A Trip To Whole Foods and A Message for All

As I pondered my conversations with clients this week, there often seems to be a theme for the week.  This week was about honoring one's body, accepting what is, loving the self with its perfections and imperfections.  I was struck by this poster hanging in the window at Whole Foods stating Treat Your Body As If It Belonged To Someone You Loved!

I was struck by how much initial desire for behavior change is determined by what one dislikes or feels a need to change about oneself.  This type of behavior change will only be temporary for a few reasons.  It takes more energy, or shall I say is an energy drain, to focus on negativity than on positive thoughts and actions.  This brought me to a youtube interview with Bruce Lipton about his book, The Honeymoon Effect:  Creating Heaven on Earth.  It is so true that when one experiences this feeling - much like falling in love for the first time - that one has boundless energy to do what he or she wants, is committed to etc.

Why then, do we focus on flaws, negativity, needing to change the very essence of who we are?  Fear of aging, money, greed - a platform of how our society is built in order to camouflage aspects that are deemed not good enough.  But according to "whose" standards?

I could go very deep into my own research on this subject because I have spent many, many years trying to "change" me, only to discover that what I truly want is self-acceptance.  And I am finally getting it and want you to get it too!

Brief history that many of you know:  very overweight and sugar addicted as a child, diets by the age of nine, no frank eating disorder but quite distorted, medical issues that cause weight gain/loss as a teenager - the fragile time when our bodies morph on their own, never mind be morphed by synthetic hormones!  I spent years trying to change my food addiction, trying to change my body until I started to look at different philosophies about our very nature.

It brings me to another book, by Greg Braden, The Spontaneous Healing of Belief - a very powerful discussion about looking at religion, philosophy and bringing unity to light and dark.  Being brought up in a religious home and having the basic education that most of get, left me with looking at good and bad, light and dark, as being separate.  Modern theory is bringing us to a closer look into light and dark being one and the same but at different frequencies.

While this can become very technical, suffice it to say that the darkness or shadow side of oneself, shows a need for love and compassion to bring it into the light.  This darkness is also a reminder that as humans, we all have dark and light, thus compassion for that which we do want to transform is key if we want to bring it into light or greatness or doing good.

My motto for years was that I wanted to be "comfortable in my own skin" and I am finally there - I am comfortable in my own skin - and when I begin down the trail of self-doubt or focusing on what I do not have, I now catch it, stop and have a list of phrases that bring me back to a place of positivity.  My spiritual coach/meditation master helped to coin specific words to elicit that warm, fuzzy, loving feeling that one must possess in order to bring the dark into light.

I share with you and wish you love, peace and contentment:
I am Whole, Perfect, Strong, Powerful, Loving, Harmonious, Happy, Healthy

Julie