious of it, you may not even notice it. www.bodypositive.com
• Make up your own body-loving affirmations. You don’t love your body?? No problem, the affirmation can go something like “I am learning to appreciate my body every day.” Pick something that works for you. This is mental support…support from within. www.thedressingroomproject.com
• Recognize all of the ways that thinness and dieting are being marketed to you every day. It’s estimated that as Americans we see 3,000 advertisements a DAY! You can’t honestly believe that you are aware of them all, and what you aren’t consciously aware of gets stored into the sub-conscious. That is why advertising is so powerful. www.campaignforrealbeauty.com
• Make an appointment with a professional dietician. This is someone who has an RD (registered dietician) after their name. They can help you to understand healthy eating and balanced nutrition, safe weight loss for obesity, the role of hormones and metabolism, and can develop a customized daily food plan until you can begin to eat “intuitively” again. Many people have trouble maintaining a healthy weight due to hormonal dysregulation. Conditions like 
• hypothyroidism, PCOS, and even diabetes can influence your weight. www.understandingnutrition.com
• Consider hypnotherapy for releasing your unconscious blocks to healthy eating and moderate exercise. www.powerjourneys.com
• Don’t be afraid to talk to a professional therapist if you need more support. Ingrained patterns can be very difficult to change. www.edreferral.com . With individual or group therapy you can:

Improve upon relationships with self, friends, family and others

Learn new ways of dealing with depression, anxiety and stress

Handle situations and food without feeling out of control

Learn how to have a healthy relationship with food

Explore beliefs about your own body

Eliminate feelings of resentment and guilt

It’s important to ask yourself if there is more going on than just body dissatisfaction. What I mean by

that is could you be masking depression with the drive for thinness or by over eating for comfort?

Often chronic dieting or the development of an eating disorder is a mask for feelings in your life over

which you sense you have no control; depression, anxiety, or loss. Your body, then, becomes a

battleground…something over which you need to exert control. Often by treating the anxiety and

depression, or doing grief work resolves the underlying drive for control.
If financial challenges stop you from seeking out a professional, here are several good books to help

you overcome your body dissatisfaction and chronic dieting:

Full Lives – Lindsey Hall

Overcoming Overeating: When Women Stop Hating Their Bodies – Hirschmann and Munter

When Food Is Love – Geneen Roth (anything by Geneen Roth!)

Fed Up-Free Yourself From the Diet Trap- Wendy Oliver Pratt

Breaking Free From Food Jail – Jean Antonello

Eating In the Light of the Moon – Anita Johnston

You Can Heal Your Life – Louise Hay (anything by Louise Hay)
For more resources, please email me at www.colleenperry.com. I look forward to contributing to

your journey toward health. You don’t have to go through this alone.
1. Admit you have needs that haven’t been met.

2. Seek help and support.

3. Look for answers…don’t stop until you’ve found them.

4. Look for solutions…stop submitting, stop rebelling.

5. Practice gratitude daily.

6. Develop a balanced point of view.

7. Share your stories with others…you are not alone.

8. Clear away the wreckage of your past…mourn the lost opportunities.

9. Continuously revise your life story.

10. Practice honesty and compassion for self and others.

11. Meet your needs..communicate honestly and directly.

12. Knowing that you are not powerless, food will fall into its healthful place.

The Choking Game

Parents- Do You Know About the Deadly Choking Game?

If you are a parent of a pre-teen or teen, knowing about the “Choking Game” could save your child’s life. What is commonly referred to as the Choking Game is also known as Pass-out, Tingling, Roulette, Black-out, Flatliner, Suffocation, California High, Space Cowboy, Rising Sun and Airplaner, among others. The goal of this “game” is to choke yourself on purpose in order to deprive the brain of oxygen just to the point before passing out in order to achieve a “high”.

