Food and body issues?  The story of my life.  Literally.  I wrote a play about it, became a life coach and in 2008, I started giving workshops to help women “make peace with their bodies and with food.”  And yet, while I had healed so many of my issues, my weight and food still were occupying way too much real estate in my brain.

In January of 2010 I had to come clean about the following:

#1. I had been giving Feed Your Soul, Feed Your Body workshops with the focus on the relationship with food without having much of a discussion about bodies.  Mostly because I didn’t want to face the fact of how unhealthy my relationship was with my body.  I was able to accept my body when I was within a certain weight range but love it??? Totally foreign concept.

1a. I was in a conversation with a friend about said workshop when it suddenly occurred to me, “you can’t make peace with food if you haven’t made peace with your body.”  Finally somebody turned on the lights.

#2. I was still dieting.  But because I called it a “food program” and not a diet, I was kidding myself into thinking I was practicing what I preached.  Bullshit.

#3. I was still  terrorized on a daily basis by the idea that I was just one reeses peanut butter cup away from totally losing control and eating my way to 300 lbs.

#4 Due to the above I was still not totally present in my life because I was busy obsessing about my body and what I ate.  Exactly what I was trying to teach people not to do.

I worked so hard to get out of my day job and start my coaching business; the two things I thought were standing in the way of happiness had come true and I was still miserable.  I finally had the freedom I had been dreaming about for so many years but I was still imprisoned.  It wasn’t the job, or the schedule, although they weren’t helping–it was the toxic messages that I was feeding myself everyday:
You are not  good enough as you are
You need to be thinner
You won’t be happy until you lose weight

I need to get help.

Sometimes help arrives when and where you least expect it.  In February a friend bought me a copy of Thin is the New Happy by Valerie Frankel.

That book was my Tipping Point.
Valerie Frankel’s story is my story and millions of women’s stories.  Those of us who grew up learning that food was the enemy, our hunger was something that needed to be contained, and in order to be loved and accepted we needed to be thin know this familiar territory.  It’s about keeping yourself in a perpetual state of needing to change, needing to be fixed, needing to be somewhere else other than where you are now.  You know, basically Hell.

Reading Thin Is The New Happy snapped something in my brain and confirmed what I already knew:

I can’t keep doing this; it’s keeping me from living my life.

I’m exhausted from constantly feeling disappointed about my body and fed up with acting out with food because of it.

I’m drained from the constant inner monologue that tells me how lousy I look and how I’ll never have the body I used to.

My emotional exhaustion from the back and forth had dropped me at the doorstep of surrender. I was ready to think about abandoning my life long way of being in the world and doing it differently.

When I tried to imagine my life without any of these issues I felt lost.    When you’ve threaded your entire existence around an issue, being without that issue feels like being cast adrift at sea, no rowboat, no life preserver, nothing; just bobbing up and down until your stamina runs out. But on the other side, ricocheting between dieting and bingeing while hating myself every step of the way had taken its toll.  I just didn’t want to engage anymore and I wanted to GET OFF THE RIDE ALREADY!

Valerie Frankel constructs a plan for herself that basically consists of the following three things: stopping dieting, silencing her negative inner voice, and forgiving everyone who has contributed to her having a bad body image.

Stopping dieting and stopping the “fat talk” were going to be key for me if I wanted to make a change.

But how…
It seemed every time I tried to start “cleaning up my diet” it turned into me trying to lose weight and every time I tried to let myself have my forbidden foods once in a while it turned into a binge fest.  I couldn’t find a middle ground.  Once again–damned if you do, damned if you don’t.  I just wanted the whole thing to go away but I knew I had to have a plan.  But the plan had to be something that didn’t involve me trying to fix myself.

Tune in tommorrow for part 2- the unveiling of the plan.

How would it change your life if you knew you had enough success, money, good looks, adoration and anything else that your heart desires?

Today I want to throw out some ideas on the concept of “enough.”

“In any competitive situation, he who has the least interest, has the most power.”

Here’s what I know in every cell of my being: when you feel like you are enough and have enough life opens itself for you.  Things come to you with ease.  You vibrate at the frequency of having instead of needing and when you go from someone who needs to someone who has you take the pressure off the situation.  It allows ease, flow, and joy to be present. You are open and receptive.  And when you come from a place of being open, things flow with ease; you become more attractive to people and a pleasure to be around.

