In a rational, functional relationship with food, what you are physically hungry for is what you are ‘allowed’ to have. And the only one who ‘allows’ you is you. Not the other people you’re eating with; Not Jenny Craig; Not Dr. Bernstein; You!

Your primary responsibility where food is concerned is to wait until you are hungry to eat something. Your next responsibility is to learn to stay present while eating and to identify and listen to the cues of comfortable fullness you are eating naturally.  You are not responsible to buy into anyone else’s ideas of what you should have or how much.

What you choose to eat may vary depending on your body’s needs on any given day, at any given time. What you needed to eat yesterday at breakfast will likely be different today simply because you expended a different amount of energy or ate a little differently (amount and nutrition wise) than you did 24 hours before. That’s a main reason why diets don’t work so well. Our bodies naturally need different amounts at different times on different days.

Practice listening to your natural cues for hunger and fullness. It’s easiest to start listening for hunger cues (empty tummy, growlies, – if you feel grumpy or shaky you’ve waited too long and your blood sugar is dropping – this is dangerous to your health and can harm your brain so eat something quick). Then once you’ve got that down you can start to pay closer attention to the signals of fullness (we’ll talk about that soon).

This week, to tackle with annoying and stifling aspect of The Diet Mentality, invite yourself to wait until you’re hungry to eat and then invite yourself to have what you really want.

If you feel that you ended up eating too much just wait until you next get hungry to eat again, and so on, and so on, and so on. You’ll soon learn how much is enough for you and you’ll also hear much less self-judgement and feel less heavy and stuffed as you go through your day.

Give this a try and tell me how it goes. Ask me questions about what you notice or what you want to learn and I’ll incorporate them into this series on The Diet Mentality.

Have a great week!

Love

For the next few weeks in my articles, I’m going to be exploring each of the key points of what we call ‘The Diet Mentality.’  Each week I’m going to briefly explore one key characteristic of this harmful way of thinking and offer you a suggestion of something you can do that week to begin to directly address this issue if it something that you recognize in yourself.  For this week though we’re going to start with an exploration of where The Diet Mentality comes from and some background on diets in general:

The Origin of Our Diet Mentality

The Diet Mentality is a way of thinking that has been ingrained in us by messages we receive predominantly from our primary caregivers and our peers. These messages are then often reinforced and enhanced by teachers, coaches, advertisements and media messages, and from diet and exercise programs that we may have tried in the past or may currently be pursuing.

It is easier to understand how we came to be where we are when we keep in mind that as children and adolescents, because we were limited by our brain’s inability to realize that not everything is about, or caused by, us, and because we had no other frame of reference than that of the family in which we were raised (and the community surrounding us), we had no contrast and therefore no ability to see clearly when our parents and peers, teachers and coaches were, themselves, confused in their thinking. We just believed that they were right and we followed blindly and innocently along. (For a more detailed article on brain development and its impact on our lives , and our relationship with food please see: http://www.cedriccentre.com/blog/lets-talk-about-your-brain/)

When, as children, we are fortunate to have caregivers and peers who, overall, pursue life from a moderate and rational perspective we naturally learn to see this as ‘right’ and naturally emulate this behavior and take up their moderate and rational beliefs as our own. This feeling of rightness is often reinforced overall by an inner sense of integrity – things just make sense and feel right – and by the positive and welcoming response we receive from most of the people we interact with.

When, however, when the flip side is true and we have key people in our lives who behave in ways that are confused or extreme we, not knowing any better and naturally seeking their approval, take up those behaviours and ways of thinking as though they are the ‘right’ or even, the only, ways to think and be. And even though this ‘right’ doesn’t really feel ‘right’ we buy it hook line and sinker. We don’t have enough experience with things feeling truly peaceful and right and don’t have the ability at that stage in our development and our dependence (we can’t just leave home at the age of 5 or 9 or 12) to argue for what we feel intuitively is right and wrong. And so we start to tell ourselves that something is ‘right’ even when it feels wrong. We begin to create an outer persona/reality and our own, sequestered and very silent inner truth. Unfortunately we are forced to assume that our inner sense is wrong and that what “they” say is right. And when our peers, or culture or society reinforces this message directly and indirectly through their actions towards themselves or towards us (“In order to be loved and happy you have to be the smartest, fastest, thinnest, nicest and most beautiful and stylish too.”) it just becomes a ‘fact,’ a fundamental truth that we don’t even think to question, even if it makes us feel bad and anxious and like a total failure all the time.

From this confused perspective and the inner anxiety it creates we keep trying to do the ‘right’ thing and don’t understand why people don’t seem to like us or appreciate what we’re doing. We don’t get why, no matter what we do, it never seems to be ‘enough’ to make that person happy or to gain their approval and the connection we so desperately seek. So, we assume it’s something about us; something ‘wrong’ with us. We’re not trying hard enough. We’re just not good enough. And so we try harder. Only problem is, we keep trying the same old thing that, unbeknownst to us, got us in this pickle in the first place.

And that, dear readers is how you came to be as you are: You received some confused messages about food, weight, and where your worth comes from, supplemented by peers, teachers, and a community that grew up with the same confused messages that they never learned to doubt or question. It’s a perfect case of the blind leading the blind really: A few folks getting rich off our confused attempts to be slim, healthy and happy. The rest of us struggling through each day feeling like failures and lazy slobs because we can’t starve ourselves enough or exercise enough to finally enter that Nirvana we call ‘good enough.’

You’re here for a solution to this, right? Good, because I’m here to teach you one. In short, the solution to finding ourselves in a new, confident and truly fulfilling place in all aspects of our lives (food, body image, relationships, career etc.) lies in learning to see clearly when we’re buying in to an old bogus ‘truth’ and, with our adult, rational brains question whether it actually makes any sense and whether we want to keep believing it or not.

Diets and the whole weight loss and ‘thin is in’ craze comprise one of these old core beliefs that have become our ‘truth.’ The good news is that when questioned with an adult, rational brain, The Diet Mentality can quickly be proven to be part of the problem and can be overcome and left behind once and for all.

What takes its place is a simple, clear, solid perspective we at The CEDRIC Centre (and certain other like-minded folks out there) like to call Natural Eating. With Natural Eating we wait until we’re hungry to eat, eat until we’re comfortably full, allow anything in moderation and in so doing sustain a healthy and normal weight for our body without dieting or rigorous exercise regimes.  Rest assured we’re going to explore Natural Eating fully in the weeks to come, and specifically how to get there from here.

But first, let’s get you good and clear on where ‘here’ is. And we’re going to do that by first exploring some statistics and background on dieting and then we’re going to explore the basic tenets of The Diet Mentality that, however unwittingly, you must agree with on some level if you struggle with a stressful relationship with food or weight.

The clearer you are on what you’re doing to sustain your stress and frustration the easier it will be for you to see it when it happens and apply a new, simple thought or action that leads you away from binging, purging or restriction (anorexia or dieting in general) and towards that heavenly place we call Natural Eating.

Reality Check Time: The Truth About Diets

We’ve all seen the Kirstie Alley ads for Weight Watchers. We saw her slimming down right before our eyes, all the while happily telling us that Weight Watchers was the answer. What we weren’t given an equal opportunity to see so much of were any publicity photos after she gained all that weight back. Funny that. Maybe those commercials were on while I was in the shower or something? … Maybe not.

In our culture, wherever we turn, we are inundated with photos of sexy women swimming inside pants that are now 10 sizes too large for them. Again, what we typically don’t see is a picture of the same person a year later. There’s a good reason for that.

