Mind Body Nutrition

In my twenties, I traveled for 6 years outside the United States. It wasn't because I became voraciously curious about food or because I loved to learn languages. (Though I did.) The core motivation for my travels was human potential.

I wanted to know what I was made of and how human beings worked. I was especially fascinated by what was universal and how people communicated across boundaries.

Everyone has topics that they are innately drawn to (and others they are averse to) and these affinities and aversions, by default, inform the path you create for your life.

I wanted to know what would make a human being fulfill their potential (and if possible, me!)

I was culturally enriched when I returned to the US, but physically depleted. I got a chronic illness that dogged me for 7 years. ("There goes my potential!" I thought, as almost all my energy got sucked into a vortex of healing and learning.)

Nutrition Counseling came very naturally to me. I was very focused on holistic healing anyway, and I'm one of those natural counselor people (you know who you are!) who people naturally confide in.

In the world of nutrition counselors, there are a lot of directions you can go. My dear friend Tina Annibell is a very inspirational cooking teacher and she's now also teaching people how to grow their own food! (So cool!) Another good friend and health counselor, Ann Gibson, focuses on helping active outdoor women optimize their health and energy levels through precision meal plans and functional medicine testing. (wow!)

There are raw food teachers, Macrobiotic chefs, cleansing specialists and locavores.

Personally, my unshakable focus has remained on this question:

"How can the food you eat serve you to unfold into your greatest possible potential as a human being?"

And further:

"How can your personal potential serve the planet as we cross the threshold into a new age?"

In other words, how can you be part of the solution and not part of the problem?

This is what led me to The Empowerment Institute to become a life coach.

Their "state-of-the-art empowerment tools have been applied over the past three decades to achieve significant and measurable behavior change at the personal, organizational and community levels."

Life coaching certification is only the first layer of what they offer. David Gershon and Gail Straub focus on large scale system change, organizational transformation, community organizing and transformative leadership.

David has a special focus on climate change and water conservation. Gail has a special focus (dear to my heart) on nourishing the power of the feminine in order to provide society with the spiritual depth and connectivity that is so crucial to our future.

Why is this kind of education and growth so important to me?

Eating gluten-free food, raw food and fermented food IS important to me, but it's not enough. It doesn't reveal the big picture, which is that our country and our planet is heading towards massive crisis and eating vital, nutrient-dense, clean food is a prerequisite to being present enough to be part of the solution.

Food is a tool for human potential. You can't be awake without vital, clean food. You need to be awake in order to engage in your "curriculum" as a human being (what you are here to learn.)

For many women, that curriculum includes stepping into your feminine power. Now. We need you to.

Believe me, I know the emotional eating issues that can stand in your way. But they are not part of your DNA.

How to veer towards consistently vital foods in your life is simply a code to crack. It's a spiritual, physiological challenge that is part of your curriculum. You have accomplished a lot. You can nail this one too. It's a temporary obstacle between you and your fullest blossoming and the world needs you to blossom fully.

When I am catalyzing this type of blossoming and awakening, I am doing what I am meant to be doing to play my part in the dynamic future.

What's exciting is that this blossoming is like a wildfire. Men and women all over the world are responding to the pressure of the environmental and social crises-- as we humans do-- with dynamism, heart and frenetic growth.

The future could therefore be amazing. If we show up for it.

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Are you a plant person? Do you notice that inner sense of satisfaction and joy that comes when you notice new growth on a plant you are tending? It could be a houseplant or a garden full of plants. There's a feeling of "Cool, I did it, I gave this plant the elements it needs to thrive."

Those elements are the right amount of sunlight, (sometimes you have to move the plant around to find it's "happy place,") the right amount of water and food and an unbroken attentiveness.

If it's a flowering plant, I feel clear, strong joy with a full flowering and a mild sense of concern when the flowering is impaired in some way. I wonder, "What can I do differently to nurture this plant to it's fullness?" I might prune it, water it differently, attend to it, breathe on it.

I am noticing that my life is like this. If I nourish my career and my relationships with just the right combination of attentiveness, authenticity and open-heartedness, I experience a flowering.

This attentiveness requires a combination of listening and action (yin and yang) that I'm just now discovering. There seems to be a "code" you can crack in your relationship to the world.

Of course, good health is prerequisite. The clearer your "instrument," the more energy and consciousness flows.

Some people seem to know innately how to conduct themselves in such a way that they somehow attract opportunities they want into their lives. How is that?