Think about it.  Having a strong attachment to the outcome of anything only creates tension and makes things more difficult than they need to be. Yes, you might like to have a situation go a certain way, but when there’s a lot riding on it, when it just HAS to go the way you need it to, it creates an air of desperation and that my dears is the emotional equivalent of RAID–stops anything dead in its tracks.  You know the saying about optimal performance “being in the zone?”   You can’t be “in the zone” and be needy or desperate.

Do you think I’m contradicting myself?  I assure you, I am not.  In order to have some say in what happens in your life you do have to create  intentions and believe they are possible but AT THE SAME TIME you need to trust that whatever does happen is what’s supposed to happen, even if it’s not what you want.  You articulate the intention and then you LET IT GO and silently whisper, “if not this, then something better,” even though you have no idea what that something is.  What feels like endless waiting might just be the gift of time so that the better thing, the real thing that you hadn’t even thought of can show up.  It’s the same when something doesn’t work out the way you want it to.

In the words of the brilliant Byron Katie: “Everything happens for me, not to me.”

What would it feel like to have enough and be enough?  How do you react when you don’t need to have a certain outcome? What happens to your behavior when you know you have enough, are enough?  I urge you to try inhabiting this space, maybe just for one day, maybe just for one hour and see how it changes things.  I think my favorite concept of all time is summed up in this saying:  Instead of chasing the carrot, be the carrot.

If you are an entrepreneur and would like to learn how to apply the principles of “enough” to your business life, please join me for the telecourse:  Taking Care of Your Business When Your Business Isn’t Taking Care of You. It starts Thursday, June 10th.  And it’s on the phone!  Just click the link for the details.  I would love to have you in class.

Every great accomplishment starts with the first step

After having “walking over the Brooklyn Bridge” on my treat list for years, I finally decided to put my money where my mouth was and do it.  So on Friday May 7th I walked with a small group of women across the bridge to Brooklyn.  Before we started the walk we each verbalized our wish for what this walk would symbolize in our lives.

Somehow, I thought by doing the walk on a weekday that we would avoid the crowds but I was so wrong.  In addition to having a bike lane that’s extremely narrow, the walk way for pedestrians is also very narrow.  You can see the white line that divides the pedestrian side from the bike side–not much room for either group.  You basically can’t walk more than two across because there is constant bike traffic.

In spite of that, it was a very exhilarating thing to do.  The weather was perfect; not too warm and not too cold.   What’s cool about the Brooklyn Bridge is  that you are above the traffic and it really is a feeling of being suspended in mid-air.  I highly recommend this experience to anyone who is craving a wide open space.

Here we are before the mid point of the bridge:

And after a fantastic lunch in Dumbo we wandered over to the Brooklyn Bridge park and I got what i think is the best photo I’ve ever taken:

On the walk back we thought it might be nice to toss any emotional baggage over the bridge into the river.  So fear, resistance, and self-criticism, were just a few of the things that ended up in the water.

The day was delightful and it was a wonderful low cost thing to do that really took you away.  The important part for me was that I finally made good on a commitment that I had made to myself years ago.  There something really wonderful about doing what you say you’re going to do especially when it’s something that is just for pure pleasure and just for yourself.  I am a firm believer in saying YES to yourself as much as possible.

Thanks to the ladies who joined me.  I was happy to do this alone but it was really great to have your company.  I’m planning to do this as a yearly event but next year, I’d like to do it on a Saturday so that more people can join.

The other great thing that came out of this is a new tag-line for my business– Freedom and Fulfillment Life Coaching: Building a bridge from where you are to where you want to be.

Obstacle – obstruction,  hindrance,  impediment.  Refers to something that interferes with or prevents action or progress. An obstacle  is something, material or nonmaterial, that stands in the way of literal or figurative progress: Lack of imagination is an obstacle to one’s advancement.

This week has been one hell of an emotional rollercoaster.  A couple of disappointments in a row and there I am in that place asking myself the dreaded questions:  Do I really thing I’m going to make a living at this?  Does anybody really see a value in it?  Should I try to do something else?  Invariably the same answer always comes:  I was born to do this. 

But what about making a living at it? Well that’s quite another story.

I love what I do as much as I love breathing so it always breaks my heart when people come to me to work on their issues and then decide to stop the work before they’ve gotten where it is they say they want to get.  Or they come for the initial session and leave feeling energized and excited for our future work together only to discover later that financially it’s not doable for them.

There is so much trust one needs to have to sustain a business that requires people to pay you to help them to get what they want in life and in the process look at the thoughts they hold that stand in the way.