You see the truth is that only 2% of people who lose weight on diets keep it off for more than a year. In fact, the only diet with any statistics to show it actually helps people lose weight is Weight Watchers, and they can boast just one study, conducted in 2005, that shows that a group of participants in the Weight Watchers program lost around 5 percent (about 10 pounds) of their initial weight in six months and kept off about half of it two years later. Really people? That’s the best stat you have?

With the billions of dollars that the diet industry takes in from us desperate and trusting consumers every year you’d think they could finance a little more research to prove the effectiveness of the snake oil they’re selling! Or maybe there’s a reason they don’t have more studies? Maybe, like so many cult leaders and snake oil salesmen of the past and present they know that they don’t have any proof to back up their claims, but they also know that we have been taught not to question or doubt these things.

Jenny Craig says her program works. The ads show people losing weight so surely that means it works, right? And that means if I can’t lose weight and keep it off on that program I am a lazy, stupid slob who can’t control herself and doesn’t really care about herself at all! Right!?  Well, we’ll never know because we’re so bloody ashamed of our laziness and stupidity that we won’t even tell anyone that we ‘failed.’

How many times have you started a diet and not wanted any one to know in case it didn’t go so well? On the flip side, how many times have you started a diet and told someone to hold you accountable and not let you eat that tasty looking, calorie laden treat? Regardless, the message is the same: You don’t really trust yourself to do it do you?

And there’s a really good reason for that – and it’s not that you’re stupid, lazy or lacking will power I assure you. Read on.

Has it ever occurred to you to wonder why there are so many diets? If they worked why don’t they work in any lasting way for anyone you know?  Why are your coworkers and family members always trying a new diet?

We often don’t dare to wonder about this. We’ve bought so fully into the “if it’s not working it’s your fault” story and we’re so busy feeling fat and stupid and shameful for our ‘lack of willpower’ that we just accept it as perfectly normal that everyone at work is on a diet, again.

One of my favorite quotes of all time is from a mentor of mine, Barbara Sher. She says, “When too many people fail a requirement, there’s nothing wrong with the people, there’s something wrong with the requirement.”  Right on Barbara! Ain’t that the truth! Think about it.

Let’s explore this in a little more detail with a look at some basic statistics to do with diets and weight loss. Now, stop and breathe; really slow down for a moment and take this in. You’ll find it very enlightening and freeing if you do.

And please feel free to print this article off and post it on the lunchroom fridge – and on your fridge – and, while we’re at it sneak on over to your mom’s and tape one to her fridge too!

Some Basic Statistics on Eating Disorders and Dieting

The facts speak for themselves. It is a known fact that most efforts to control weight through calorie restriction result in only very short-term weight loss, and, often ultimately lead to weight gain. Funny, how the diet industry and pill peddlers don’t mention this in their commercials and magazine ads. Things that make you go…Hmmmm.

• “Dieting for weight loss is often associated with weight gain, due to the increased incidence of binge-eating.”   Field, A. E., Austin, S. B., Taylor, C. B., Malpeis, S., Rosner, B., Rockett, H. R., Gillman, M. W. & Colditz, G. A. (2003). Relation between dieting and weight change among pre-adolescents and adolescents. Pediatrics, 112(4), 900-906,
  Stice, Cameron, R. P., Killen, J. D., Hayward, C. & Taylor, C. B. (1999). Naturalistic weight-reduction efforts prospectively predict growth in relative weight and onset of obesity among female adolescents. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 67, 967-974.

• Adolescent girls who diet are at 324% greater risk for obesity than those who do not diet.  (Stice et al., 1999). (Did you get that!? 324%??? Of course they are at greater risk for obesity! The diets teach them to ignore the natural signals of their body and the restriction naturally triggers them to overeat when they next get around food. It’s a natural cycle found in any species, not just adolescent females. It’s just not outcome that the innocent and confused dieting teen is hoping for.)

• In a study published in 2003 in the journal Pediatrics, researchers at Harvard Medical School found that adolescents who dieted put on more weight than those who did not diet over a three year period.

• A review of 10 of the nation’s most popular weight-loss programs found that except for Weight Watchers, none of them offer any proof that they actually work at helping people shed pounds and keep them off.

• Only Weight Watchers had strong documentation that it worked — with one study showing that participants lost around 5 percent (about 10 pounds) of their initial weight in six months and kept off about half of it two years later. Diet Plan Success Tough to Weigh, Christine Lagorio for CBS News, January 3, 2005

Isn’t it startling when you stop and think that at the same time that there are more diet centres and diet books and low fat this and low carb that than ever before in the history of humanity, the incidence of eating disorders and dieting are on the rise? Doesn’t that just make you go, hmmm?

Well, while you’re ‘hmmm-ing,’ why not add these stats to your musings:

• 80% of 10 year old girls have tried dieting at least once.

• Over 90% of all eating disorders, whether overeating, restricting or purging (now labeled as Binge Eating Disorder; Bulimia; Anorexia and Orthorexia) begin with a diet.

• 1 in 3 women have been on more than 10 diets in their lives; (OMG! 33.333333+% of us keep beating our heads against a brick wall!)

• And yet, the average woman can stick to a diet for only 2 weeks at a time; (Yes, you read that right! Only 2 weeks. So, you’re not lazy and you don’t lack willpower, you’re just normal!)

• Only 9% of women never diet! (No wonder women think it is normal to focus on food and restriction!). Statistics from Women’s Health Magazine, January/February 2010 Issue, WomensHealthMag.com

Well, there you have it. The truth about diets. Not a pretty sight. But at least you know you’re not crazy! They don’t work. And it’s not because taking in less calories than you expend is not a way to lose weight. Obviously if you take in less calories than you expend you will lose weight. That’s not a disputed fact.

What is not mentioned by the diet programs and their cronies is that unless you learn to balance your life (healthy meals, moderate exercise, functional relationships, financial security etc.); manage your stress with life-enhancing measures; and understand how certain foods influence your body you will continue to ricochet back and forth between restricting and binging and your weight will continue to be a source of stress and frustration.

Diets teach you what to think, not how to think. They don’t show you how to handle life. They don’t show you how to figure out what’s making you want to eat or restrict or purge in the first place. They don’t help you to understand why you have those extra pounds on your body anyway.

I’m here to teach you how to think. I want you to feel confident in your ability to sort out any problem or stressor that comes you way, whether it be what to eat or how to tell your boss that you want a raise or how to talk to your partner about a big relationship problem.

The underlying process of clear thinking and solid decision making is the same regardless of the issue.

So, off we go! Over the next few months we’ll explore the ins and outs of your relationship with food and how it influences, and is influenced by, every other aspect of your life.

For this week I want to invite you to just notice how prevalent the diet mentality is in your home, in your community, at work, in your family, and in your mind. How often do you hear yourself judging your body and thinking that it needs to change? How often do you judge your food choices or tell yourself you have to restrict yourself?

Just notice. Next week we’ll talk about a core element of the diet mentality and what you can do to start to shift it.

Have an insightful week,

Love

1. 1.  We often (usually) don’t even know what we truly feel and want and need. We might know something doesn’t feel right or good or okay but we have our inner critic immediately judging our feelings and so we mistrust our emotions just as we mistrust our hunger and fullness cues.
2. We are scared crapless to piss people off! Let’s just admit it! We don’t want to upset anyone. We don’t want to be the bad guy. We don’t want anyone saying anything about us that isn’t nice and warm and fuzzy. And so we bail on ourselves.

And just in case you’re still wondering if this applies to you: If you have any food and body image stress, or if you binge, or struggle with restriction (dieting or anorexia or orthorexia (an obsession with eating “clean”), or purging (through exercise, laxatives, or vomiting) you can guarantee that you have a high dose of co-dependent training. 

