The other night something stressful happened. I'm not sure what it was. It could have just been the daily chaos that comes from my children running around, all needing me at once, etc. This feeling swelled within me that I really needed to eat some ________ (fill in the blank) - - chocolate, homemade bread, SoDelicious "ice cream," homemade cookies, whatever. This seemed like it would help solve the situation, make things balanced and peaceful again.
At the same time, I had a conflicting thought. If I were just ____ pounds lighter, life would be better and I wouldn't even care if this stress arose.
I realized the contradictions in my thinking, not to mention the lack of logic. I also recognized how often these kinds of thoughts enter my mind throughout the day. Part of me is thinking that so much in life would be better if I could lose a little more weight and the other part of me is thinking that I would feel so much better if I ate more, more food. If I did the latter, the former wouldn't be possible. If I wanted to do one, I'd have to give up the other. One has to win out. I have to give up the other. Which will it be? If I hold onto both desires, I'll forever be disappointed. I'll never be content. I've battled this out in my mind since. (Yes I do lead a normal life amidst this and even accomplish some things, but my mind is a busy place :)).
I'm thinking the eating response needs to change. It's probably not healthy (or sane) to have either thought all the time, but I need my eating to come from a desire to nourish my body, not cure my emotional needs.
I'll do an update post at the end of July and will let you know how I do with changing my conflicting thoughts. TTFN!
Very interesting, Renee. I've been reading in a book by Tony Robbins (Awaken the Giant Within), and he references something along these same lines: "Our rules have resulted from a dizzying collage of influences to which we've been exposed... With the addition of more rules, we often tend to distort, generalize, and delete our past rules. We develop rules in conflict."
ReplyDeleteIn talking about life values, he says, "So often I see people who take huge strides forward, only to mysteriously pull back at the last minute. Or they'll say or do things that sabotage the very personal, emotional, or physical success they're pursuing. Invariably the reason is that they have a major values conflict. Part of their brain is saying, 'Go for it!' while the other part is saying, 'If you do, you're going to get too much pain.' So they take two steps forward, and one step back."
Robbins then goes on to say that we need to gain awareness of what our current values are so that we understand why we do what we do. He says to list, in order, the things that are most important in your life. Then, he says, decide if any of them need to be rearranged and others added in order to be the best person you could possibly be, in order for the values to have the largest impact on your lifetime.
He gives more in-depth explanations of these concepts, and it requires quite a bit of thought. But the basic idea is fascinating to consider.
Thanks so much for sharing that, Rusty. I sabotage myself at times. Sometimes I do it early in the day and see that I'm doing it first thing because it brings relief from failure (if that makes any sense). Instead of fearing failure, I just fail right away and don't have to think about failing anymore. Quite silly, isn't it?
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