I was saddened beyond words when I read that a 12 year old boy from southern California had died this week from choking himself and then passing out and losing consciousness which resulted in his death. My first thought was, “What’s wrong with these kids? What is going on?” But then, suddenly, I had a vivid memory of a time when I was 12 years old. The following story is why this boy’s death hit too close to home.

I was 12 years old. I was sitting around with a group of kids who would come every summer with their parents and rent cottages on Cape Cod from my grandparents. We had grown up spending many happy summers together. One of the kids in the room asked us if we had heard about a way of getting out of school just by bending over at the waist and breathing heavy? What I didn’t know then was that he was teaching us how to hyperventilate, and then you stand up really fast, while at the same time squeezing yourself really tight (like a bear hug) and then you let go. The goal was to faint. This, he assured us, was a sure-fire way of getting out of school. I tried it, I felt tingly and very dizzy, but didn’t pass out. Luckily, I didn’t get “high” and never tried it again. I had no idea those many decades ago that I had just tried a watered-down version of the choking game.

Let me assure those of you who are thinking, “Yeah, but only troubled kids try this craziness. My child knows better.” Don’t be so sure. I WAS that good kid, the kid that did well in school, loved her church, had ballet lessons, never talked back to adults, was loved by all my teachers, and wouldn’t even swear for fear of disappointing my parents. Hell, I hadn’t even kissed a boy or tried a cigarette, never mind anything more dangerous! When my friends were sneaking beer I was watching off in the background.

This is NOT a new fad. This behavior has been around for decades, but now it has come into popularity. It gives the “good kids” a chance to get “high” without the risks of getting caught with alcohol or drugs. The average age of kids doing the choking game is 9- 16 years old, and 250- 1,000 kids die in the U.S. and Canada each year from it. It’s difficult to get accurate numbers to assess its lethality since many are ruled as suicides.

But, as it seems with so many things today, the “game” has been amped up a few notches. Twelve and thirteen year old children, boys and girls alike, are “choking out” by applying pressure to the carotid artery of friends and of themselves, or bear-hugging around the chest thereby cutting off blood supply to the brain. The brain is then deprived of oxygen, resulting in brain cell death by the millions, and in some cases, brain damage, or death.

The thrill of this activity causes people’s sympathetic nervous system, or the “flight and fight” part to be activated. The pituitary and hypothalamus release natural endogenous opiates or ‘heroin’ like substance. These feel good chemicals cause warm-fuzzy feelings. As the blood carrying oxygen to the brain is decreased either reversible functional/physiological changes may occur or non-reversible structural/anatomical change may occur. The exact point at which this decreased cerebral blood flow will cause permanent changes or transient changes is fleeting. There is no way to know when this magic moment is, and getting it wrong will end in an ischemic stroke, seizure or death.

This behavior can be very addictive. Some kids start out with friends and end up choking out alone. They can be dead before anyone knows they’ve even passed out.

Signs someone may be playing the choking game:

• Blood shot eyes
• Frequent or unusual headaches
• Marks on neck
• Locked doors
• Knots tied in room
• Wear marks on bedposts, closet rods, etc.

The choking game is different than auto-erotic asphyxiation. In the latter, the goal is sexual release in addition to the “high”. Children participating in the choking game are not sexual deviants. They are simply ignorant of the chance they are taking with their life at time in their life when the tendency to feel invincible is natural.

This article is meant to be informative and is in no way intended to provoke someone into engaging in this behavior. For information on how to talk to your child about it, or how to talk to a friend if you know someone who’d doing it, go to www.gaspinfo.com. Don’t wait for your child to talk to you about it. They need to be educated by someone who loves them before they become seduced by someone who isn’t scared and convinces them that near-suffocation is only a game.

Teens, Sex, and Self-Esteem

A young woman recently asked me the following question: “My boyfriend is asking to take our relationship to the next level, sexual relations, and I’m not ready. How do I tell him that I’m not ready and to wait until I am?
Dear Not Ready,

Have you tried simply saying “I’m not ready and we need to wait”? My guess is that if you thought he would agree with you, then you would have said it already. Are you afraid to lose the relationship if you say “No.”?