It’s extremely disappointing to open your heart and mind for someone only to find out they’re too frightened to take the journey.  Not to mention the impact it has on my finances.  And when I say impact I mean that I have to start going without things because of it.

If enough of this happens in a short time span I find myself where I was this afternoon, feeling deflated and defeated and staring at my altar with my gaze fixated on my statue of Ganesh who is, in Hinduism, the remover of obstacles.  Right before my mind starts down that well worn path where I ask for that kind of intervention a voice in my head says:

Do not ask for the obstacle to be removed.

Embrace the obstacle and dance with it.

Dance?  Really?  I’d rather not, I say.

Silence.  They’re waiting.

And so I did.  I was so rigid and uncomfortable at first.  We waltzed my obstacle and me, and as the discomfort grew so did the awareness that there was no choice but to surrender.  I let go of the resistance and in so doing, let go of the pain.  And then I noticed that the obstacle was totally supporting me while we danced.  My feet were not even touching the ground. I began to understand what a disservice I had done to myself all of my life by wishing for the obstacles to be removed; by not understanding that inside each one of them was a healing and a pathway to a stronger, wiser version of me.  Strength and wisdom that would serve me so that I could serve others.

And so we dance and I Iearn:
that in order to teach perseverence, I must learn it myself.
in order to help others let go of limiting thoughts, I must learn to move through my own
that the most beloved teacher comes disguised as obstacles and that underneath it all everything is working for my highest good

And it is with another layer of understanding that I announce my latest venture:

A three week teleclass called:

Taking Care of Your Business When It’s Not Taking Care of You: How to Transform obstacles into growth.

Thursdays June, 10, 17, 24.

7:00 – 8:30 PM Eastern Standard Time

$65

I hope you’ll join me.  Ganesh will be there too.  More details to come as the time gets closer.

I love the change of season from winter into summer. It’s incredible to watch everything that was brown turn green.  It looks so automatic and effortless.  If only change could be that easy for humans.  We all have things in our lives that we want to change or improve . Yet, so many of us keep doing the same things the same way and then wonder why we’re unhappy.  Why don’t we do something about it?  In my experience it boils down to one of two things: we’re so overwhelmed by just getting through our day to day that we don’t have the energy to make the changes we want to make; or the change feels terrifying –we’re afraid of the unknown. We’re so paralyzed by the fear that we stay stuck where we are even though we’re unhappy.

Making a job, career, or relationship change doesn’t have to feel emotionally like jumping off a cliff. Actually in coaching, it’s quite the opposite.  Making big life changes is like walking across a strong, sturdy, bridge–one step at a time.  I’ve used the bridge metaphor in my own life to go from an office job to a career that is my passion, and I use the bridge metaphor all the time with my clients to help them get from where they are currently to where they want to be.

Coaching builds a bridge by breaking the goal into its smallest and most manageable steps.  Each week the client takes a few steps toward the goal.  Weeks pass, many steps are taken, many objectives accomplished.  They are on the bridge.  The bridge consists of elements of the old behavior, or old life along with elements of the new behavior or new life.  Specifically with regard to career change this would be the time when you’re doing a job for money and working toward doing the thing you love.  Eventually the thing you love will grow large enough to replace the job you’re doing for money.  Making a major career change can mean being on the bridge for a while–and what I’ve learned in my own life is that the bridges are filled with important information.  If you are on the bridge for a very long time, it is because there is much for you to learn and know before getting to the goal.  Time is a teacher and when used correctly can help you to transform into who you need to be in order to have or do what you want in life.

Taking a walk

On Friday, May 7th, I’m going  to take a walk over the Brooklyn Bridge.  People do it everyday but on this day, I will be walking with a group of workshop participants, clients, and friends.  Each person in the group will be holding their own intention for the bridge that they want to build in their lives or celebrating a bridge that they have crossed. It doesn’t matter what area of life you want to change.  Whether it’s a new career, business, or relationship with someone else or with yourself, declaring an intention is the first step toward making a change.

Every great accomplishment starts with the first step.

Bingeasarus – 1.  One who eats as if their entire food supply is going to be cut off in the very near future. 2. One who eats to protect against the hunger to come. 3. One who eats to try and make up for the hunger in the past.

