Is Eating the Same as Taking a Break?

Each month I'm an emotional wellness expert on 'Your Caregiving Journey,' an online radio show devoted to caregivers. This month: the link between taking care of others and NOT taking care of ourselves. So often, we use food to give us the 'break' we really need, because eating makes us feel like we're 'doing' something. Really, though, our souls may be yearning for lots of other outlets--including the ability to sit and do absolutely nothing, stare into space, take a bath.

So how do we stay in touch with those possibilities? One of the ways we explored on the show is to make a list of 20 or 30 things you'd love to do to relax or nurture yourself--include staring into space, calling a friend, putting on music, reading, drawing, going for a walk--and put it on the refrigerator or on your cupboard. The next time you reach for food and this list stares you in the face, ask yourself whether or not one of the other things on your list would meet your deepest need more kindly.

We also talked about continuing to pay attention to the body's signals and language as a way of understanding what you need, similar to the blog of a few weeks ago on Body Language. Do you know the difference in your body between sadness and hunger? How would you describe each physically in your body? Paying attention to these differences can make you more aware of why you're eating and the difference between emotional and truly physical hunger.

I could go on, but it might be more fun to just listen to the interview yourself! So here's the link:

http://www.caregiving.com/2011/08/im-enough-so-ive-had-enough-of-the-doritos/comment-page-1/

And for those of you who don't know, 'Anna Stookey's Befriend Your Body' page is newly up on Facebook. I'll be posting thoughts a few times a week on the bodymind relationship and include inspirations from other friends and followers... Check it out!

My warmest thoughts for a healing end of the summer--

Taking time to take care of yourself even as you care for others...

The Limboland of Illness

I'm back from a whirlwind tour of my hometown in Maine. All the way from the coast of California, my husband and I got ourselves to a little town in the middle of the state and--with my sisters, their husbands, my three nephews and my parents--squeezed in a day at Acadia National Park, a lobster dinner, a cocktail party and a million other things. I came back to a full schedule of clients, including all day at a women's retreat.

This morning I woke up with a headache that hasn't gone away.

It's not completely debilitating--I've seen clients, shuffled some papers around. But I find myself walking in circles, not completing thoughts or tasks. I am not quite tired enough to sleep and not quite with-it enough to be operating at my usual frenetic pace. As a result, I have spent most of the day, literally, staring into space, flipping through a magazine, listening to the sound of birds. I have no idea where the day has gone, in fact. But I wonder if this isn't the point.

My body is up to something. Its pain calls me into the wilds of Limboland, a place that is neither here nor there, where I respond differently to everything around me. I can't even make to-do lists in my mind if I want to. I have surrendered, succumbed. I have to give in.

I remember how strange this feeling was in childhood--when a perfectly fine day would suddenly yield itself to a woozy feeling, chicken soup in bed and constant sleep. It surprised me, and it felt like an altered state, something bewildering and powerful, to which I gave myself completely. A day or two later I was back in action.

It's more of a battle as an adult. I like neat lines, agendas, moving forward. The limboland of illness is something I fight, want to get out of. As I sat with my head pounding today I realized how little I ever just stare into space, doing nothing. I realized how rarely my time is vast and open with no activity in it but just being. I'm talking about sitting, like a blob on the bed, watching the world around me through the slow-motion filter of non-doing.

Almost never. Which must be the function now of illness for us. Our body calls us into an altered state, a place of other-soul work, a moment removed from the functioning of life. It's a kind of initiation, though we could never fully put it into words, when we fall into it. And things feel strange and dizzying until they don't anymore. And that state can last a moment or years, depending on our symptoms and our health.

I often ask clients with chronic pain or illness to go more fully into what they're experiencing, become curious about it, dialogue with it rather than resisting. But the resistance is ingrained in us, the desire to move forward heroically without slowing down. We learn surrender from illness and the sense it ultimately gives us of something greater than ourselves running the show.

So I am in slow motion today, but--let's be honest--I probably deeply need to be. My whole being is integrating a week full of experiences and travel that went by at lightening speed. Stop, my body says. Please don't do anymore. Let's just be, like a cat in the sun or an open boat on the flat water. Let's just be and soak in all that is.

If this is what my headache has to teach me, I'm trying to listen.

Illness is like a funny guru, coming to call us into deeper places in ourselves.

Sometimes we forget how to get to that stillness, that netherland, on our own.

Our bodies remember. Our bodies, whether we like it or not, take us there until we find it.