It seems to come down to how you talk to yourself (how I talk to myself.) When I become conscious of all the messages that are running in my operating system, almost below my verbal plane, I notice beliefs that create my world.

These underlying beliefs act as the soil for the flowering of my life.

One of the beliefs I recently became aware of through my work with the Empowerment Institute is my "Irish Pride." It makes me feel comfortable in working class neighborhoods and less-at-home in swanky ones. It makes me brag about the bargains I get shopping at second-hand stores and I have even found myself feeling uncomfortable about becoming affluent.

Like sunlight for my flowering plant, this belief constitutes a nutrient for the energetic flow of financial abundance into my life. When I couldn't see it before, I couldn't tweak it.

Through this work I have discovered many other beliefs that affect the energetic flow of all sorts of things into my life. I have been able to illuminate places in my operating system that are pinched and fearful, that have been manifesting effects all along, and I couldn't understand why. I couldn't see the mechanism.

Clearly it's my thoughts that are the soil, sunlight and water for the flowering of my life.

"I don't have an impact. I might get hurt. I am stuck. I will always be stuck. When the chips are down, I need to rely on my intellect, not my intuition. If I become affluent, I will betray my Irish roots. If I speak my truth, someone will get hurt. It works for other people, just not for me."

Really? I think THAT?

One after another I was astounded to uncover limiting beliefs that were manifesting effects for years. Decades.

One by one, I turned them around. I am turning them around everyday.

"I am part of a vanguard that's ushering in a new era on the planet. My thoughts and actions have an impact on the world."

"By conducting my life from a place of being in touch with the Divine Feminine, I heal the wounds of being exploited in this and past lifetimes."

"I manifest money easily, doing work I love."

"I am aligned with the universe and it constantly gives me feedback. I am learning to receive and respond to the feedback I get."

"My authentic truth is a vital part of my dynamic relationship. I reside lovingly in my truth and welcome others to have their reactions."

"I am proud of the affluence I create and use it to protect and defend people who are afflicted by poverty."

"I am brave, persistent and dynamically growing. I am illuminating old patterns and changing them now."

This process has created a flowering in my life. Like I am now dancing with the Great Mother-- the life force of the Earth, and realizing that she tells me when conditions aren't ideal. She communicates, if I'm listening.

It's very much like the process of when she communicates through a happy plant. She says, "Ah yes, that's better." Or "Nope, not enough!"

When I receive and respond to the feedback I get, my life flowers with opportunities through my work, deep and penetrating love, connectedness with my son, my friends and my family, music and creativity and best of all, a sense of peace.

The peace comes from a sense of being on the right track, being in right relation to the Great Mother.

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Holly Noonan writes about self-nourishment and food empowerment every month in her Mind Body Nutrition Newsletter.

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I'm 40. While some of my friends are starting to complain about "age-related" aches and pains, I've been going in the opposite direction. The chronic illness I developed in my early 30s is getting harder to see in my rear-view mirror. It's gone, and I watch chronic complaints disappear over and over with my clients. What a treat to watch! Here's the road map for how to make that happen for YOU.

1.    Eat Gobs of Vegetables-- Eat more of what you already like. Try vegetables you’ve never had. Join a CSA and try to really eat it all! That’s right. Eat MORE.  Don’t focus on what to cut out, just get more of these nutrient-dense, antioxidant-packed foods into you. They clean out your liver, help you think clearly and make your skin shine.

2.    Do your inner work— If you go through life without facing painful events that leave traces on your consciousness, you naturally close down and feel less and less as you get older. When you face your stuff, it can be very unpleasant for a short while, but the reward is that you get reconnected with the full life force that is available to you. It’s worth it. Be brave.

3.    Make your exercise into your spiritual practice—When you find ways to move your body that get you outside in any season, connect with the elements, animals, plants, friends or God, you will be drawn to it when you run into stress.

4.    Cleanse— Do a 7-day cleanse at least once a year, in the spring. Use this week to reset your metabolism, remove sugar, caffeine, all refined foods and most animal products. Drink more water, add superfoods and supplements you need and sweat often. There’s no need to be hungry, just clean up your intake.

5.    Find Your Food Fingerprint-- Use the week after your yearly cleanse to re-introduce foods slowly and systematically to reveal any food intolerances you have. Every human body has its own “food fingerprint.” Only when your system is running very clean can you find out exactly what works for you and what does not.