The fact is love does not equal sex. If it did, how could any of us love our parents, siblings, teachers, coaches or friends? Love is about mutual respect, wanting what’s best for the other, even if it isn’t what’s best for you. Love means being willing to let go of a relationship if it isn’t meeting your needs or his. Love is NOT about giving up what’s best for you in order to “keep your man happy”. That never works out for the woman in the long run. In fact, it usually leads to low self –worth and diminishes self-respect. If you did give in, as many girls do who are afraid of losing their boyfriends, then where is your sense of empowerment? No empowerment = No self-esteem. Healthy sexuality grows out of love, not the other way around.

Conversely, sex does not equal love. How often have your friends or other people you’ve known given into sex too soon simply because the guy told her that he loved her, and then ended up dumping her after sex? Sadly, this happens all the time. Everyone wants to be loved and to be told that they are loved. Someone saying it doesn’t make it real. Talk is cheap and easy to do especially in the moment when passion and hormones are racing.

Now don’t get me wrong, women are equally as justified as men are in wanting sex and not having to be in love to get it. The problem with that is we still live in a world of the “double standard”. When a boy wants sex and then has sex, he’s considered “The Man”! When a girl wants sex and has sex without being in love and having a boyfriend, she’s considered “A Slut”. Fortunately, this changes for women as they get older. Then sex can be about satisfying your own need for sexuality.

But until then and particularly while you are in high school and even in college, it’s important that your first time be with someone who you love and who loves you back. That’s what makes it safe and sexy! And the only way to truly know if he loves you back is to be honest about your emotional needs around waiting to have sex, and seeing how he responds. If he respects you (and loves you), he’ll wait until 

you’re ready. If not, he’ll leave you for someone else who is willing to have sex with him. Don’t for one minute think though, that she wins. On the contrary…she becomes the “booby prize”, pardon the pun- a mere substitute for you.

Treating Chronic Pain- There is a Better Way!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/colleen-perry/treating-chronic-pain—t_b_265351.html

Plagued By An Inner Critic

Are you afraid to feel angry, jealous, lonely, helpless or anxious?  It’s no coincidence that four out of seven clients I have seen this week have all had the same paralyzing fear about expressing their feelings to someone they love, be it a parent, lover, friend, or wife.  What they all have in common is a very strong inner critic.  Often, those of us with this difficulty feel overwhelmingly vulnerable just saying what is on our minds and in our hearts to someone we love.  Why is this?

Many people grow up with a critical parent or parents.  What criticism does is teach the child that their feelings aren’t valid, or that they are “overly sensitive or emotional”, and in some families, negative feelings aren’t tolerated at all.  How many times has a client said to me “When I cried in front of my mother/father, I was told to stop it, or I would be punished further or sent to my room.”  “I remember my father saying to me that if I didn’t stop crying, he was going to hit me.”  This lack of empathy and acceptance on the parent’s part teaches the child that negative feelings are dangerous and therefore need to be suppressed.

In some cases the child grows into an adult who unconsciously chooses a partner that is also critical or judgmental of their feelings.  And in some cases, the client simply assumes that their loved one is going to meet their expression with derision or scorn which keeps them from being able to get their need for emotional safety met at all.

I recently discovered a wonderful website dealing with this issue called www.forthelittleonesinside.com.  Here is what the author has to say on the subject of the inner critic: “Our inner critic, although it now seems only to torment and batter us, originally came into being to protect our small and vulnerable selves.  It came to prevent us from doing things and being ways that threatened to bring upon us more frightening and dangerous external criticism…criticism that might have led to the withdrawal of the love and support that were so essential for our survival. “

I think Alice Miller said it best in her well known book, The Drama Of the Gifted Child, The Search for the True Self  “…for a child can experience her feelings only when there is somebody there who accepts her fully, understands her, and supports her.  If that person is missing, if the child must risk losing the mother’s love or the love of her substitute in order to feel, then she will repress her emotions.  She cannot even experience them secretly, ‘just for herself’; she will fail to experience them at all.  But they will nevertheless stay in her body, in her cells, stored up as information that can be triggered by a later event.”