Stepping Back Into the Body

"I don't want to go in there..." is how he said it tearfully when I suggested Adam take a moment and feel what was actually going on in his body. Middle-aged and overweight, he was now struggling with a flood of negative thoughts about his body that kept him from his life. Like many of us, he'd developed a habit of judging and criticizing his body that kept him locked out of it. He was genuinely afraid of what he'd find.

Sometimes that first step back into the body is a tearful one, full of thoughts and feelings held in reserve like Sleeping Beauty, waiting for our consciousness to wake them. We can all think of moments when we slowed down enough to let ourselves catch up with the vastness of our lives, step out of the reign of the mind or of logic, to feel what's happening right now in this moment. We may be aware of things we thought we'd left far behind.

I love this quote from Oriah Mountain Dreamer, the great poet and writer who wrote The Invitation. She was going through a move--something she wanted to do efficiently, without slowing down, so she wouldn't have to feel it. But living in her were an array of feelings--grief and sadness around the change--that her body called her to be with:

"The minute I bring my full attention to this moment, letting go of mentally keeping track of what has happened or needs to happen next, I become aware of my body. I feel my breath and the stiffness in my back and remember that I have not done my yoga yet this morning. I let my shoulders drop. I am aware of my tiredness and fear that it won't all get done or I will get sick getting it done or I'll forget something critical. And if I stay present with these feelings, letting my hands pause as they pack a box or move over the keyboard and just take three deep breaths, I am aware of another feeling that I do not want to touch, a feeling of something welling up inside me that I have been keeping at bay for weeks.

"Herein lies the answer to my question Why is it so difficult for us to bring our full attention to the present moment, to be here now? Because there are aspects of reality we do not want to accept, that we cannot avoid being with if we are present." (Oriah Mountain Dreamer in The Call: Discovering Why You Are Here)

To be still with the body is to allow ourselves to be right where we are, and to say that we are willing to hear what is there. What we have to sit with may be years of abusing and ignoring our bodies. It may be old traumas or losses. Or it may simply be the quiet joy of being present, feeling the energy and aliveness that's there, waiting for us, like an eager and open child.

Today I invite you into the present moment with your body, just this moment. Take a moment to feel what's going on in there, to notice the sensations and feelings that emerge when you slow down and step back in. How far away have you felt from the immediacy of your body? As feelings emerge, stay present and compassionate and watch what happens. Like any uncharted road, the path becomes more comfortable with time, revisiting the tracks, marking what shows up with attention.

How long has it been? What happens if you just show up to explore the body's sensations and the feelings that emerge, without expectation or judgment? If the mind wanders, return to what is present now. What is the breathing like? Does your body feel heavy or light? Where is there feeling?

Sometimes the first step to befriending our bodies is simply being willing to step back in. Will you take that step today, even for a moment? What will your body reveal if you do?

Are you afraid of, or open to, that truth?

Take Your Body On A Honeymoon

It's not every day, sadly, that we feel like we can really and truly listen to our bodies. Sure, we'd love to eat a lighter, healthier meal but instead we choose that thing we can microwave at work. And yeah, we'd love to get more sleep but we're burning the candle at both ends as it is and our kids, dog, or partner is going to wake us up before our body is really ready, long before eight hours of deep dreaming have soothed our senses.

I'm not letting anyone off the hook. But I know how it is. It doesn't do us much good to punish ourselves for this state of existence. The problem is when it becomes a permanent one. So permanent that before we realize it we have utterly, deeply forgotten how to check in with our bodies at all. How do we know when we're tired, hungry, ready for a breath of fresh air?

I want to suggest a kind of body get-away. Last week we wrote about the body relationship that's caught in a rut, that's gotten boring and stuck. This week I want you to consider what it would be like if you went on a bit of a body honeymoon. I mean it.

Maybe it's not possible every day, or even for one whole day. But I invite you to consider framing a chunk of time out of your weekend or taking a few hours away from the fray with one clear intention: to pay complete and undivided attention to your body and its needs. I'm talking total romance, the kind you get on a first date: gazing into your body's eyes and saying 'What do you need? I'm here. I want you.'

If you're tired, you let yourself sleep. Before you grab for whatever it is that's lying around the house, you ask yourself what your body actually wants to eat. And before you check out on the couch for the afternoon, maybe you ask your body if it feels like doing anything different.

For one day, one hour, one afternoon your body gets to rule your life. How often does it get this chance and how do you think it feels about being ignored day after day while you and your mind run the show? Can you give it one bit of time to be the center of your attention?

I'll tell you what happens when I do this. First, I realize how deeply, deeply tired I am. Most of us are running on fumes and if we stopped for half a second and asked our bodies what they wanted, really wanted, our eyes would probably roll back in our heads and we'd be out cold. So usually this kind of time means letting myself just plain get some sleep. Even if my mind thinks I'm being lazy or unproductive, if it has some other 'idea' of what I think I should be doing. My body rules. And boy does it choose sleep.