6.    Sleep—get to bed before 10 pm to honor your circadian rhythms so that the hours of sleep you get are deepest and most restorative.  Make your bed into a sumptuous haven with nice lighting and yummy sheets.  Back off on caffeine after 12 noon and make sure you fully hydrate early on each day so you’re not drinking at night and waking up to pee. Sleep deprivation has been clearly shown to interrupt hormones that aid in weight loss. Sleep more to lose weight. Not kidding.

7.    Take an annual retreat by yourself-- Whether it’s a pilgrimage to the same place every year (Check out Omega, Kripalu, Esalen and Hollyhock) or a new place each time, choose a contemplative, restorative trip to somewhere without your friends or family (unless they are ready to meditate!) As a cleanse reboots your body, this retreat reboots your soul and helps you forge the future you deserve.

8.    Explore your sensuality—Sensuality is life force. Get off your devices and pick up a musical instrument. Buy flowers, fill your home with velvets, silks, high thread count sheets and fragrances.  Dance, play with babies, sing in your car, go swimming, eat amazing food and laugh.

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Holly Noonan writes about self-nourishment and food empowerment every month in her Mind Body Nutrition Newsletter.

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We are on the cusp of a new era of consciousness on the planet. The whole hub-bub about 2012 is about this shift. It's a transition from masculine to feminine consciousness, meaning those humans (men or women) who resonate with the earth's unfolding creative, dynamic, careening, ever-changing life force, will be better prepared for a future that holds a tremendous amount of change in the next 50 years.

A major determining factor on whether you will be one of the clear-minded, flexible, sensitive creatures who rides the universal flow or one of the clamped-down, stuck, recalcitrant, comfort-seekers is....of course.... THE FOOD YOU EAT.

I have noticed both a decline and a crescendo of human consciousness in America. (Have you?) The primetime network TV shows seem to be getting more crass, more violent or vulgar and yet... the artists and visionaries and healers I know are galloping over their life-hurdles at an apparently accelerating rate. The news gets ever-bleaker from around the world, and yet quantum physicists are agreeing with the Dalai Lama. (and Einstein might have too.)

In one single week last month, I had four people who didn't know each other mention to me the healing power of ley lines and vortices. (This is something like fengshui or acupuncture for the planet-- Camden, Maine, where I live, happens to lie in a vortex of energy, much like the ones in Taos, New Mexico, Sedona, Arizona or Findhorn in Scotland) Apparently the people who live in such magical places are the beneficiaries of some form of earth energy that amplifies and vitalizes all growth and development.

I know a group of artists who moved here expressly for this reason. Almost everyone I talk to--from bankers to massage therapists--seems to know that this is true here, without knowing why. The vitality, creativity and healing energy are that self-evident.

When you spend time here, you come to marvel at the number of world travelers, artists, healers and metaphysical practitioners who have settled here. You also come to marvel at how you can drive 30 minutes inland and it's not there. An hour south, nope. 40 minutes north... nope. There are edges to this vortex of energy. You can tell from the store fronts and the people and the food. It just feels different.

Food is dangerously crappy everywhere you go in America (and now in many other countries too.) Devitalized, processed food is available to everyone here and in many places in the country, there's no alternative.

People are raised on extremely nutrient-deficient food and they never even see someone who eats a different kind of food.

Certainly that happens here too. But there's a choice of food culture here. Many of my friends haven't owned televisions for years. (A regular TV habit is a very solid predictor for eating processed food.) Most everyone I know cooks their own food most of the time. A fair few friends shop regularly at Farmer's Markets and natural food stores. This culture honors farmers.

Artists and healers are particularly sensitive human beings, by nature.

Fact: If you eat processed food, you injure your sensitivity. You close it down.

It follows, then, that to truly be prepared for the shift that is happening around us, we must eat clean food. We must get right with ourselves and connect with our environment. We must support our farmers and acknowledge their crucial role in delivering to us the vital life force of the earth, so that we can participate in the earth's evolution.

The Mayan calendar is the one that ends on December 21, 2012. Carlos Barrios, Mayan elder and Ajq'ij (is a ceremonial priest and spiritual guide) of the Eagle Clan studied with many teachers and interviewed nearly 600 traditional Mayan elders. This is what he has to say:

"At sunrise on December 21, 2012 for the first time in 26,000 years the Sun rises to conjunct the intersection of the Milky Way and the plane of the ecliptic. Some observers say this alignment with the heart of the galaxy in 2012 will open a channel for cosmic energy to flow through the Earth, cleansing it and all that dwells upon it, raising all to a higher level of vibration."