My clients feel ashamed and confused about their feelings because acknowledging and accepting their full range of emotions have never been safe, but we are “feeling creatures” by nature.  Denying and suppressing our feelings leads to emotional pain and physical pain.  Science confirms that there is an area in the brain responsible for detecting cues that may be harmful for survival, such as physical danger or social separation, and that this area shares a common pathway with cues for physical pain.  In a meta-analysis by Eisenberger and Leiberman out of UCLA, the authors state that “It has been suggested that, in mammalian species, the social attachment system borrowed the computations of the pain system to prevent the potentially harmful consequences of social separation.”

So I assure my clients that they are not crazy or defective for feeling so fearful.  I help them to understand the basis of their fear of feeling, and encourage them to question their inner critic rather than to accept outright its insistence on pushing us to do more, be better, faster, smarter, and thinner in order to feel loved, worthwhile, and valuable.  The only thing we need to change about ourselves is to stop holding ourselves to these unreasonable standards and begin to risk ourselves by being honest with those we love.    As I remind my clients: “Those who never risk themselves, never fully become themselves.”

Blog on Step #4 Look for Solutions…stop submitting, stop rebelling.

Do you hate your body?  Do you try to diet thinking that if you just lost 10 pounds, your life would be miraculously improved?  Are you sick and tired of being sick and tired of your struggle with weight?  Then practicing step #4 on a daily basis is your answer.  Look for solutions…stop submitting, stop rebelling.    

In my last blog about step #3, Look for answers…don’t stop until you’ve found them, I invited you to ask yourself what needs of yours were being met by food, and I shared with you some of the places that I have looked to find MY answers.  Step #4 is similar in that looking for our answers sometimes leads us to our solutions in overcoming body dissatisfaction, body loathing, and the drive to thinness through dieting.  But unless you are familiar with the concepts of compassionate communication, you must be wondering what the heck I mean by “stop submitting, stop rebelling”.  Simply put, whenever you submit (disregard, ignore, repress) your needs, you are doomed to rebel in some way.  Rebellion takes on many forms.   It may look like passive-aggressive comments or behavior, over eating or binging, under eating or restricting, over drinking, compulsive shopping or gambling, showing up chronically late, calling in sick to work, having an affair, the list goes on.  Whenever you say “yes” and you really mean “no” you are submitting some need of yours.

Most diet programs focus on extinguishing the rebelling behavior, but that is totally backward.  If you give yourself the time and energy to know what your needs are, and are then willing to ask for them to be met, you will no longer be in the submit/ rebel cycle. Since I gave you a clear example of the submit/ rebel cycle last blog by sharing Lisa’s story, let me give you a couple of examples from my clients that have nothing to do with dieting.  I have a client; we’ll call her Betty, she works as a nanny.  She loves her job and the family she works for, but Betty also loves her Sunday’s off.  She looks forward to this one day a week where she has no commitments or responsibilities to anyone else.  A few weeks ago her employer asked her to attend the birthday party of the little girl she nannies for, and guess what, it was on a Sunday.  Betty, feeling that she “should” say yes, said “sure” and then came to her session with me that week and complained about it.  First of all, whenever your self- talk includes a “should” or a “have to”, you are probably submitting.  Betty was submitting her needs for rest, choice, and peace and harmony.  I gently tried to point out the set-up she created by saying “yes” when she meant “no”.  That was pretty much the end of it until today, the day after the party when client described feeling miserable and wanting very much to “call in sick” to work.  This was her “rebellion”.  Again I pointed out her part in the submit/ rebel cycle.

