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CEDRIC Centre 2013 ‘Master Series’ Workshop Schedule

2013 ‘Master Series’ Workshop Schedule

2013 ‘Master Series’ 3-day Weekend Workshop Schedule

Hours: All workshops run from Friday to Sunday, 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. each day. Cost: All workshops cost $636.00 + tax with payment plans available.

Vancouver Workshops with Michelle Morand, MA, RCC:

‘Master Your Brain – Master Your Behaviour’ Dates: ; Feb. 22nd to 24th; May 17th to 19th; Aug. 9th to 11th; Oct. 18th to 20th ‘Mastering Balance: Creating Solid Self-Esteem and True Inner Peace’ Dates: March 15th to 17th; June 21st to 23rd; Nov. 15th to 17th ‘Mastering Relationships: The Relationship Equation’ – July 26th to 28th; Dec. 6th to 8th Venue for all Vancouver Workshops: Century Plaza Hotel,  1015 Burrard St, Vancouver, BC V6Z 3B6

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Victoria Workshops with Dawn Cox, M.Ed., psych, RCC:

‘Master Your Brain – Master Your Behaviour’ Dates: March 8th to 10th, July 12th to 14th and November 8th to 10th Venue: Common Room at 1246 Fairfield, Victoria, BC, V8V 3B5

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Calgary Workshops with Michelle Morand, MA, RCC:

Master Your Brain – Master Your Behaviour Dates:July 5th to 7th ‘Mastering Balance: Creating Solid Self-Esteem and True Inner Peace’– Dates: July 12th to 14th Venue: MacEwan Conference Centre, U of Calgary, 2500 University Dr NW Calgary, T2N 1N4 There is a hotel at the University, if you would like to stay there as well.
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Posted in: 2012, Complete Recovery, News Release, newsletter, Relationship with Food, Relationship with Others, Relationship with Self, Relationships 101, Self-Help Services, Services, Upcoming Events, workshops

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The Process of Lasting Change

Process of Lasting Change

Repeated patterns are a window to your needs and the process of lasting change will help you address those 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.

Understanding the Process of Lasting Change

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!”

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Posted in: 2012, CEDRIC Centre, newsletter, Relationship with Food, Relationship with Others, Relationship with Self, Tips for Natural Eating

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The Secret to Making Your Dreams Come True

Making Your Dreams Come TrueToday, (11/21/11) for me, was one of those days that we might dream about for years and years, hoping it will come true but truly wondering if it ever would. Perhaps from our little girl selves at the age of 8 or 10, and then again, with greater emphasis and clarity in our teens, and then early 20’s and maybe during some dark times too, that dream would keep us plugging along, one seemingly cement-laden foot in front of the other. Today I had the experience of educating a group of 160 nursing students on The CEDRIC Method. Now, that in and of itself is rather frickin’ cool! Getting to educate up-and-coming front line health care providers on a respectful, simple, effective way of perceiving and supporting their clients who may struggle with eating disorders or substance abuse issues is an incredible honour. Period. That’s a pretty cool day. But, it gets better! It was at a college that I went to many years ago. At that time I was a grade 10 drop out. A pot smoking, binging, isolating, depressed, anxious, insecure, totally – and I mean to-ta-leee – codependent young woman who couldn’t make eye contact with anyone without breaking out in hives! I used to literally slink onto campus, keep my head down in class and try not to interact any more than necessary with any other students. I could relate to the teachers amazingly well – even was asked and agreed to attend staff functions (aka pub crawls!) from time to time. But I felt so totally fat, gross, and just plain geeky with my peers (aka the cool people), that I didn’t make one friend in 4 years. Not one. (more…)

Posted in: newsletter, Relationship with Food, Relationship with Others, Relationship with Self, The Law of Attraction

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Making it Safe to Forgive

Making it Safe to ForgiveI had an experience earlier this week with my dear husband where I sure as heck didn’t practice what I preach! We have a sensitive topic between us in regards to another dear family member and how best to support them through a difficult time. We often need to agree to just set this topic aside and trust that we will come back to it and it will get sorted in the way we always do, respectfully, amicably, fairly. This time around, I didn’t do so well with that! We agreed we were not going to bring up that topic during our quality time together that day. I committed to that. I meant it. And then….as we talked of this and that….the conversation naturally segued into a discussion about this situation and what the best solution might be so everyone feels good about it. I admit, I brought it up. In my defence, I was halfway through my second or third sentence about it before I realized I had shifted from one topic to that one. What I would like to have done, and what I will do in the future, and have done in the past, would be to say “Ooops! Sorry, I didn’t mean to bring that up. I know we had an agreement not to. Can you forgive me? And can we start again?” What I did instead was justify bringing it up (to myself) by thinking – “oh, this wasn’t intentional, it just ….happened.” And, “He’s not flipping out and telling me I shouldn’t be, so it must be fine, right?” (more…)

Posted in: newsletter, Relationship with Others, Relationship with Self, Relationships 101