Likewise, people who struggle with alcohol use, anger management, isolation and procrastination have had the same training. In other words, you’re in great company, only it’s like the plague – everyone’s got it but you really don’t want it!  Good news, there’s lots you can do to change that and to step free of that way of thinking completely and for good.

That’s what the CEDRIC Centre does for you. We help you to have greater clarity on what exactly is not working in your life and why and exactly what you can do about it to create lasting change in all areas of your life.

Simply Put:

• The number one thing that will make your healing journey take longer than it needs to, is your unwillingness to be honest with yourself.  
• The number two thing is your unwillingness/fear to be honest with others.

Both need to be addressed and overcome in order for you to have the self-esteem and self-respect that you need in order to feel safe and secure in the world and to trust yourself to have integrity regardless of where you are or whom you’re with.  And in case you’re wondering, it is impossible to get over your stressful relationship with food and feel comfortable in your own body without that.  This is because your current use of food to cope (as well as any problems with anxiety or depression, isolation or procrastination) stems from a lack of trust and confidence in yourself to take care of yourself first; a lack of trust that you will not compromise yourselves for others.

This has to change in order for you to feel peaceful enough and to feel good enough about yourself to only engage in behaviours that will enhance your life. It’s that simple.

So, if you’re ready to create lasting change let’s begin.

First know that it is always – and I mean always – easier than you think it will be to identify what you really think and feel and it always goes better than you think it will and produces greater results than you expect when you are respectfully and appropriately honest with others.

I have been working with clients directly around these issues for over 17 years and have seen this to be true time and time again for my clients as well as in my own personal life.

For this week, let’s start by exploring #1: Being honest with ourselves about what we truly feel and need.  This is easier than #2 and it naturally leads to greater comfort with being honest with others.

1. Notice when you want to eat and aren’t hungry or are telling yourself you can’t have what you want even if you are hungry. (You can also do this exercise by asking yourself to notice when you’re feeling anxious/insecure/embarrassed/ashamed if you find that easier to notice right now.)
2. Then ask yourself what you were just thinking. Don’t censor it. Allow yourself to be as petty and small as you can be; express your worst fears and criticisms to yourself honestly. No one else needs to know. And just so you know, allowing yourself to be honest about what you’re truly thinking and feeling in any situation doesn’t ‘attract more of it’ like the magical thinkers believe. You’re already thinking and feeling that way.

Whether you are honest with yourself or not you’re being impacted by those thoughts and feelings and the only way to completely step free of them is to:

• be honest that they are there, see why there are there and either see them as flawed and irrational, thereby immediately freeing yourself of them; or
• see them as having some basis in fact thereby creating an opportunity to for you consciously resolve the problem and never have to deal with it again. 

The ostrich approach (if I don’t acknowledge it, it isn’t happening) has never served you at all. In fact it’s why you are where you are.

The clients who move the fastest through this process are those who are willing to let themselves be honest with themselves about their true fears and feelings. Those who try to be politically correct or “good,” “nice,” “not attract bad ‘ju ju’ through thinking unkind/base thoughts,” stay stuck on the surface of their awareness, repeating old patterns, feeling more fake and phony and stuck every day.

Do your best to be honest and then, when you have written out what you really think/feel/fear/need in any situation, ask yourself:

“What am I telling myself about that, which makes me judge it as bad/wrong/petty/needy?”

And then ask,

“Where does that story come from?”

And,

“Why do I think they are right and my own needs, thoughts, and feelings are wrong?”

You will learn a great deal about yourself in this way.

And if you’d like to take this a step further and get some support to change this way of thinking and the way you relate to food and to others as well, please email or call. My team and I would be happy to help.

Love

Repeated patterns are a window to your needs. For every pattern you repeat, for example: overeating, purging, or restriction, there is a need which is being met within you. Your inability to change the undesirable pattern has nothing to do with lack of willpower or discipline. The pattern is merely a symptom of a deeper problem. If you direct your efforts only at attempting to eliminate the symptom without putting effort into understanding and dissolving its cause, you are setting yourself up for a very fatiguing and defeating battle.

Awareness is the first step in changing any behaviour. You must first become aware that you are doing something which is detrimental to your values and life plan. Resistance is often your immediate reaction to becoming aware of what you are doing and why. This makes perfect sense. You have lived your life with a certain set of behaviours and beliefs. Given this, change, even if desired on some level, often feels less like innovation and more like annihilation of your entire existence as you know it. You wonder what will be left of you, your relationships and the life you know, when you have made the changes necessary to free yourself of this debilitating behaviour. This really means: when you are fully aware of the underlying need that led you to execute this behaviour, will you still choose the people and things you have chosen thus far? From this perspective, change can look very scary and the outcome very lonely. This is why so many of us have to hit our own personal “rock bottom” before we are ready to challenge old, harmful patterns of thoughts and behaviours. You must reach a place where you say, “I don’t care what the outcome is. Just make it stop!”

And yet, questioning what life will look like when you are “done” is a wise and significant thing to do. It implies that you know you can change, and on some level you know that your current behaviour is providing you with a way of remaining in an uncomfortable situation without having to fully feel the discomfort being generated. In other words, you know you are numbing yourself to certain aspects of your life, and, because you have chosen this approach to problems for so many years, it is a little scary to imagine being fully present and aware. You are saying that you want your life to be different but are fearful of how this change might appear. This sounds reasonable, from the perspective of the person who has yet to experience the benefits of the change and can only imagine the void which will remain by the removal of the old behaviour. Until you have experienced the pleasure and freedom that is created by letting go of the old pattern, you are naturally going to have some discomfort and doubt about the change.

It is human nature to seek familiarity and feel comforted by it. Often, even when the familiar behaviour is harmful to your essence and prevents you from fulfilling your dreams, you will cling to it because of the comfort provided by the familiar. This very tendency in all humans is why lasting change must happen gradually. When you demand immediate and complete change, you deny yourself time to learn the lessons that the problem or situation you have created is meant to teach. And you certainly don’t have a solid base or foundation in place to feel secure as you move into unfamiliar territory. This means you are likely to flounder and find yourself returning to your old familiar behaviour when things get a little challenging. This can leave you feeling defeated and hopeless.

Just think of any diet or “nutritional plan” you have tried. You no doubt discovered that your attempts to heal your relationship with food and body-image focus, prior to understanding the cause, set you up to have short-term success. Your success could last only for as long as you did not require those coping strategies, that is, as long as nothing in day-to-day life upset your apple cart! This is why, at the pinnacle of our Diet Mentality, many of us can stick to a diet or some form of restrictive behaviour for only about 12 hours! Max! You can be “good” during the day when you are busy, out and about or in front of others, but when you get home, or the chores of the day are mostly attended to, you decompress with food and the whole cycle repeats itself. If the underlying trigger that leads you to use food to cope is unattended, you will be in trouble when something happens that you hadn’t planned for, or didn’t happen the way you had hoped. The feelings and unmet needs, which naturally and appropriately get triggered in those life situations, currently drive you to restrict, binge or purge to cope.

To be successful in changing an old coping strategy, you must have the confidence of knowing that a nurturing force is standing by, ready to catch you when you start to naturally default into those old patterns. And this force must be predominantly found within. Building a solid, nurturing, supportive and understanding relationship with yourself can take some time as it would with others; however, you will begin to see the benefits of this stronger and more supportive internal relationship immediately, in your awareness of what you are thinking, feeling and needing in that moment and in your ability to respond to those thoughts, feelings and needs respectfully and appropriately.