I am certainly number 3. I spent years depriving myself of sweets, bread, and dairy products. My initial impulse was for health reasons. Instead of focusing on the fact that I had made a choice to follow a specific food program, I focused on my feelings of deprivation. Instead of focusing on how much energy I had, I focused on feeling denied the fun foods that everyone else was eating and I realize now there is some part of me that wants retribution.  It’s payback time people. Do you know how many dozens of brunches I’ve sat through where I really wanted to order the pancakes or the french toast but never did? Instead I was eating the Nicoise salad and feeling very, very deprived.  I can count on one hand the number of times I had pancakes or french toast at brunch and I’ve gone to lots of brunches.

So a couple of months ago I decided that I would say YES to the pancakes at brunch!  Here is the progress that I have made with my food issues: a year ago, I would have just bought pancake mix and maple syrup and made the pancakes and eaten them at home as soon as the idea of pancakes crossed my mind.  Instead, I decided that I could wait and eat them at breakfast like a normal person, so at least I felt good about showing some restraint, but that is where the restraint ended. When the pancakes arrived, there were three of them, each as large as an 8″ dinner plate. My first thought was, “I’ll never finish those.” Famous last words. Even I, marathon eater of the 70′s and 80′s could not believe I finished them.

Let me just say that this kind of eating is pretty much devoid of pleasure. I ordered the pancakes because I wanted them, but finishing them was an attempt to make up for deprivation in the past.  The irony is that it’s two weeks later and it’s like the whole thing never happened. Eating the pancakes didn’t satisfy anything! My desire for pancakes still feels like a bottomless pit.  I think I’m going to have to do this a lot to get it out of my system. What???

When I think about what I just said I see that it is insane and how clearly, none of this is about food–it’s about allowance and not feeling left out. It’s about saying yes to something and not always being told no.
It’s about trying to experience expansion, freedom, and joy in my life by using food as the conduit.

Why don’t I just try to start a fire by rubbing two tissues together?  Or bang my head against a wall in hopes that it will make my painful childhood memories disappear? It’s almost like a crazy voodoo. I keep thinking I will have that one perfect meal that undoes all of the bad decisions that I made in the past about food but each time I go to that place, I come up empty handed.

I had an epiphany the other day. What if in the past I was always able to eat whatever I wanted? What if it was all balanced and normal so there was no debt to pay, no retribution to seek, no pleasureable experiences to try and make up for?

There’s really nothing to stop me from adopting this idea about my past. I think it will help me tremendously.

I came across a great quote today: “Every momment of your life, including this one, is a fresh start.”

I’m going to go with that one.

Now I just might end up regretting this post, the possibility always exists that  tomorrow I could find myself up to my neck in Ring Dings.

But as for right now (and what else is there, really?) it’s been 48 days but who’s counting?  On February 21st just as a way to clean up my diet, I stopped eating sugar.  Nothing new, I’ve done it a dozens of times in the last four years each time I’ve attempted to eat healthier.  I figured it would just be the usual–I’d make it until the weekend and then I’d find myself downing some chocolate or some ice cream.  Somehow this time, that time never came.

For those of you who know me you know all about “the breakup.”  That’s the time from 2001 – 2006 where I stopped eating any and all sugar.  Those 5 years were quite an experience. Because I gave up sugar from a place of discipline and wanting to lose weight–a place of not trusting myself around food, I had a pretty big rebound. I have lots of stories of eating myself into oblivion in the last 4 years but I’m not going to go into that here.   What I will tell you is that very naturally one day a couple of weeks ago, I woke up and the thought of eating sweets just nauseated me.  Pretty weird since the last time I gave up sugar it took every ounce of discipline that I had and every bit of energy to maintain the abstinence.  Of course I’m thinking it’s too good to be true but as of right now, I just don’t feel the need or the desire for it.  I guess dreams really can come true.  Honestly, part of what’s driving this thing is that I’ve been working on simplifying my life–clearing it of situations and relationships that require way too much work and navigating a relationship with sugar is just more than I’d like to deal with right now.  I’d just rather do without it.  It’s strange to be in this situation without the element of deprivation but truly there is none.
I found this letter that I wrote in 2004 about the experience.   Some things are different this time, but some things are still the same…

An open letter to my best friend and worst enemy:

The first time I tried to let you go for good I cried every day for a week. In my eyes I was losing my very, very, best friend; my most dependable, true friend. What a soothing comfort you were for me, and what rebellion.  Whenever I was hurting, I could just reach out for you and there you were.  You were always there when I needed you, and you were my favorite mode of acting out.