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The first step to thinking rationally (and never using food to cope again).

thinking rationally about foodThis week I want to share an article with you that will get you thinking in a whole different way. If there are ever times these days, when you find yourself feeling stuck between agreeing with someone else’s perspective or holding your ground and honouring your thoughts / feelings / experience, then it is highly likely you’ve been trained to think in an all or nothing way that sounds something like this:
  • If I acknowledge any validity in what you are saying that means I am completely negating my perspective and that makes you “right” and me “wrong.”
Or, put another way:
  • If I let you know that I understand why you think and feel as you do that means I’m saying it’s right or okay and that means you won’t take the time to acknowledge or validate my perspective, nor will you see any need to grow or change (if your perspective/approach doesn’t work for me).  In other words if I acknowledge that I understand you it means I am agreeing with you and therefore I am agreeing to things continuing to be as they are; agreeing that you are “right” and therefore I am “wrong.” I’m not okay with how things are therefore I can’t acknowledge your perspective.  (This, by the way, is the mentality that leads to most of the divorces in our society).
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Posted in: All-or-Nothing Thinking, newsletter, Relationship with Others, Relationship with Self, Relationships 101

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Making sure your basic needs are met – Review

Making sure your basic needs are met 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?
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Posted in: newsletter, Relationship with Others, Relationship with Self, Relationships 101, Tips for Natural Eating

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Natural Eating 101: Week 1 The Diet Mentality

The Diet MentalityWelcome. This is the first article in a series entitled Natural Eating 101 where we will focus on the diet mentality. Natural eating refers to an easy and peaceful relationship with food where you simply eat when you’re physically hungry, stop when you’re comfortably full, make honoring choices about what you eat overall, and have any food in moderation. No guilt. No shame. No sneaking, hiding, binging, restricting, purging. When you eat naturally, your body comes to its natural weight without rigorous exercise programs and without dieting or restricting. And it stays there. (more…)

Posted in: CEDRIC Centre, Natural Eating 101, newsletter, Relationship with Others, Relationship with Self

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When I Use My Tools, They Work! – Revisited

“When I use my tools, they work! Things are easier, more peaceful. I just don’t feel the need to use food to cope when I use my tools.” I hear this a lot from clients. And it’s true. However, from clients who are a little new with the process, there is usually a “…but” attached to the end of it and the rest of the statement sounds something like, “…it’s just so hard to use my tools.” Or “….it takes too long and I don’t have the time or energy to do anything other than eat.” Or even “….what if they stop working? I need to hang on to my use of food to cope,  just in case my new tools stop working.” This is such an important topic, that we did an audio podcast on the subject as well. Read the original When I Use My Tools, They Work! article here. Listen to the When I Use My Tools, They Work! audio podcast here.

Posted in: CEDRIC Centre, newsletter, Relationship with Food, Relationship with Others, Relationship with Self

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Relationships 101 Week 4

Flags in a RelationshipThis article is part of a series: Relationships 101: Week 1, Week 2, Week 3, Week 4. This week in our Relationships 101 series, I want to chat a bit about flags in a relationship. If I do say so myself, I wrote a pretty smokin’ section on this in my book so if you’ve got access to “Food is not the Problem: Deal With What Is! I encourage you to check out Chapter 23. It’s got lots of good education and tools on communication in relationships. I’m going to present an abridged and updated version of the section on flags here so you can get a good feel for the concept and begin to experiment with it yourself. The Flag System I am about to share with you a concept that is not in and of itself a communication tool. However, it is a fundamental tool for assessing the information you are receiving verbally and non-verbally from people in your life. Once you have assessed this information, you will be in a stronger and clearer place to determine for yourself how you want and need to proceed. By that, I mean whether or not you need to speak to the other person, and if so, what you need to say.  (We’ll address the what to say and how to say it in the next 2 weeks of this series of articles). (more…)

Posted in: CEDRIC Centre, newsletter, Relationship with Food, Relationship with Others, Relationship with Self, Relationships 101

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Relationships 101 Week 3

Flags in a RelationshipThis article is part of a series: Relationships 101Week 1Week 2Week 3Week 4. Okay folks, we’re at Week 3 of what could (but won’t) be a 52-week series! We’re going to tackle the key bits of any relationship and how to make yours hum in 6 weeks (or so). This week we’re specifically going to explore flags in a relationship. If you’re not into this series as it’s just not where you’re at or what you’re needing at this time, I highly recommend you spend the next few weeks reviewing the “Complete Recovery Series.” This is a series I wrote that lays out the key tools you need to begin to experience healing in your relationship with food. You’ll find a listing of all the articles on the left hand side of the blog. If you’re following along with this series however, you’ll have experimented a bit last week with providing for others and for yourself that which you have been expecting or looking for from them. I’ll bet you learned a great deal and that already you have greater empathy for yourself and for others. (more…)

Posted in: CEDRIC Centre, newsletter, Relationship with Food, Relationship with Others, Relationship with Self, Relationships 101

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