With a greater sense of trust, security and awareness of yourself rather than the impatience your Drill Sgt. was throwing your way, you will feel a sense of relief which allows you to relax and trust yourself to make life-enhancing and dignified choices around food, yourself and others.

And know this as well: you own this process of change. It does not own you. You can take it as fast or as slow as you like and as you have time and space for. You can look at as much “stuff” and be as aware as you want at any given time, and you can make as many changes as you wish; furthermore, you can return to your previous comforting behaviour whenever you feel the need for the old numbing peace that it brings. Soon, you will naturally find that the old, comfortable coping behaviour no longer fits. It just doesn’t feel right any more. It is not who or where you want to be, nor will you really feel the need to find “security” this way. You will naturally choose not to use it, opting to engage in thoughts, feelings, and behaviours which you have had some practice with and that are coming to feel so much more respectful and natural, so much more “right” – on a gut level than that old coping strategy ever did or ever could. You have found yourself. You have found peace. 

Love

Travelling with an Eating Disorder – Part I

Travelling with an Eating Disorder – Part II

Travelling with an Eating Disorder – Part III

Part I

Traveling with an eating disorder packs a triple whammy for the already beleaguered spirit in desperate need of true rest and relaxation. Whether you struggle with dieting, overeating, purging or a general dissatisfaction with your physical form that prevents you from settling peacefully into the moment, a vacation can be a stress-filled experience that makes you want to just stay at home instead with the covers pulled high.

Travelling with an Eating Disorder – Part II

Travelling with an Eating Disorder – Part III

By Michelle Morand

This is Part III of an article on navigating travel and vacation time in the easiest most relaxed way when you’re still on the path to recovery from the use of food to cope (ie. overeating, restricting, purging, or that annoying diet mentality).

In order for you to completely understand why you do what you do and what you can do to begin to think, and therefore, behave, differently, I’ve put together a kind of step-by-step flow of logic that will help your brain shift out of confused, stuck thinking and into rational, reasonable thoughts that will influence you to behave in ways that will enhance all aspects of your life. ’Cause, let’s face it, you know that some of the things you do aren’t the best choices, you may even have tried to stop or cut back or make some big lifestyle changes. But if you haven’t understood what’s really driving you to do those things in the first place, you can’t be successful for long, and instead will likely feel more stuck and hopeless rather than inspired and confident.

If you’re at all a believer in the concept that your thoughts create your reality, the following logic flow will help you to feel more solid and grounded in clear thinking. This means you will be confidently more present in the world and able to enjoy your food, drink, exercise, free time, and socializing more while being less likely to use any of those substances and behaviours to cope with stress or emotions such as anxiety, anger, insecurity or sadness.

The following is a list of basic premises you must accept in order to heal from any stressful patterns of thinking and behaving and live life to the fullest. I encourage you to read this over on a daily basis for a week and you’ll be amazed at the shifts that occur in your relationship with yourself and with others, with little or no effort on your part.

Premise #1:

Every human being has needs.

Having needs doesn’t make you “needy,” it makes you human. Anyone who has ever implied otherwise to you is someone who is simply uncomfortable with the vulnerability and dependence that the meeting of needs naturally requires. The greatest sense of peace, trust, and safety that a human being can experience in their lives comes from being able to trust in your ability to meet the majority of your own needs and from feeling confident in your right and ability to ask for others to help you meet your needs too. You are entitled to take care of yourself. You are entitled to ask for help. If someone says “no,” it doesn’t mean you were wrong to ask or that that person doesn’t care. Nor does it mean you won’t get that need met. It simply means it doesn’t work for that person, at that time, to meet your need.

Premise #2:

All humans, (whether they like to admit it or not) have the same needs overall and they need to be met in ascending order of priority to our survival.

Our needs for food, air, water and rest come first innately. Without these for any length of time and we’re going to suffer grave consequences, likely death. So naturally, these are the first priority.

Then come our needs for physical safety and security. By this we mean a safe, consistent place to live (we don’t move around a lot); no real or threatened harm to our physical safety or that of anyone we care about; and financial security.

The next natural priority is our need for emotional safety in our bonds with key people (primary caregivers, extended family, peers, teachers, community at large). In order for us to come out of our family of origin feeling confident in ourselves as lovable, worthy, and deserving beings, we need to see that the key people in our lives speak and behave towards us in ways that demonstrate respect, caring, kindness, and acceptance.

Then comes our need for positive self-regard, a.k.a self-esteem. Self-Esteem naturally flows from feeling safe and secure in our world and in our bonds with others. The extent to which we felt that sense of safety and security emotionally and physically will be the extent to which we see ourselves as lovable, capable, worthy human beings who are equal to all others.

And lastly, our needs for self-actualization, the realization of our full potential as a human being, must be met. Whatever our gifts or natural abilities are, the meeting of our lower level needs for physical wellness, emotional and physical security and self-esteem ensures that we have the strength and support to achieve them.

Premise #3:

Given that all people have these needs, whether they acknowledge it or like it or not, it naturally follows that these needs are natural and appropriate.

This means that your needs are not right or wrong or too much – they just are. The way you attempt to meet those needs may be effective or ineffective; life-enhancing or harmful, but the needs themselves cannot be judged as right or wrong with any rational mind. They are a natural part of being human.

Premise #4:

Anxiety is a natural and appropriate signal from within that we have needs that are not being met.

Whenever any of our natural, basic human needs are not met, our senses send a chemical signal through our body to bring our attention to this need. We humans call this signal: Anxiety. Thus, when we feel anxious it is a statement from our instincts that some need is not being met. In our culture we have been taught to judge anxiety as bad or ourselves as “over-sensitive” or having an “anxiety disorder” when we are anxious often or when we are anxious in inconvenient circumstances. In truth, your anxiety is trying to get your attention and tell you that something isn’t feeling right.

Premise #5:

The appropriate human response to this sensation of anxiety is to stop and identify the situation that has triggered an unmet need then take appropriate action to meet that need. In so doing you will return, as quickly and effortlessly as possible to a state of peace.

This state of peace is your indicator that your needs are met in that moment. We could therefore say that anytime you are feeling anything other than peaceful, it is an indicator that you have unmet needs. This awareness of peace as an indicator of met needs and anxiety as an indicator of unmet needs makes it much easier for you to identify when things are going well and when you need to take some action to resolve some problem.

Premise #6:

Your naturally occurring unmet needs will trigger you to have a thought that will naturally trigger an emotional response which naturally triggers you to behave in some way that meets that need or that help you to tune out to the awareness that you have an unmet need.

Thus, it can be asserted that our needs naturally trigger a sensation within us, I call it ‘the niggle.’ This niggle can be a slight feeling that something is up, such as we might experience if we’re a little hungry or need to return a phone call sometime that evening. It can also feel like full blown panic if someone or something is cutting off our airway for example.

The key point here again is that if we are feeling anything other than peaceful it is an indicator that we have needs that aren’t being met. This niggle is meant to be instantly acknowledged by us and acted on so that our need gets met quickly and we feel peaceful again.

The triggering need and corresponding niggle will naturally trigger a thought (“Something is up”). The way we then assess (think about) the stressful situation and our ability to handle it well, becomes the story we tell ourselves about whether our need will get met or not and what we need to do to meet it.

This story about our ability to get that need met naturally triggers an emotion (anxiety, anger, sadness, joy), which naturally triggers a behavioural reaction: We, like all other humans on the planet, are meant to do something to meet that need.

