Radical Self-Love Instead of Resolutions

My friend and mentor Robyn Posin (forthelittleonesinside.com) often says that setting goals rather than forming open-ended intentions can lead to problems. Because we don't have the ability to predict the future, we can't know what will be right for us tomorrow.

Today though, you may have an idea that losing weight will make you happy in the future. Today, as the new year approaches, you may be setting a resolution to diet harder, to eat less, to exercise more, to get thinner.

I want to invite you to think about the last time you lost weight (and the time before that, and the time before that). Did you feel an initial rush of excitement as you fit into smaller clothes? Did your self-esteem go up as the number on the scale went down? Was there another feeling alongside or just under the excitement? Was there fear or worry, maybe even dread that you would not be able to sustain the behavior required to keep losing weight?

This is the conundrum that 95% of dieters face. Most of us can restrict our eating and up our exercise on January 1. Many of us can continue our “lifestyle changes” through January, even February. By March though, a lot of us are selling our exercise equipment on eBay. By April, we are in therapy wondering why we have failed again.

If this is you, please listen. You are not a failure. Diets have failed you. If you are an emotional eater, no diet will ever be able to address the underlying reasons why you reach for food to change your mood.

In 2012, you have an opportunity to look at your relationship with food and your body in a whole new way. Instead of viewing food or fat as an enemy to be conquered, what would it be like to open your heart in compassion and curiosity? What would it be like to feel a craving, but instead of fighting with yourself, to be a loving ally who asks, what am I really hungry for?

A few days ago, I was talking with my friend, Nadine, about how she quit smoking. She talked about having to let go of all the ideas in her head about quitting, and how even the word “quitting” was getting in the way for her. Instead she found the word “finished” as in, “Am I finished with smoking yet?”

I wonder if Nadine's discovery might be helpful in your process as well? When you feel a craving, what might happen if you ask yourself, “Am I finished feeding my emotions with food?”

If you choose to play with this language, please don't make being finished right and not being finished wrong. There is no right or wrong here. Maybe an even better question would be, "Am I ready to feed my emotions with love instead of food?"

However you phrase it, the question should help you get close to the part of you that has relied on food to feel okay, close enough to really feel into the need. Is the timing right to feel your emotions? Is the timing right to make a loving space for your needs? If the timing is right, then you might be finished feeding your emotions with food. And if the timing is not right, can you have your own tender and gentle permission to not be ready yet?

At the heart of these questions lies a fundamental stance, that you never deserve your own scorn, that anger and disgust will never motivate you, at least not for long, and that you always deserve your own lovingkindness, gentleness and support without any conditions.

Is 2012 the year you set an intention for radical self-love instead of making resolutions?

New Years' Resolutions for Emotional Eaters

If you are like most people who turn to food to soothe feelings, you probably started a new diet on Jan 2nd, or maybe this past Monday (who really starts a diet on the weekend?). Now it's Wednesday. You may be powering along, feeling like this time for sure, you'll lose the weight and keep it off. Maybe you're still following the diet, but you're at that phase where you've started dreaming about forbidden food. Or maybe you're battling with yourself, wanting cookies but gnawing celery. Or you may have already slipped or cheated or had a full scale binge.

Because that's the cycle. And it's all part of the emotional eating problem. Diets don't fix the feelings that make you turn to food. In fact, dieting, like overeating, is part of the compulsion. It keeps your focus on food (in this case, not eating it). Your thoughts become obsessive, counting grams of this or ounces of that, weeks till you hit your goal. It's just another way of avoiding or escaping your internal emotional world.

And since 95% of diets fail within the first 2 years, there is a good chance that you will cheat or binge, feel all kinds of guilt and shame, and then have to eat more to escape the bad feelings until the next wave of dieting kicks in. Dieting gives the illusion that you are "getting somewhere," when in fact, you are on a merry-go-round making endless circles (or as my friend, Jill says, the treadmill of rumination).

This year, I want to invite you to try a different sort of diet all together. Since you eat to soothe and escape bad feelings, I want you to consider a diet that restricts self-induced guilt and shame. The goal of this diet is to become a safe, nurturing and loving person to live with (because you are the roommate who will never leave).

Here's the plan, written in the form of New Years' Resolutions

1. I will not yell at myself or beat myself up for turning to food when I feel bad. In fact, I will not yell at myself, period.
2. I will abstain from activities that fuel my inner critic including things like: Magazines and TV programs/ads that emphasize weight loss and achieving the perfect body; engaging in conversations about diets, fat, exercise, health or anything else that is really body hatred in disguise; spending time with people who think it’s okay to judge or criticize my eating habits or body; using clothes shopping as a reward for weight loss/depriving myself of nice clothes right now
3. When I overeat, I will practice kindness, gently wondering what happened that felt painful, scary or difficult, that I needed to escape.
4. I will actively seek help, learning to identify my emotions, and develop ways to be loving and present for myself when I feel bad, so that one day, I won't need or want to turn to food to escape.
5. I will actively look for friends who are accepting, loving, and who model healthy self-care.
6. I will not allow anyone to bully me about my size or weight, not my spouse, my doctor or even my mother.
7. I will find something beautiful in everyone I meet, teaching myself to see my own beauty.
8. I will practice treating myself the same way I would treat my dearest friend, with love and kindness, respect and compassion.
9. I will listen care-fully to my hungers and cravings - for food, for rest, for security, for fun, for space, for quiet, for friends, for love, for self-acceptance.
10. I will honor those hungers and cravings to the best of my ability whenever possible, and when I can't, I will still be present and loving for myself.

You already know that dieting doesn't work. You already know that self-criticism doesn't work. So maybe this is the year to try something new. As you practice self-love, you may find that your weight problem is no longer a problem. But that's not the real gift. The real gift is spending every moment of your life with someone safe, loving and nurturing - YOU.