"This process has already begun. Change is accelerating now and it will continue to accelerate. We need to take care of the Earth that feeds and shelters us."

"We are disturbed -- we can't play anymore. Our planet can be renewed or ravaged. Now is the time to awaken and take action. Everyone is needed. You are not here for no reason. Everyone who is here now has an important purpose. This is a hard but a special time. We have the opportunity for growth, but we must be ready for this moment in history."

"Meditation and spiritual practice are good, but also action. It's very important to be clear about who you are, and also about your relation to the Earth. Develop yourself according to your own tradition and the call of your heart. But remember to respect differences, and strive for unity.

"Eat wisely --- a lot of food is corrupt in either subtle or gross ways. Pay attention to what you are taking into your body. Learn to preserve food, and to conserve energy. Learn some good breathing techniques, so you have mastery of your breath. Be clear. Follow a tradition with great roots. It is not important what tradition, your heart will tell you, but it must have great roots."

"We live in a world of energy. An important task at this time is to learn to sense or see the energy of everyone and everything -- people, plants, animals.  Go to the sacred places of the Earth to pray for peace, and have respect for the Earth which gives us our food, clothing, and shelter. We need to reactivate the energy of these sacred places. That is our work."

Wherever you live, you are an expression of the earth's energy. A dynamic conductor of life force. Or not. Kinda depends on how many Hot Pockets you have in a week. (wink)

Taking steps (even baby steps) towards clearing out your pantry and your life of "black hole" food (that which sucks your energy into an abyss) is taking steps towards a new future where your life and your body are part of the solution that the planet conjures up for itself. Wouldn't that be nice? To be a dynamic conductor of the solution? The healing of the planet and all her inhabitants?

Yes, please. Supersize THAT.

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Holly Noonan writes about self-nourishment and food empowerment every month in her Mind Body Nutrition Newsletter.

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Have I seemed a bit quiet lately? I feel quiet. Lately, I haven't felt like climbing up onto my soapbox and squawking about revolutionizing food or health or human consciousness or any of the things that need to be revolutionized.

As many of you might know if you follow my blog, 2010 was a year of massive transformation for me. I got divorced. I bought and renovated a house. I turned 40. Then to cap of the year, I fell in love. Since January I have been in a program at the Empowerment Institute designed to help me clarify my vision and sweep my consciousness of any impediments that stand between me and that vision. (Then show others how to do the same.)

Something is brewing. I am quiet for a reason. My core is being reorganized and refined. My message will be different after this process has fully unfolded. I am in a chrysalis. Inside this chrysalis, my heart is glowing in pulses. It's getting stronger, brighter, clearer.

My son and I are leaving on Saturday for Costa Rica to stay in a house right on the beach for a week. Somehow I know that hearing waves crashing 24/7 will work this process, even (especially?) when I'm sleeping.

Back in January, I interviewed Gail Straub-- co-founder of the Empowerment Institute and author of Returning to My Mother's House.

The core message she had for us was that, as women, there is an immense reward to be gained by delving into silence and solitude. That when we dismiss our very real need for an inward, yielding experience and instead indulge only in our masculine drive to accomplish our tasks, we dismantle our own power.

Our power source is in the silence. That's our refueling station.

So I'm taking a break from my soapbox.

I'm following my inner world for the moment, which says "Be quiet. Lie Fallow. A big growth spurt is coming, so conserve your strength."

There is still 2 feet of snow blanketing my garden, literally and figuratively. Here in Maine, Springtime is an explosion of lifeforce. The chi of the planet pulls a rip cord and careens forth explosively.

I'm not going to buckle my seat belt.

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Last week I collaborated with Kerry Altiero from Café Miranda's on a Gluten Free cooking class. (What fun! Kerry's a loose cannon! Bursting with creativity and ribald humor...)

His emphasis in the class was on how very MANY possibilities there are to enjoy when you decide to forego gluten. (He created a delicious risotto, gorgeous polenta with cheese and roasted tomatoes, a white bean ragu, a curry dish, even mac and cheese!)

One of the questions asked of me during the class was this: "Do I really have to give up all the foods I love best for the rest of my life in order to be healthy?!?"