Premise #7:

If the behavioural reaction we choose actually meets the need we feel peaceful and experienced an enhanced sense of trust in ourselves and heightened self-esteem. If the behavioural reaction we chose did not meet our need we will typically respond in one of two ways:

1. If we have high self-esteem we will naturally feel some frustration that our efforts were unsuccessful but we will trust that there is a solution and that we are capable of finding it. We will seek to understand what it was that didn’t work and find an alternative solution either on our own or with help from others. In other words, we don’t give up. We aren’t ashamed to admit we don’t know all the answers and we freely ask for help. We keep looking for a solution until we know we have exhausted all possibilities. Then we grieve, accept the situation and move on. It does not undermine our overall sense of ourselves as a good, worthwhile, competent human being.

1. If our self-confidence is lacking and we doubt our “okay-ness” we have less likelihood of seeking help outside ourselves and therefore, of finding the most effective and simple solution. In other words, we don’t want to admit we aren’t “perfect;” that we don’t know something or that we couldn’t figure it out and thus we make things 10 times harder than they need to be. This resistance to admitting our needs and to asking for help; to being vulnerable and dependent on another, leads to a greater level of anxiety and distress (often growing into depression) as our needs go unmet and our judgement of ourselves and our fears of being judged by others grow.

It is likely, in this fearful frame of mind, that we have told ourselves that there was only one solution to the meeting of our need, the one we tried first, and it didn’t work. Therefore, we will naturally feel increasingly anxious and frantic as not only do we still have the initial unmet need to contend with but now we have a story, repeating in our brain, that we “tried and failed,” “WE failed.” This story is naturally triggering increasing feelings of fear and sadness (which often manifest themselves as anger towards others or towards ourselves.)

If the need goes unmet for long enough, or is a lower level need for emotional or physical security, or food, air, water or rest, and thus imperative to our sense of overall security and well-being in the world, we will begin to feel overwhelmed by the chronic sensations of anxiety. We will get stuck in a loop of stories of impending doom and failure, triggering more anxiety (and, if longstanding, depression), which triggers increasingly ineffective behavioural responses to help us cope with the anxiety that we feel unable to relieve completely.

Recall that thoughts trigger emotions which trigger a behavioural response. These thoughts can be rational or irrational and our corresponding behavioural response can be helpful or harmful to our overall well-being.

Premise #8

When we feel fearful of asking for help and feel anxious because we feel stuck in our efforts to meet our needs, we begin to try to distance ourselves from our lives and from others who might judge or reject us “if they really knew us.” To do this we naturally engage in harmful coping strategies such as alcoholism, drug addiction, eating disorders, binge eating, dieting, gambling, sex addiction, relationship addiction, raging, overspending, and physical abuse among others.

If we are thinking irrationally, we get stuck in a “learned helplessness loop” where we believe that: Because we were unsuccessful in our initial attempt(s) to solve our problem and meet our needs, there is no solution.

Therefore, we believe that we just have to try and cope with the situation and the feelings it triggers. We devise psychological, emotional and physical strategies to distract us from the situation and the anxiety it is naturally and appropriately distressing us.

We give up on any long term solution and settle for short term relief/preoccupation/distraction. The old problem remains and now we have a new one too which usually has ramifications on our physical, emotional and mental health as well as on our finances and relationships.

These harmful coping strategies trigger unmet needs of their own because of the harm we do to ourselves physically and emotionally, and often, to others through these behaviours. This triggers even more thoughts of helplessness and an even greater sense of distress and stuck-ness, triggering a faster and faster return to the harmful coping behaviour each time and creating greater and greater anxiety and unmet needs overall.

This explains why, whenever you’ve tried in the past to stop a certain behaviour that you know isn’t good for you, you end up doing it more! If you haven’t identified the underlying needs you were seeking to meet through that behaviour in the first place and they are still unmet and you’ll still need to use your coping behaviour, regardless of your best intentions. It’s just that simple.

You have got to have some solution in place to meet the original unmet needs before you can successfully take away the behaviour or substance that you’ve been using to cope with the stress that those needs create. You can’t just exchange one coping behaviour for another and expect to be successful in relieving your anxiety or depressed feelings.

Premise #9:

In contrast the assumption we live from when we think rationally is: There is a solution, and if I can’t find it, I simply need to find someone to help.

Regardless of how it may seem, it is true that there is a solution to your problem in all but the most dire situations (terminal illness for example) but even in this case, thinking rationally we can accept the reality of the circumstance, “I have a terminal illness,” and then set about finding solutions to enhance the quality of life we have left.

If we are thinking clearly, and we were unsuccessful in our attempt to meet a need, we naturally do one of 3 things:

Either reassess our initial strategy to see if it will work if implemented in a different way;

• Try a different approach altogether;
• Or ask for help/guidance.

One way or another, the problem gets solved. We do not undermine our self-esteem by telling ourselves WE are failures. This is a learning experience. We learn the lesson and move on. As long as we are learning from our life experiences, we are doing life right!

Premise #10:

Therefore, when you have been taught to think in a learned helplessness way and not in a confident, self-trusting way, you will naturally engage in harmful patterns of behaviour such as: overeating, dieting, overspending, procrastinating, isolation, and compromising yourself for others. These are some of the most common coping strategies that humans will turn to to help them numb out from stressful situations.

Because of our life experiences as young people when our needs for emotional or physical security weren’t met, rather than looking for helpful solutions when we have a problem, we kick in to learned helplessness thinking which triggers more stress and greater anxiety and ultimately an inappropriate/unsuccessful behavioural solution.

So, there you have it! A clear, step by step understanding of why you (and others) do what they do, even when they know they want to stop.

Reminding yourself of this as you go through your day to day life and see yourself engaging in any harmful behaviour, or feeling anything other than peaceful, is the first and most important step in creating deep and lasting change.

I am a firm believer in moderation. I know firsthand from my own binge eating disorder and use of other harmful coping strategies, that once you’re able to identify ways to meet your needs that truly solve the problem, you’ll be able to engage in eating any food, anywhere, anytime, or having some drinks, or going shopping, or having challenging conversations without losing your grip and slipping into old extremes. Instead you’ll be able to feel trusting of yourself to handle situations with respect and dignity for all parties, first and foremost, yourself.

There are some simple tools and strategies that you can add to this newfound understanding that will lead to significant change in longstanding problems within just a few weeks.

If you’re an individual client of The CEDRIC Centre or a member of our web based program you’re already learning what’s really triggering you and what you can do about it. If you’d like to learn more, please visit email me @ mmorand@cedriccentre.com.

Love

This article was originally published in the December 2011 edition of Encompass Magazine.

The only reason you ever use food to cope, no exceptions, is because you have needs (See Abraham Maslow’s Hierarchy of Basic Needs Chart on the left) that aren’t being met in some area of your life and you’ve told yourself that you’re not allowed, not deserving, or just not capable of getting them met, no matter what you do. These stories you’re telling yourself lead you to feel depressed and anxious, lethargic and frantic, in other words, they overwhelm you.

And when you’re feeling overwhelmed about something you believe you can’t do anything to change or resolve, the only thing to do is to find a way to diminish or discount the impact of that thing: to numb out.

In comes your primary coping strategy.

Is it binging?

• Is it restricting calories, certain kinds of foods, or times of eating regardless of whether you’re hungry or not?
• Is it purging (through an hour or two of exercise, through laxatives, or vomiting)?
• Is it an attachment to a certain weight or way of looking?
• Is it drinking?
• What about drugs; shopping; gambling; the pursuit of that perfect relationship?
• Do you take responsibility for what others feel, or what others need?
• Do you procrastinate to cope with overwhelming things?
• Do you isolate yourself?
• Do you avoid certain people or places?
• Do you resist downtime?
• Do you resist going to bed at a reasonable hour?
• Are you a clean freak? Or just the opposite?