Then of course, after getting lots of sleep I start to realize how much of my random grabbing at food has been fueled by exhaustion or the need for distraction. When I'm getting enough rest and I'm actually being kind to my body, I'm a little less interested in potato chips. Seriously.

Your body feels different when it's being paid attention to, as do we all. If you romanced it for a day, let alone a weekend, and really listened to it moment-to-moment it might just surprise you. It might feel like more of a partner. It might hum in quiet bliss to the bottoms of your toes. You might be fighting it less and wanting to feel it more.

I dare you to try. Even for an hour or two. Where would your body guide you if you listened? And would you order room service or a bouquet of flowers?

The Seven Year Itch: Surviving the Boring Body Relationship

Call it the Seven Year Itch. You've been with your body awhile, say decades. It doesn't always do everything you want and it may even, at times, have disappointed you with pain, illness or weight gain. That 'in love' feeling you may have had as a kid, the sense that you and your body were invincible and could do anything, may have shifted to a more ginger, tempered approach--one earned by years of body history, of learning that things can happen that leave a scar or a symptom. The truth is, we're not immortal. Much as we'd love our bodies not to change, buckle or age, they do. What do we do to keep the love alive?

It's the same crossroads we come to in relationships, if we're lucky enough to have them for that long. They go through cycles. Sometimes your partner is boring, disappointing and blah. Sometimes there's connection, beauty and grace. What is it the makes the difference? There seem to be a few key pointers for those relationships that survive, and I think they apply to the relationship we have with our bodies too.

1) Commitment - In our relationships, we can be with someone and still have one foot out the door, always looking to see if something better is going to come along. Ironically, we can do the same thing with our bodies, wanting to be someone else or escape from where we are with some magical, miracle cure, diet, etc. Our relationship to our bodies benefits greatly from our fully choosing to be present, without fear, to whatever is showing up. If we can see our bodies as great teachers (even if we don't always like the lesson while it's happening) we stay in the relationship in a different way, uniquely committed to it. The same is true when we honor any relationship. We actually want to listen to what our body has to say instead of judging it and wishing we were somewhere else.

2) Patience - The best relationships honor not just our strengths but our weaknesses, having some compassion for whatever's hard for us. Patience with your body and yourself means that slow and steady wins the race, that you have good days and bad days and that you're here for each other one day a time. Instead of being impatient because your body isn't giving the results you want--or you're not following through the way you thought you would on some new regimen of self-care--have patience that you're both moving toward a goal. The most important thing is the connection along the way. Impatience breeds contempt and a lack of respect, and makes you both miserable.

3) Fun - Don't forget to actually enjoy each other's company. When was the last time you did something that felt great for both of you, that connected you to each other? Sometimes that can be as simple as checking in, taking a breath, feeling what's actually going on in your body. Maybe it's also putting on some music and dancing around, going for a walk outside in the fresh air, stretching, getting a massage, taking a bath. We can be such stern task masters in relationship to our bodies that we forget we can also enjoy them and all the senses they provide us with.

Boredom, judgement and disappointment can plague all of our relationships. We all have the fantasies we'd like to escape to. But sometimes the escaping keeps us out of really creating the best relationship we can have in the here-and-now. What could you do right now, today or this week that would surprise and delight your body? How can you renew your commitment to it by taking some move toward it rather than away? Maybe the Seven Year Itch can become the Seven Year Hug.

Conversations With Your Body

For those of you who've read Neale Donald Walsch's book Conversations With God, you know that he struggled with life challenges including homelessness, joblessness and depression before he finally threw up his hands and cried out to God. And to his surprise, God answered. The result was the Conversations With God series, which is Neale's ongoing conversation and questions to God, the answers he heard back.

I mention the book not just to plug it--though it's a fascinating read for anyone who hasn't thumbed through those pages--but because I wonder if we don't do a similar thing with our bodies. We rally against them, fight them, try to get them to do what we want, feel disappointed when they get sick or injured. But I don't know if we really believe that we could talk with them, interact with them, have a relationship with them.

What if we knew that our bodies were there to talk to, make requests of, interact with? What if, instead of resenting our bodies for not being the weight we want them to be, we assumed we could present them with our request and ask them how we might make it possible? What if we learned that we could partner with our bodies instead of just resenting them?

It's a radical shift, I know, not dissimilar from the one that found Neale Donald Walsch. But it seems like we spend so much time and energy acting as if our body is some inert thing we can't have a dialogue with, something we have to feed and clothe without ever getting to know it. What if we're wrong?