Hellz no!

Information is power. Information is freedom. Most people feel stuck and powerless because they aren't receiving the information that is available to them about their body. When they learn how to receive this information, they can then make informed decisions on what to eat and how to live in a flexible and realistic way.

Long story short, you have the power to make a decision to eat something that won't make you feel good. Sometimes it's bloody well worth it! And that puts you and only you in the place of complete responsibility for your health.

Hear me out now...

Each body is unique. Some bodies get stomach cramps from half and half. Some get skin rashes from wheat. Some gain weight from hormone disrupting foods such as soy and sugar. Some people get narcoleptic right after they eat something they are allergic to. There are a million different ways that YOUR body is reacting to your food.

Most people are simply not burning clean enough to get clear messages and since the messages are confused, they don't listen to them.

It's like one pebble being thrown into a calm pool of water versus a handful of pebbles being thrown into a calm pool of water.

When it's one pebble, you can see the ripples clearly. When it's many pebbles, the ripples gallop over each other in a confused pattern.

The single biggest way you can take responsibility for your health and therefore your future is to get cleaned out enough so that your body is like a calm pool. That way you can receive clear, accurate information about what true reaction your unique body has to different foods.

When you are burning clean and notice that you want to fall asleep every time you eat wheat, or your eczema kicks up every time you eat soy, you get information that makes you powerful and free.

When you have a negative reaction to food, you simply don't want it. It hurts or it's inconvenient or annoying. It doesn't take willpower to avoid something annoying.

But, indeed, there ARE times when you want the thing. When you have done the work to see clearly the effect certain foods have on you, you can make an informed decision as to whether the negative effect is worth it!

I try to run a clean enough system that it's annoying for me to have coffee. (I get hyper-jittery.) But I LOVE coffee. So there definitely are times when I indulge in a (really good) cup of coffee and deal with the annoyance. Gluten, soy, half and half, sugar and caffeine all bother me. But I haven't  "given them up for life."

I manage my symptoms so that I can have what I want. I try to get away with what I can.

Bottom line is: Eat what you want! Stressing out about perfect food isn't healthy either.

The secret is to change what you want to eat. Get free of food addictions, get clear of food allergies, get hooked on vegetables. Food can make you feel vital, zippy, loved, powerful and satiated. If you are not feeling those, then your food habits could use some tweaking.

If you're wondering how to start running a clean-burning system, my free 6 weeks of e-coaching on how to free yourself from cravings is a very good start. You can sign up for that here.

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When we lived in Japan for two years, we got acquainted with the Japanese conception of an "inner" face and an "outer" face. The first is true, private and only revealed to intimate friends and family. The second is public, proper and "mature." In fact, it's considered childlike to reveal one's inner face, with its true emotions and candid thoughts. One mustn't do THAT. I was all wrong, all the time, on that one.

The truth is that many of us deal with this kind of psychological split. We get the message-- loud and clear-- about what is acceptable and respectable and god forbid our truest, inner spirit wants to join the circus or come out of the closet or make art. I know someone in whose childhood home almost any artistic endeavor was disparagingly dismissed as "underwater basketweaving." Sound familiar?

The outer-mandate/inner-truth split could be anything though. It could be a military/birdwatching split, or a dancing/computer-geek split or a Cattle Rancher/ Vegetarian split (or vice versa on any of those!)

None of these things are genuinely mutually exclusive, it just tends to SEEM that way in the family where you grew up. And if a split exists or existed, it can tend to chip away at a natural-born dignity we all have. I believe every human being is endowed-- just like the Declaration of Independence says-- with something inalienable. It's an innate dignity, one that comes with the natural unfolding of whatever kind and style of human being you are.

If your innate style happens to coincide well with your family and your culture, you will feel honored and you can blossom as your design intends. Unfortunately, many --if not most --people don't feel honored and their blossoming becomes problematic.

When a personal sense of dignity is injured by the context of family and culture around you, it can sometimes make sense (feel "right") to actually perpetuate the injury on oneself.

This is where food comes in. There are, of course, many ways to injure and honor oneself. But one of the most primordial, most foundational ways is with food.

Here's what I notice. When the split I mentioned above is really BIG, your truest inner spirit feels all wrong and stays hidden. A person can actually agree on some level with the cultural and family opinions that being (X) is reprehensible, even though this person's true self is, in fact, really freaking (X).