Another client, let’s call her Veronica, clearly states that her partner does not meet her need for appreciation, acknowledgment, and emotional safety.  She wonders why sex has become so physically painful to her (now she avoids it).  And then there’s Carly.  Carly is a client who is engaged to be married.  As it often happens, family issues that aren’t often discussed rear their ugly heads when it comes time to plan a wedding.  Her fiancé’s brother, in a jealous rage, threatened to kill him last year.  Now, his family not only thinks he “should” be invited, but that he should be part of the wedding party.  Carly and her fiancé do not agree with his family.  I asked Carly what she thinks would happen if the brother where to come (submitting their needs).  Without skipping a beat she admitted that her fiancé would most likely get drunk and that would ruin the night for both of them.  I congratulated her on recognizing the rebellion (over-drinking) right away.

For the many of us that were raised to be kind, sensitive, compassionate, generous and people-pleasing, saying “no” means risking the discontent, anger, or judgment of others.  Many of us learned to say “yes” to avoid the guilt or negative consequence of saying “no”.  Submitting our own needs was encouraged when our needs were at odds with our parents’ needs.  Alice Miller’s book, The Drama of the Gifted Child  explores this phenomenon using other terms, but makes the point that growing up in a family environment in which the child had no choice but to acquiesce to the emotional needs of the parents, results in the child ignoring his or her own needs, which results in the disappearance of the “real” self.  The “false” self that emerges is interested foremost in pleasing others.  This dis-connect from the self is often what leads us to binge eating, chronic body dissatisfaction, and eating disorders.

“Okay, I get it now” you say, “but what do I do from here?”  Knowing your needs is step#1.  Looking at your resentments is another good step so that you can clear them out of your way.  It’s no accident that the fourth step in my recovery plan corresponds to the fourth step of most 12 step programs which is “Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.”  I don’t recommend doing this part on your own.  Find someone whom you can trust and ask for their support, preferably someone with 12 step experience.   They are there to bear witness as you work through this step.  They are not there to comment or to pass judgment.   In order to clear away resentment I recommend making four columns.

1.       I’m Resentful At                        2. The Cause           3. What it affects                            4. My Part

(people,institutions,principles)           (why I’m angry)    (self-esteem, pride,pocketbook,   (selfish, dis-

                                                                                                     Ambition,personal relations,sex)  honest, self-

                                                                                                                                                        seeking,frightened)

I like to replace “What it affects” with “What needs were not met”.  This reinforces your needs as being a part of the process.  The 4^th column, “My Part”, is usually the most difficult as it asks you to take responsibility for the exact nature of your wrongs.  For this reason, it’s recommended that you do all the examples you can think of for column 1 before moving on to column 2- the cause.  Complete that column before moving onto your unmet needs in column 3.  When you have finished with your unmet needs (for each example you listed in column 2) then and only then are you ready to look at your part. 

As I’ve said before, breaking free from chronic dieting, learning to love and accept yourself, isn’t always easy.  I make no promises that this step will be easy, but if you are willing to be honest with yourself and others, you will put an end to submitting your needs, there will be no reason for you to rebel, and the result is lasting self-acceptance and self-worth.  For more information on step #4 or any of the previous 3 steps, please visit my website www.colleenperry.com.   You are not alone!

1. Admit you have needs that haven’t been met.

2. Seek help and support.

3. Look for answers…don’t stop until you’ve found them.

4. Look for solutions…stop submitting, stop rebelling.

5. Practice gratitude daily.

6. Develop a balanced point of view.

7. Share your stories with others…you are not alone.

8. Clear away the wreckage of your past…mourn the lost opportunities.

9. Continuously revise your life story.

10. Practice honesty and compassion for self and others.

11. Meet your needs..communicate honestly and directly.

12. Knowing that you are not powerless, food will fall into its healthful place.

Blog on Step #3…Look for Answers…don’t stop until you’ve found them.