How do you currently cope with the unmet needs in your life?

Which of the above coping strategies do you use when you have needs that aren’t being met? Make a mental note or write them down.

The solution?

Step 1: Learn to immediately identify when you have needs that aren’t being met.

Step 2: Learn to acknowledge and validate those needs, rather than question or squash or judge them.

Step 3: Learn how best to meet your needs in ways that are lasting and life-enhancing. This builds self-esteem and creates a life that is peaceful, balanced, passionate and fulfilling.

Step 4: Live, have fun, enjoy, practice good self-care without effort and never even think about using any harmful coping strategy again.

But before you can live in step 4 you have to master steps 1 – 3.

Each of us has an appropriately and naturally occurring sensation of discomfort or distress when we have a need that isn’t being met. I call it “the niggle.” A sense of “something’s not right” or “I just can’t relax” or, even worse: “Something bad is going to happen.” Your goal is to learn to identify immediately when the niggle arises. And, instead of judging it and numbing out to it with one of your coping strategies, you’re going to do this:

1. Acknowledge that you have a need that isn’t being met. “I am feeling that niggly sensation. That means I have a need that isn’t being met.”
2. Ask yourself what you were just thinking or what just happened that may have triggered you to feel stressed (niggly).
3. Then ask yourself: “What has to happen with that situation I was just imagining in order for me to feel completely peaceful?” (However unlikely or unreal it may seem, let yourself get clear on what you really need in that situation in order to feel peaceful about it – write it down!)
4. And voila, you’ve identified your unmet needs and can now set about learning how to meet them. You may also discover that your niggle was arising not from any present-day unmet needs but from memories of old painful circumstances or from imagining certain future events in a way that made you feel niggly (ie. that your needs wouldn’t be met in the future).

Most of us have such a long history of judging and tuning out to our needs that just doing step 1 is a challenge on our own, let alone steps 3 and 4.

That’s where I come in.

It doesn’t have to take a long time. It doesn’t have to be “hard.” It’s only taken awhile, but it’s been challenging so far because you’ve been trying the wrong thing over and over. It typically takes 5 or 6 sessions to get the basic tools in your tool kit (or one weekend workshop) and then a few follow-up sessions as you road test them.

There is this ridiculous mentality out there in the medical system and amidst many eating disorder and substance abuse recovery facilities that once you’ve got an eating disorder, or alcoholism etc., you’ve got it for life and that the best you can do is learn to live in such a way that minimizes its effect on your life. Well, that is just not true at all. That is the most defeating, paralyzing mentality anyone can have and it’s no wonder that by the time people come to work with me, they’re feeling completely stuck and hopeless.

I want to reassure you that your use of food to cope, in whatever way you do it, and any other harmful coping strategy you engage in, can be completely overcome and left behind for good. And you don’t have to go through years and years of arduous, white-knuckling it, just a few months of consistent practice of a new way of looking at yourself and at the world is all it takes.

It’s all about needs. You can choose to continue to judge your needs and shame yourself for having them, and therefore doom yourself to stay stuck where you are. Or you can allow for the possibility that in a short period of time, even if you don’t know how, you can learn to identify and meet your needs in ways that makes you feel stronger and happier than ever before and that make your relationships with others the way you’ve only ever dreamed of.

That’s been my experience as a completely recovered binge eater and exercise bulimic, and as a specialist with over 17 year’s experience in this field. There is hope. There is freedom. There is an amazing life waiting for you!

Love,

… I loathe looking in the mirror, gross out at changing my clothes. Can’t stand being around people. Hate even being touched!

My eating disorder looms, waiting to pounce at any given moment. I think I’m calm but then the moment I walk in the door (usually after work), I binge on whatever I see even though I’m not hungry!!!

I have been trying ‘natural eating’ and hate it. Instead of having an easy & calm relationship with food, I spiral into extremes. Without food ‘rules’ I rebelliously indulge in foods just to prove that I am free. I end up eating food that makes my PLA rise to a 10 on my stress scale. I know my diet mentality is controlling me and I guess I just don’t believe I will be ‘slim’ eating this way.

I am unmotivated and depressed. I feel trapped inside my room looking out on everyone living life normally but I just cannot join in. Too scary!

I am back to the beginning again and wonder if I’ve made any progress at all!

Sorry to be such a downer. This has taken everything in me just to express this much. But I am drowning and have nowhere else to express it. The people closest to me don’t ‘get it’ and just want the nice me. Can’t give it to them and I feel horrible.

I’m supposed to be together right? I’m a mom and a wife and have a respectable job and even teach Sunday school…. but I just want to scream swear words at everyone, especially my Drill Sergeant!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A

I can totally relate to those feelings of loathing and disgust, frustration and fatigue. It’s a very depressing and overwhelming place to be.

The reality is, if we’re feeling anything other than peaceful, we have needs that aren’t being met (or we’re remembering events when needs weren’t met or imagining future events and that they won’t be). Our knee-jerk reaction has been to start focusing on food and on our body when we feel anxious or insecure. That’s our training in life:

“If you just look like X, all will be well.”

“If you just don’t eat Y, you will be good, and all will be well.”

We’ve bought in to the story that we have to look a certain way or only eat certain things in order to gain the approval of key people, or any people for that matter. And we are so desperate to achieve that state of acceptance that we aren’t interested in taking our time to find balance and a sustainable lifestyle with exercise and with food. We want it now.

Of course the irony is, it takes forever to achieve a sense of peace, security, and balance in your life when you try and achieve it through restriction and body image focus, and it takes such a short time to create true balance in your life (which always includes being a natural weight for your body) when you just eat naturally (eat when hungry, stop when comfortably full) and respond to your emotions and needs in respectful, life-enhancing ways.

We do need approval now. We all do. But restriction, binging and purging to get it will never work. That path only leads us to feel more loathing for ourselves and more insecure around others every single time. It hasn’t worked for you as a path to security, self-love, peace and happiness so far and it will never work. Ever.

And any time we start to think that overeating or restricting are what we “need” to do, we are not in our rational mind, we are in our all-or-nothing thinking and we need to stop and check in about what it is in our lives that might be triggering stress for us.

When we say, and again, I completely relate to this experience, that we are “trying” natural eating, what that really means is “I’m legalizing binging, until my Drill Sgt. jumps in, and he will, because I really still believe I need to restrict. I still believe I can’t trust myself around food. I still believe that I can’t trust my body to know what it needs and how much it needs.”

Natural eating just is. You’re hungry, you eat, you’re full, you stop. It’s natural. There’s nothing to try. It’s the layers and layers of diet mentality on top of your natural cues and your natural response to them that are causing you stress and frustration and triggering you to binge and purge. Those layers can never be removed by focusing on what you’re eating or on what your body fat ratio is that week.

They can only be shed when:

1. you prove to yourself that any restriction; any eating when you’re not hungry; and purging; and critical thoughts of your body; are just your learned approach to “handling” stress, and
2. you learn some simple steps to handle your stress and solve your problems in life in more mature and respectful ways.

If you’ve set yourself the intention for a day to eat when you’re hungry and stop when you’re full and at some point in that day you realize you’re starting to want to binge, or you wake up in full-fledged binge mode, that doesn’t mean you couldn’t do natural eating. You did eat naturally, until whatever point in your day saw your stress rise beyond your current ability to handle it, triggering your anxiety and your diet mentality coping strategy kicked in with thoughts of what you should/shouldn’t be/have eaten, and therefore whether you should just binge and purge to “take care of it.”