A person like this tends to get addicted to something, often to food. To a person like this, eating the nastiest gas station BBQ wings followed by the crappiest 99¢ pastry washed down by some high fructose corn syrup drink can actually....make....perfect...sense. It makes sense. It's what a secretly-reprehensible-person should eat. Somehow.

I've been there. Can you tell?

By this line of reasoning, the converse is true. That gifting your body with vital, vibrant delicious food is what a divinely-unfolding person should eat. This is true.

So eating vibrant, vital food is an act of dignity. It's a vehicle of self-respect. It's a primary way in which you can honor yourself. It's a primary way in which you can honor the people you feed.

Now-- bear with me here as I swing wildly from the spiritual to the political-- it's interesting how this bears out in our society. Those who struggle most for basic dignity are usually the ones who only have access to a self-injurious diet. This diet of subsidized, processed, denatured food is cheap, obfuscatory and  disease-promoting.

For most of human history, poor people were thinner than rich people. That is still true in many places. But in this country now, "food insecurity" means that people who don't know where their next meal will come from tend to choose whatever will fill them up most cheaply and for the longest time. Often their ONLY choices to by food is a 7-11 or a gas station or a fast-food restaurant.

As Dr. Mark Hyman says, "Not having enough to eat may cause obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, and heart disease." The food manufacturers like it this way. The pharmaceutical companies like it this way. So how will poor people who are struggling just to get by have the wherewithal to somehow defend themselves against an entrenched status quo that is genuinely conspiring to make them and keep them sick?

This is what government is for. What other entity is big enough to represent the people? This, too, is a question of dignity. It's the role of our government to protect and defend the dignity of our citizens. It is a primary way in which our country can honor its citizens, especially its children; Eating vibrant, vital food is an act of dignity.

Tonight the Senate is voting on the Food Safety Modernization Act. This is one small step-- assuming it passes-- for our government to protect the health of its citizens above the health of corporate profits derived from an unsustainable, inhumane food commodity system. Read what Michael Pollan and Eric Schlosser have to say about this moment in food politics history.

Gandhi said, "Be the change you want to see in the world." Calling our senators is a great idea. Agitating for change on behalf of people who can't afford to protect themselves is even better. But the best? Bestowing your one precious body with the dignity of nourishing food so that you can do your best work in the world.

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Ever had writer's block? Do you have a creative pursuit that you love but you can't seem to "keep the flow?" Ever wonder what your food has to do with creative and emotional stuckness?

Now is the perfect time to test this. Halloween is coming up so you will have undoubtedly have access to crappy candy and you can sort of take a reading of how clear you feel afterwards. Can you think? Are you buzzing, aching, craving or just fine?

Some people can get away with eating junk food without immediate physical effects like a stomach ache or clear loss of mental clarity-- but it ALWAYS manifests eventually. For those of us who experience physical pain from eating junk food, we are the lucky ones. Pain is motivating.

But for people who digest most things easily, it's really like the frog getting slowly boiled alive. In tiny incremental steps, they lose their vitality and clarity, they wake up tired, drink more coffee, experience a diminished libido or creative motivation.

The only way to really feel the contrast is for them to do a cleanse or something similar.

But whichever kind of person you are (sensitive to junk food or not sensitive) you can try this little experiment. Just notice your level of mental acuity and ability to tap into your creative flow after eating junk food. You don't need to go out of your way to eat junk food, the opportunity will present itself sometime soon during the season between Halloween and New Years.

For creative, tuned-in people, the loss of mental acuity and creativity can be even more motivating than physical pain. You have to make the connection between the unconscious action and the consequences of your choices. Making that connection simply makes you less drawn to things that suck. It's that simple. You just have to do the sleuthing and then be brave enough to stick around to feel the things that suck.

Use these holidays with their crazy foods as a research tool. When you tune into your body and eat junk food, you can get invaluable, life-long motivating insights. You just have to stay awake and deliberate amidst the sugar fog and junk food traditions.

Trick or treat!

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My son and I went to Family Camp at a Meditation Center in Vermont last week. Along with 50 or 60 other families, we slept in tents, used the outhouses, ate in the dining tent and tried to not melt in the 95°F heat. In the mornings, Griffin would go to the "Tiger Tent" for games, art-making and even meditation for 5 year olds, and I would go to the shrine room for 3 luxurious hours of shamatha sitting meditation, walking meditation and captivating discussions on the spiritual rigors of parenting.