There are reasons why you are a chronic dieter.  There are reasons why you have an eating disorder.  Do you know what they are?  My guess is, probably not.  That’s why you’re reading this!  It’s important to know the “why” behind your behavior.  Some people will disagree with me here.  They would say that it’s not important to understand “why” you are doing what you are doing.  It’s only important to know “how” you’re going to stop the behavior.  This is “why” I disagree.  Let’s take overeating as an example.

There are plenty of programs out there that promise to show you “how” to lose weight, and “how” to stop overeating.  They will tell you what to eat, and, so as to not leave anything to chance, they will even provide the food for you in its correct serving size.  You don’t have to think about anything…just buy the food and eat what they tell you to eat.  Great, but for how long?  What happens when you’ve lost all the weight and you’re ready to eat on your own again?  If you haven’t addressed the “why” for overeating in the first place, you will most likely go back to your old way of eating. 

Step #3 Look for Answers…don’t stop until you’ve found them, asks you to explore what need were getting met with food.  What needs are being met by over-eating?  If you don’t figure this one out, you’ll never know how to get those needs met in a life-serving way, a way that does not require you to use food.  And this, my friends, is one of the reasons that dieting alone DOES NOT WORK! Here is my friend Lisa’s story:  “I finally decided, after a long struggle, that it was OK to divorce my husband. Since he was overweight, I stayed slightly “padded” as well, although I was naturally athletic and petite. I realized, as I grew further away from him in my heart, I was still trying to stay connected by identifying with him - by having this thing in common - fat. After all, if I got really into shape, I would become more attractive to others and myself and would have to deal with a whole new can of worms - our lack of intimacy and my own buried sexuality. My padding helped to insulate me from feeling a lot of fear and guilt. I’m very happy to report; I found the courage to take care of myself. I’ve worked through my feelings and proceeded with my divorce. Exercise kept me sane and in great shape. And most surprising and blessed of all - a very special and fit man has come into my life!

Any woman, man or child trying to break free of dieting or an eating disorder must be willing to be fearless in their search for answers.  If it were easy, then millions upon millions of us wouldn’t need to be dieting; wouldn’t loathe ourselves so much that making ourselves vomit or starving ourselves would seem reasonable.  For many of us, body dissatisfaction has been a life-long struggle.  We don’t stop to ask ourselves who’s standard of beauty are we conforming to; our culture’s, our family’s, or friends’?  Who was it that told you that you were anything less than beautiful?  Why did you believe them?  Why do you chase after the need for self-worth based upon your weight?  Aren’t you more than just your body?  I know I am.  As someone who has both met the cultural norm for beauty and has defied it too, I can tell you that my own self esteem comes from doing “esteemable” things, NOT by fitting into a size 4 pants. 

I have been a warrior in my quest for happiness and self-acceptance.  Here are some of the places I’ve looked to find MY answers:

You Can Heal Your Life – Louise Hay

Celestine Prophecy – James Redfield

Conversations With God – Neal Donald Walsh

Countless other self-help books

Hypnotherapy

Inner child work

12 step work

Yoga

Individual therapy

Group therapy

Life coaching (learning non-violent communication)

Sitting in circle with women

Drumming

Graduate work in psychology

Acupuncture, chiropractic care, massage therapy

The Mind Body Prescription – John Sarno MD (cured my chronic lower back pain)

Movement and dance therapy

Volunteer work every week

Women’s retreats

Master and control of body (aerobics teacher, pilates, ballet, jazz, triathalons)

The Artist’s Way course

Drugs for depression                      

Nordic Runes, I Ching, Feng Shui

Dream boards, vision boards

Started a business

And this is only what comes to mind!  I haven’t always found the answers I was looking for, but inevitably whatever path I was on led me to the next path.  It’s a matter of “way leading unto way” as Robert Frost so eloquently wrote in his famous poem The Road Less Traveled (read a great book by the same name too!).  What have you tried in looking to find happiness and acceptance for yourself other than by losing weight? 