It’s the diet mentality that is the problem. It’s the story that restriction is necessary and will solve anything that is the problem.

Imagine if you were able to remind yourself immediately, whenever you started to feel stressed about food or about your body in any way, that that’s just your coping strategy talking and it means you’re feeling anxious or insecure about something (other than food or body image); at the first niggle of stressful food focus, you rallied to your side and looked deeper into what was causing you distress.

Immediately your focus on food and body image would release, you would know it’s just smoke and mirrors and not the real problem and you’re not interested or willing to distract yourself with coping strategies any more, you’re ready to see and to solve what’s really bugging you.

That’s true freedom. That’s what you’re here to learn to create for yourself 24/7 (Actually, you’re here to get to a place where the thoughts of food in that old restrictive, judgemental way, don’t even arise. That will come. Let’s first focus on getting you to the place of recognizing food and body focus for what it is, a sign, a symptom, and not the problem in and of itself).

So, give yourself a big hug from me and from all of us here in the group. We care about you and know how you were feeling, firsthand.

Your whole approach to yourself, to life and to food and body image will shift when you get that any focus on food and body that is stressful is just a coping strategy. Its whole purpose in your life is to distract you from something that’s stressing you out that you believe you can’t do anything about.

Your natural step then, each time you notice those old thoughts or behaviours around food kicking in, will be to ask yourself, “What’s really going on here? Separate from food and body image (which are just coping strategies anyway), what’s stressing me out and what can I do about it?”

You will not get hooked. You will not spiral, and your self-esteem will grow and grow as you not only see yourself handling life in ways that demonstrate confidence and self-respect, but also see yourself not using food to cope because you won’t need to.

Realizing that we’ve shifted out of Natural Eating and back into Diet Mentality is one of the most important things, but also one of the hardest things to do in this process because we’re so accustomed to feeling anxious and crappy about ourselves and food we often don’t notice it when it sneaks back in. It’s so familiar it doesn’t register. So we think we’re “trying natural eating” but really we’re feeling anxious and overwhelmed because we’re stressed and we’re in diet mentality to try and cope.

It is fundamental to you and your freedom from this annoying behaviour that you do whatever you can to help yourself remember that any feelings of judgement, loathing, stress, anxiety, etc. around food are diet mentality and not natural eating.

Then, whenever you come to and realize you’ve slipped back into the diet mentality or missed a stress cue, or two or 10, instead of letting the Drill Sgt. beat the crap out of you and depress the hell out of you, you can simply remind yourself:

It’s a coping strategy. There is no value in focusing on the food because that isn’t the problem. It’s the way I currently deal with stress and it will only change when I can show myself that I can handle life in other ways that are far more life-enhancing and respectful.

And how do you prove this to yourself so you can really trust that food is not the problem?

Ask yourself, whenever you notice you’re eating when you’re not hungry, or not allowing yourself to eat as much as you know your body needs to be well:

1. What might just have happened, or what was I just thinking that might have caused me to feel anxious or insecure?

2. What are the stories I’m telling myself about that? (and that means…and that means…)

3. Is there any all-or-nothing thinking in that?

4. What are some other possibilities? How else could that story go? What other stories are also possible?

5. What, if any, action would I like to take/do I need to take in order to feel truly peaceful about this issue?

6. Breathe.

Question:

“One minute after our talk, which I found extremely insightful as I always do, I walked out of office and into my cubicle to have my lunch.  I had ordered egg salad on a wrap and fruit.  I was ready to eat until full and, if I wanted, to finish rest later if I got hungry.  I’ve really been working hard on trying to listen to my body cues.

One of my coworkers came in and said he had brought in my favorite fried chicken for us all, biscuits, etc.  I went over and thought okay, I’ll have one piece and one biscuit as I love them both.  As I was eating the chicken, I just had the physical and mental urge to eat more and more until I was stuffed, it was like the forbidden food, and if I overate, I would be a bad girl.  I was even starting to lose focus of my surroundings as I do in a full head-on binge.  It was scary I had just talked to you.  In my head, I was thinking, Enjoy this piece and have that be it. Don’t let this chicken have that much power. I couldn’t decipher any Drill Sgt. stories as I was trying so hard to fight the binge.

Had I ate my egg salad, I would not have had this struggle, Why?”

And then a few days later…

“It happened again today. I had checked in during the morning and was doing okay, then I realized I was going to an area of NJ today that had a great local hot dog stand.  I swear to you as soon as I thought of having a hot dog it went to immediately thoughts of having 2 or 3 hot dogs, then I got the urge to eat even though I had just had breakfast. I was immediately in all-or- nothing because I wasn’t going to have a salad for lunch but was allowing myself the hot dog which isn’t really a good choice when you should be losing weight and be dieting perfectly.  I swear it was the pressure of having a hot dog and not being perfect with my eating that sent me into oblivion. It happened in seconds.  Is that possible?”

Answer a la Michelle

Oh, yeah! It’s possible. It happens in a split second that our all-or-nothing thinking kicks in, triggers us to feel that urgent niggle, and we are off and running in our coping strategy cycle of negative /all-or-nothing thinking -> anxiety/feeling overwhelmed/feeling stuck/feeling hopeless -> numbing out with food (or thoughts of food), or alcohol, or TV, or isolation, etc. -> negative/all-or-nothing thinking ->  more anxiety (and now we feel like crap physically, too! -> more numbing out…etc. etc.

What really happened was a lot of unconscious chatter that triggered you to feel unsettled/anxious which just gained more and more momentum as you continued to focus on

Thoughts of Food:

whether to have hot dogs;

whether to have 1 or 3;

what would happen if you had 3;

what kind of a person even wants 3;

you have weight to lose, you shouldn’t be even thinking of having a hot dog let alone 3;

what’s wrong with me…?

This cycle will repeat itself exactly as it did here, every single time you start to feel at all anxious or unsettled about anything until you learn the key piece of the puzzle:

Any thoughts of food that trigger you to feel anything other than peaceful are coping strategy thoughts.

Got that?

Any thoughts of food that trigger you to feel anything other than peaceful are coping strategy thoughts.

That means that any time you start feeling that old familiar sense of push/pull, I love you/I hate you, just this once….I’ll start again tomorrow…., what is really happening is you’re into coping strategy mode and not in the present moment. The majority of your conscious and unconscious energy in that moment is either in the past or the future ie. this happened last time and that means it’s going to happen again… or…I wasn’t able to do X last time so I won’t be able to this time. It’s all part and parcel of the instability and insecurity that is all-or-nothing thinking that stems from unmet needs within you for connection (with yourself), for reassurance (from yourself), for validation and acknowledgment of your feelings and needs (from yourself) and safety and trust (with/in yourself). Did you notice a them there? All the key needs that trigger you to binge or purge or restrict can be met by yourself, easily.

Your Very Own Self-Esteem Brownie Recipe

Once you are able to recognize that any energy around food that isn’t peaceful is simply an indicator that you’re feeling unsettled about something (or a number of things) and you’ve just kicked over your manageable stress threshold into maxed out, needing-food-to-cope land, then your automatic default will no longer be to get hooked and ride the train of food focus and self-flagellation, instead, your reaction will be empathy and compassion.  You will stop. You will breathe. You will say:

“Wait, I’m getting hooked into food focus here that isn’t feeling peaceful or good. That means I’m feeling anxious or overwhelmed about something. What was I just thinking/what just happened that might have triggered me to feel at all anxious/unsettled/…pressured? And what am I telling myself that means? And was there any all-or-nothing thinking in that thought? If so, how else could it possibly go? And do I think that outcome is equally or more likely?”