We could have spent much more than a week on parenting and the 6 Paramitas  (Generosity, Discipline, Patience, Exertion, Meditation and Wisdom.) But of course the spiritual path of parenting is hands-on, so after getting all blissed out and calm, I would go pick up my son and brace myself for the big fight we would have over lunch.

"I am NOT eating ANY of that!"

First I would try to find some low-nutrient-density carb to entice his taste buds into allowing his body to feel hunger on a swelteringly hot day. Then came negotiating, cajoling, playing, demanding and eventually bribing and bullying.

There are some kids that can just play and play-- graze just a little-- then happily play more. My son is not one of them. He will play and play, get a bit uncoordinated from being so hungry, hurt himself, then go ballistic, usually on me.

So not-eating was not an option.

Although they served quinoa and kale, and even gluten free bread, it was all unseasoned and unfamiliar. Most meals were concoctions he had never seen before (meatloaf, lentil-cauliflower soup, quiche-but-no-ketchup.) I had very little control over how it would taste.

So in the first few days I filled our plates with the amount he would normally eat, he would eat a small fraction on his plate, and then I would eat the rest so as not to waste it. I was stuffed after every meal, until I caught on.

By then, I was already off-kilter foodwise, myself.

We took to having fruit juice "pospicles" after lunch everyday, because they were cold, because they were calories and because they were slightly more effective than thumb screws to get him to eat 5 bites of vegetables.

I had them too, sometimes had some chocolate as well. Slowly it careened into a sugar binge where we'd have corn flakes together at 4pm and by week's end, gluten-free was a futile aspiration. We had the wheat chocolate chip cookies that were on the buffet. I was drinking bad coffee with abandon.

Gluten makes Griffin cranky and rashy, but hell, he could hardly get crankier and he was covered in bug bites, scrapes and mud. As for me, I was so far off kilter, I was just riding the roller coaster now.

I had not relinquished that much control over my food since I went on food-service as a freshman in college. That was the year I gained "the Freshman 15" so fast that I got bright red stretchmarks on my inner thighs.

(I'm turning 40 this year, by the way, and reminiscing like this makes me anti-nostalgic for my youth. You could not pay me enough money to turn back the clock and go back to being 20 years old. Just so you know. All those people who'd like to pay me to be 20 are just out of luck.)

So just to help myself remember "the good old days," Griff and I stopped for a slice of pizza and a greek salad for lunch on the way home. The pizza wasn't gluten free, but the chocolate chip cookies we had in the car afterwards were, for whatever that was worth, which wasn't much.

He had 2 or 3 cookies. I sat there next to the bag in the car and ate probably 20 cookies right in a row. I was just watching myself do it. Saying "this is the last one," then --op!-- there's another one in my mouth! How did that happen?!

Partly I was morbidly curious as to how many cookies my unbalanced body wanted-- so I went with it--and partly I wanted to literally make myself feel sick in order to have motivation to clean up my act.

Does that sound nuts?

This leads to my theory of the Fast Way or Slow Way of getting Back On Track.

The Slow Path Home

In the slow version, I work with the sugar and caffeine cravings I have cultivated in my body and rather than denying them (which makes me crazy and eventually leads to some sort of backlash,) I allow myself 5 more days of having sugar and caffeine in diminishing amounts.

In this scenario, I'm pretty clear about the difference between my emotional and my physiological cravings. I'm working with my physical cravings here. (If I have emotional cravings come up during this time, I try some other and usually more effective emotionally nourishing strategy [calling my dad, watching a movie with a cup of hot sweet tea, meditating.])

I will try to get the TOP QUALITY chocolate or coffee or whatever I'm craving for this 5-day transition time. I mean go for the good stuff. The good stuff has fewer ingredients and less chance of creating confusion in your body with thickeners, preservatives and chemicals. (note: Godiva used to be the good stuff, but read the label, it's not anymore!) The top quality stuff also helps you savor it more because it's so good AND expensive. (That's good! you want to feel the pinch!)

You enjoy your treats everyday, being very sensitive to eat it only until the point you are satisfied and not beyond it. You are allowing the pendulum to stop swinging slowly and if you eat past that magic point, you give your pendulum another push.

It helps very much if you have a clear and regular feeling of what it means to be balanced in your body. Balance feels calm, bright, vital and if largely free of cravings. If that's not a familiar feeling to you, then it can be hard to aim for it.