Tips for Positive Change in the New Year

With the New Year approaching, I know I’m not the only one thinking about changes I’d like to make in 2009.  To do this, I ask myself, what qualities really worked for me this year and what qualities didn’t serve me so well that I can “let go” of.  For instance, I made a commitment to myself in 2007 to “let go” of self-consciousness.  The result was that I had to come to terms with my perfectionism and how I view myself.  Self-consciousness cannot exist without self-judgment…I have been militant about looking at all my self-judgments and combating them with compassion. (I’m noticing my use of the terms “militant” and “combating” and realize I still have a way to go as far as compassion for self is concerned).   Sometimes that compassion comes in the form of positive affirmations or self-talk, and sometimes it means giving up certain behaviors, like working out in order to “deserve” to like myself.  This has helped me enormously when trying to prioritize my time.  I now ask myself “What feels joyful?” and then I do that!  I’ve also chosen to examine where those judgments come from and what parts of me need healing for all my years of self-abuse. 

This year I’m focusing on the quality of patience…never my strong suit.  I’m finding that by waiting, either to act or to say something that’s bothering me - often situations tend to resolve themselves.  That doesn’t mean that I’m passively living my life.  On the contrary, I’m usually quite pro-active about things. But sometimes, in my need to express my negative feelings without censoring, I’ll act too quickly when waiting would have been more prudent.  This emotionally-laden tight rope that I walk is a direct result of years of “people pleasing” and suppressing negative feelings.  Everyone needs to find the balance between patience and expression that is right for them.

So patience is the quality I’m embracing.  What I would like to have less of in my life is my need to make my point of view the right point of view.  What I’m realizing more and more is that my feelings are always right (feelings don’t lie, they’re automatic, no sense judging them), but that everyone feels that their point of view is the right one.  This year it’s my intention not so much to be “right” but to have my needs for understanding and consideration met.  And when I’m determining my priorities this year- what to fit into my schedule and what to get rid of, I always consider the following story that was told to me many years ago…

The Mayonnaise Jar and 2 Cups of Coffee

When things in your life seem almost too much to handle, when 24 hours in a day are not enough, remember the mayonnaise jar and the 2 cups of coffee.

A professor stood before his philosophy class and had some items in front of him.  When the class began, he wordlessly picked up a very large and empty mayonnaise jar and proceeded to fill it with golf balls.  He then asked the students if the jar was full.  They agreed that it was.

The professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured them into the jar.  He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles rolled into the open areas between the golf balls.  He then asked the students again if the jar was full.   They agreed it was.

The professor next picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar.  Of course, the sand filled up everything else.  He asked once more if the jar was full.  The students responded with a unanimous “yes”.

The professor then produced two cups of coffee from under the table and poured the entire contents into the jar effectively filling the empty space between the sand. The students laughed.

“Now,” said the professor as the laughter subsided, “I want you to recognize that this jar represents your life.  The golf balls are the important things- your family, your children, your health, your friends and your favorite passions-and if everything else was lost and only they remained, your life would still be full.

The pebbles are the other things that matter like your job, your house and your car.  The sand is everything else- the small stuff.  “If you put the sand into the jar first,” he continued, “there is no room for the pebbles or the golf balls.  The same goes for life.  If you spend all your time and energy on the small stuff you will never have room for the things that are important to you.

“Pay attention to the things that are critical to your happiness.  Spend time with your children.  Spend time with your parents.  Visit with grandparents.  Take time to get medical checkups.  Take your spouse out to dinner.  Ride your bike with friends or just feel the breeze, play another 18.

There will always be time to clean the house and fix the disposal.  Take care of the golf balls first –the things that really matter.  Set your priorities.  The rest is just sand.”

One of the students raised her hand and inquired what the coffee represented.  The professor smiled and said, “I’m glad you asked.  The coffee just shows you that no matter how full your life may seem, there’s always room for a couple of cups of coffee with a friend.”

Welcome to my online blog…

I look forward to posting articles, information and resources that will benefit the lives of women and girls. I also look forward to reading your posts!

Welcome!

Colleen