I encourage you, especially if you're struggling with your weight, to stop acting as if your body is a thing and start acting as if it's a partner, a living thing to talk to about what you want for it. What happens if you sit for a few minutes with your body and present a desire: 'I'd love to be about thirty pounds lighter...how do we do that?' Then see what happens. Do you get any messages back, any urges in your body that give you more information? I can promise you that you will. Then the question is, will you listen?

What if you let your body be involved in the process of creating change, showed it the vision you'd most like of your healthier, lighter self and asked how that might be possible? Imagine the possibilities when you stop spending your energy acting as if you can't have a relationship with the very thing you're wanting to transform!

Today, give yourself a few minutes to get quiet. Sit in meditation with your body and scan it for sensations, feelings. If you just listen to what's present, what do you find? Then create an openness to dialogue, making yourself available to speak what you most want and to listen to what the body has to say in return. Ask the question you most want to ask. Present what frustrates you the most about what's happening. Then see what you hear back. Is your body frustrated too? Are there changes it would like to see happen? What would it like you both to be doing that you aren't?

Each day, give yourself time to revisit the dialogue, and throughout the day begin to check in with your body, asking as you eat, move: do you want this? Do we want this? Does this align with the vision we're creating of how we want to feel and what we want to weigh?

When your body becomes something you're in a relationship with and not just an object to be fixed, there's a different level of accountability. It's harder to ignore. And it's there to work with you, even to experience the same frustrations you do. You can no longer blame it or separate from it; you're connected to it.

Spend a week being willing to begin the dialogue--the one you didn't think you could have. Don't be surprised if you begin to realize there have been whole conversations you've blocked out: insights and feelings the body had to share about how to get to your goal, but you were too busy blaming or judging it. Write down what you're learning. See how it feels to be in a different kind of relationship, to acknowledge that you're in a relationship at all.

Once you start, it's hard to go back. Like Neale's voice of God, your body will come out of its silence and show up in a way you may never have expected. Let it. Then see how you both can heal and transform, together.

The Power of Now

A friend of mine recently confessed that she's been feeling very out of touch with her body. It's showing up in extra weight, in eating things when she's not really hungry, and in an increasing sense of awkwardness whenever she does anything physical. Sound familiar? The more time that goes by, the harder it is to check in with herself and the less she actually wants to be in her body. Like other relationships that grow distant, when we start to lose touch with our bodies, it's harder to reconnect the longer it goes on.

Why is that? You feel guilty or you've lost the path back. You think there's something you have to do in order to make it all better, some dramatic gesture like getting back into an exercise regimen or making a huge change to your diet. "If I could just start going back to yoga every day..." she lamented. Then every day she doesn't go back to yoga is another day she feels she's done something wrong.

What if we changed that paradigm and said it's not so much about what we do (though that's important too) as it is how we 'be' with our bodies? It hadn't even occurred to her that one way to start connecting with her body was just to communicate the desire to connect, to sit, and to begin to pay attention. We talked about what might happen if, instead of making a list of all the things she thought she needed to do to feel better in her body, she could just listen to it right now and hold an intention to reconnect. No big dramatic changes, no fireworks or Biggest Loser. Just a shift in perception and a willingness to hear.

If you've been feeling at odds with your body and want to reconnect but keep missing the mark, keep not 'doing' the things on your list that would make it all better (supposedly), ask yourself instead how you could 'be' right now in a way that would begin to give you a sense of the connection you really want.

Take a deep breath. Close your eyes and with awareness, begin to scan the body for sensations. Notice how the mind wants to get involved, distract, and just come back again to the body, exploring what's there. Notice if there are any feelings, sensations, messages. Notice if your body responds to you at all as you make space for it to be heard, seen and made important.

Sometimes this reset is the most profound for a relationship, not all of the 'things' we think we're supposed to do. One client I worked with had a long list of the classes, smoothies and breathing exercises she was doing to connect with her body and wondered why she still felt dead inside. Something in her wasn't letting in the simplest thing of all: an intention to just 'be' with her body, pay attention to it, be willing to go back inside it and see what's there.

Ask yourself if you might be willing to take one moment to reconnect, whether you get to yoga this week or not. If you're stressed out at work, see if you can take a deep breath, feel the sensations in your body and follow them instead of just wishing you had time to get to the gym. Reconnecting is really as simple as your next breath, your next thought. The more complicated we make it, the more we begin to believe that we'll never get there unless we're doing all the right things. Don't buy into that.

What could you do right now to reconnect, listen and open to your body again? How long will you wait to let yourself be exactly what you need, one moment at a time?