There’s your recipe. It’ll make a perfect batch of self-esteem brownies every time! No binging and a solution to whatever was really bugging you, thus a win-win in the moment and an increase in self-confidence and an overall decrease in your baseline stress level.

The Double Whammy

In the example above, as with so many of these instances in our healing, what was likely taking place for you was twofold: A genuine stressor triggered some thoughts and feelings of distress while, simultaneously (‘cause goodness knows we don’t have enough to deal with already!)  some good old diet mentality triggered guilt, shame and confusion about where you should be focusing your thoughts. In other words:

1. You were feeling somewhat unsettled about a stressor or a few stressors in your life and some stories about how they were going to unfold or how successful you were going to be were likely starting to kick in, thus you weren’t starting out around food from a peaceful place and you weren’t fully connected to your own thoughts and emotions (if we use food to cope it means we typically check out to our own feelings and thoughts whenever we start to feel anxious/unsettled and we are in need of tools to help us notice those cues more immediately and respond to them appropriately rather than numb out to them, which really means we are numbing out to ourselves and our own, authentic experience of the world).
2. When the opportunity to have some of your favorite food arose, not the choice you had planned for yourself, there wasn’t any balance in you, just all-or-nothing thinking (again, you were already a little/lot unsettled because of underlying stressors so the all-or-nothing thinking Drill Sgt. was already up and about – the presentation of a “bad” food choice just kicked you that much faster into the food-to-cope mode of making the focus of your distress food, rather than what was triggering you initially): “That’s bad food; I should eat “diet” food; I’m bad for eating this; I’m bad for wanting this; I’m going to get fat; I’m never going to lose weight; I’m evil; I’ll never figure this out and… our favorite: someone should probably just lock me up in a room full of jelly doughnuts and throw away the key, now! I give up!!!”

A Little Natural Eating Refresher

Had you had the natural eating handout in your hot little hand at that moment (or up on the wall in the staff room! Even better!!! J ), you would have been reminded of all the key pieces you needed to stop and chill out in that moment:

• If you’re hungry, eat!
• When you’re full, stop!
• As long as you honor those 2 steps, you can truly eat anything and not be overweight! I know it for a fact from my own life and from thousands of men and women who have gone through The CEDRIC Centre program.
• If you can’t do that you’re absolutely, 100% guaranteed, using food to cope and you need tools and support to identify why, and what to do about those underlying stressors (that’s where we come in).
• Eat everything in moderation
• There are no good and bad foods, it’s only when we eat when we’re not hungry, and eat more than we’re hungry for that we have extra weight on our body. Now, of course, certain foods are healthier than others, but we’re not talking about that. We’re talking about judgements of goodness/badness, rightness/wrongness, that make us feel bad and wrong for eating or even thinking of eating certain foods, rather than realizing that in moderation nothing is “bad.” These judgements only serve to alienate us further from our needs and feelings in the moment thus increasing our need for food to numb out rather than reducing it. The diet mentality and the all-or-nothing Drill Sgt. will never do anything but make you feel stuck and crappy about yourself.
• We don’t need to focus on the kinds of foods we’re eating at this stage, only why we are eating (for hungry or emotional reasons). The truth is, once you cease needing to use food focus to cope with life, which can only happen once you’ve developed the self-esteem and confidence in yourself to handle life in competent, respectful and dignified ways, you will naturally be drawn to more honoring food choices regarding types of foods and quantities, it happens with no effort, and there is no sense whatsoever of restriction or of “I can’t have…”.
• No guilt ladies and gents! No guilt! No guilt! The only reason to feel guilty is because you’re out of integrity with what you believe is good or right for you. So if you’re feeling guilty around food, check in with yourself and ask: “Am I feeling guilty because I have some all-or-nothing thinking about what is a good food vs. a bad food, which is the diet mentality and which I am committed to tossing out the window as I drive alongside the Loch Ness?” (because that’s really just an old, stupid, misguided societal crap story that only ever made people feel bad about themselves) “Or am I feeling guilty because I’m not hungry and I’m reaching for more food and I know that means I have needs that aren’t being met and I need to take a few minutes to be with myself and identify what’s stressing me and what I can do to resolve the issue?”  If it’s the first, head to Scotland, fast!  If it’s the latter, breathe (4-7-8, or just 3 deep breaths), prove how safe it is in that moment to be in your body, in that moment, and learn to identify what’s really going on in your mind and in your life that’s making you feel so overwhelmed and stuck.

My guess is that if you had been able, in that moment in, what shall be forever known as …“The Chicken Incident” to remind yourself of the first 3 bulleted points above, you’d have been just fine. Same with the hot dog incident. Same with most of our overeating experiences.

Tired of Watching the Train Wreck?

So do what you have to do to create opportunities throughout your day for the next week (and beyond as needed) to remind yourself of the above key points of natural eating, and know that any time you’re relating to food any way other than the natural eating way, you’re using food to cope which means you’re anxious/stressed about something, have told yourself you can’t handle it (which is always a big pile of pahooey!), and are checking out so you don’t have to stand by and watch the train wreck.

Well, the truth is, there is never going to be a train wreck, because you are competent, you always pull “it” off and get by. That’s reality. That’s truth. That’s what your life has shown you. It doesn’t matter if you pull it off at the 23^rd hour or in dirty underwear for Pete’s sake! You do it, you’ve always done it and that goes for all of you reading. You know it! You’re not perfect (welcome to my club 6 billion members and counting), and you don’t have to be. You only need to do your best in each moment and get off your case. That’s all! Really!

Let go of The Old All-or-Nothing

It doesn’t matter what anyone else from your past told you you had to do, think, feel or be. You only need to hold yourself to their expectations if you choose to continue to hold the all-or-nothing perspective that that person (those people) is God; that somehow, they have the “right” answer and the “right” way of doing things and that they are “perfect” and that your life depends on their approval. That’s a very irrational, childlike perspective on the world. It made sense to see key people as Godlike when we were small because, in essence, they were our everything. We were completely dependent on them, and we had brains at that time in our development that couldn’t entertain any grey area or multicolored approaches to life. The child brain can only think in terms of all-or-nothing, fight or flight, threat or not, good or bad, right or wrong, period! That’s why we are in the pickle we’re in.

That old brain made us see ourselves as those people seemed to (flawed, bad, wrong, stupid, fat, ugly, lazy, selfish, weak…), not realizing that they are just people too. They had their own strengths and weaknesses. They had their own needs and their own (often) ineffectual ways of meeting or coping with those needs.

What we all Needed

What we all needed, was parenting and role modeling of an open-minded, moderate approach to the world in which we were taught:

1. That what we were feeling was valid, as feelings only arise, automatically, from our thoughts which come from an instinctual sense of some need not being met, therefore, they can’t be bad, wrong, or even “too much” they just are;
2. To ask questions and seek to understand things that seem strange or don’t meet our needs in some ways;
3. To express our feelings in ways that are respectful of ourselves and of others and create safety and trust within and between;
4. To realize that there is more than one way to see everything and that all perspectives have validity given that person’s life experience and self-awareness. We don’t have to have everyone agree, or even anyone agree, in order for us to be “right” about how we feel or what we need or our opinion on something. We can hear contrary ideas and opinions and still stay with ourselves and with the truth of how we feel and what we need.

I’d say that about covers it!

I hope this was helpful to you all, and as always, I really welcome your sharing and questions. It’s really so validating and affirming to hear how you’re exploring these tools and how this process is working for you.

Love

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© Michelle Morand, 2010