The Fast Path Home

This is what I took yesterday. Ahem. I got SO far out of balance and then I got some kind of food poisoning. I will spare you the yucky details, but suffice it to say that at 4am, that pizza and those chocolate cookies opted for an alternate route.

I am prone to digestive upset, it's true. But it's also probably true that I can handle more "adventure" when my body is balanced and strong. Something got past my defenses yesterday and probably because my defenses were in sad shape.

So the Fast Path involved drinking only juice for a whole day or two. Apple/Blueberry with ice, rice milk, bee pollen, B12 and Blue/green algae for breakfast, Banana/blueberry, ice, almond butter for lunch and carrot, daikon, cucumber, lime and maple syrup for dinner.

I woke up this morning feel MUCH better, and voilà, my sugar and caffeine cravings are gonzo! That's a nice bonus to feeling crappy for a whole day.

But the Fast Path is, I think, what I was aiming for when I was eating enough cookies to bring on a feeling of being sick. I believe deeply in the wisdom of learning from your pain, even to the point of calling it into your life.

**Caveat**--This does NOT work for people with true food addictions! But for many of us, pain is the quickest possible way to reconnect with our formidable motivation to feel better.

The exasperated, frustrated feeling of "I'm SO DONE with this!! ARGH!!" is the gold at the bottom of the downcycle. (Note that this does not include shame or self-loathing or disgust, which are feelings that keep you stuck.)

So, the week of camping, junkfood and meditation was a rousing success, especially if Griffin and I can pull out of the tailspin within a week or 10 days.

I have a headstart on him in the race back to being balanced. But with a little food magic, the kid will be back to his mild and constant sugar cravings in no time!

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I talk all the time about how your relationship with good food goes in cycles. You eat well, then some thing happens and you get derailed for a while, eating crap. That eventually gets really old and you clean it up again, and so it goes. On and on. For years.

Sometimes, when you "bottom out" in the cycle, it seems to have an extra gravity, doesn't it? Like you got caught in a tar pit, when self-care is just a hypothetical concept you laugh scornfully at.

"Yeah, yeah, exercise and a bowl of broccoli sound LOVELY for someone who has TIME! My life is so far from achieving the whole 'self-care package' of eating well, exercising and sleeping, that there's no point in even starting. I'm going to Dunkin Donuts. Want anything?"

Sometimes it's regular old disorganization, other times it's self-defeating thinking.

But sometimes we are on the threshold into a new stage of development in our lives and it's SCARY. Sometimes our life invites us to step UP, to inhabit a larger, more spectacular version of ourselves that feels...too... good.

Boy THAT, my friends, is when my self-care goes to hell.

That's when I can't find time to exercise and stay up late to finish things and get into the caffeine routine in the morning. I eat chips. I eat sweet stuff. Without even noticing it, my inner conversation goes from "What am I drawn to that will make me feel awesome?" to "What can I get away with?"

After a while-- weeks? days? My body starts sending me emails. Certain familiar old pains come back. Left foot. Lower back. Headache. Stomach cramp. They will waltz on stage for a few moments, then retreat. If I don't listen, they come back. They get louder. They refuse to retreat.

My healer told me "The universe doesn't mind throwing bricks rather than pebbles."

So I listen. With each cycle of self-care, I try to get the memo as soon as I am brave enough to. I try not to press the mute button with pills that will make my pain go away.

But there's this extra stickiness that the bottom of a cycle when I have to cross a threshold to crawl out of it. When I have to pull something off that I've never done before or faced something in myself that I'd rather not face.

Are you feeling me?

I knew a woman who got into Little Debbie Snack Cakes in order to avoid the loud cry of the universe for her to step onto a path she didn't feel ready for (or rather her family didn't feel ready for.) Others will pick up smoking again. It's like tying some sand bags onto your hot air balloon so that it doesn't fly off into the sky before you are ready.

Seeing it for what it is-- a purposeful gesture of self-sabotage to slow down the pace of growth-- allows me to have compassion around it.

We are all coursing with the same life force that the plants and flowers are bursting with this spring. That in all of us. It can feel like a careening maelstrom at times and a mellow unfolding at other times.

What seems clear is that we all use food as a sort of "throttle" to regulate the speed of our growth. If you want it to speed up, eating food that's full of life force works REALLY well.

But if you want it to slow down, you want to not see or feel so clearly, then junk food serves us for that purpose.

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