29 Mar Where Do You Put Your Messy?
I had a great conversation the other day with a friend of mine and at the end of it we concluded that we are ALL just a little bit of a mess. We chuckled a bit and went on with our days. But it left me thinking (as great conversations often do) about what we really meant when we were saying that, and why so many of us struggle with those parts of ourselves that don’t feel up to par.
We are living in a time and place where comparisons are all around us. Check out Facebook and see the gorgeous meal that someone is eating. The great vacation that they are on, and the smiling family that they are on it with. We don’t see (because we don’t post) the mess in the kitchen that produced the beautiful meal. The fight on the way to the airport before boarding the plane for that great vacation, nor the less than gracious conversation that preceded the vacation because somewhat forgot to deal with getting the dogs cared for. Its not that we don’t know that those things are happening for everyone else as much as they are happening in our lives, but somehow we skip over that part when we fall into envy and self reproach.
I bring this up because I think that there are ways in which it can relate to how we feel about our eating lives and our attempts to eat and live in a healthy way. We look around and it seems that it comes so easily to everyone else.
Here are two questions that I get asked a lot in various forms:
Why does everyone else get to eat/drink/spend so effortlessly when it is such a burden for me?
Why does discipline and organization come so easily in other areas of my life but when it comes to food and weight loss I feel so out of control?
While there are no easy answers here, I do have one that might shift the conversation away from self blame and toward a place of loving curiosity.
This is so hard for you because its where you put your “messy”.
Its the part of your life, for any one of a number of really interesting reasons, that your messy stuff shows up. And now, instead of spending our energy on self blame or shame or denial (none of which lead to lasting change) we can spend our time learning about how to live with the messy and hearing its message.
It might just be saying something pretty interesting.