In September of 1997 I got up the strength to say goodbye.  After about a year of being without you, I came running back.  I missed the excitement of having you in my life.  I missed the roller coaster.  It was fun for a while, running with you again – until the weight started to come back.  That’s when it really became a problem.  I thought I could keep you in my life and manage it all somehow, the cravings, my weight, my emotions.  Something about the act of walking away from you completely and staying away for a while intensified my need to have you.  So I came back, and what a sweet reunion it was.

Things were fine in the beginning, after all I missed you desperately, but after a while I began to get lost in the push- pull of having you and then trying to do without you.  It started to take over my life.  You began to haunt me. I was truly addicted.   I hated myself for the way I used and depended on you.  Every moment of my life became centered around the fight to have you or not have you.  Kind of like an abusive lover that you don’t want to live without.

I beat myself up so much each and every time I succumbed to you that I destroyed any pleasure I might have gotten.  That’s when I knew it was all over.  There really was no point in us being together if it wasn’t pleasurable for me so in October of 2001 I said goodbye again.  But this time I meant it.   I had to summon every resource that I had to make it happen—so much so, that my entire life had to revolve around maintaining this abstinence.  Eventually the effort gave way to relief.  Not having you in my life freed up so much of my psyche that going back to you just seemed like emotional suicide.

Yeah, having you is nice for as long as it lasts which for me is only about three minutes but then it’s over.  That’s when the beating/obsession over what to have next starts and that’s just the expressway into a black hole that goes absolutely nowhere.  I feel a freedom and a clarity in my life now that was never there before.  I’m finally in touch with my true hunger which feels so much more honest than that crazy train I was on while you and I were together.

Sure sometimes I reminisce about old times – ending my night out with a pint of Ben and Jerry’s on the couch; the sugar rush of eating a bag of Pepperidge Farm cookies on an empty stomach; the shot of serotonin after eating a package of Resse’s Peanut Butter Cups.  I confess that I do sometimes miss using you to numb myself into oblivion.  But like any memory, it lasts a moment and then it’s over.

I think of our fun memories together fondly, but I don’t miss the insanity.

Your Friend,

Cathy

2010 P.S. – So my old friend sugar, we’ll see how long this lasts.  And I need everyone who is reading this to know that I have no judgement about anyone eating sugar.  If you love sweets and they make you happy, by all means–go for it!  For me it’s always been a contentious relationship that required a lot of energy and I’d rather have that energy for other things.

I had an interesting conversation with a close friend yesterday. While we don’t get to speak all that much there is such a deep connection between the two of us that I often feel like we’re living parallel lives but not necessarily in synch. Our world views and life philosophies are very much the same and thus our interpretations of what happens in our lives and our reactions to things tend to be similar–she totally gets me and I totally get her.

She is in between a business that she started which dissolved very quickly and trying to figure out what she should do next for work. There are a lot of options open to her, she just has to decide what direction she wants to go in. Of course it’s easy for me, being on the outside of the situation to make a pithy assessment of everything but she’s having a rough time of it. I’ve been down the road she’s on–the road of having to reinvent myself and create something from nothing. Anyone who has their own business is often in the business of creating something from nothing and let me tell you, it ‘s exhausting. My friend being the brilliant writer that she is had a great analogy for what she’s been feeling–she said she’s got too much “drag.” Drag is a technical term for one of the aerodyamic forces that acts on an airplane. When there’s too much drag on a plane, it won’t take flight. Right away I had a visceral sensation of being dragged down as she began to name the elements that make up her drag. I’ve been having my own challenges lately and feeling pretty stuck and got me thinking about what my “drag” is… At first I could not think of one single thing but after I gave it some time here’s what I came up with:

The belief that manifesting anything is difficult.

The belief that I don’t have the capability to accomplish the things I need to and I can’t get anyone to help me.

The belief that there is always something in the way of getting what I want.

The belief that there is always something that I have to fix about myself or some life circumstance that I have to overcome before I can be happy.

I cannot tell you what a relief it was to just name these things. Such a simple exercise yet there’s something about calling these things out into the light of day where I can see them that totally deflates them. I really wasn’t aware of the degree that these beliefs were affecting my life. Knowing what they are is the first step to changing them. When I stopped to think about it, I realized that most of these things aren’t even true. They’re something that my psyche has constructed to keep me stressed out and terminally unhappy–states that I had grown accustomed to living in in the past and my brain was just doing its thing to recreate what’s familiar.

Looking at my drag was like that scene in The Wizard Of Oz when Dorothy finally gets the ruby slippers and is told that the thing she’s been most afraid of (the wicked witch of the west) no longer has any power over her.

My plan for next time I get together with my friend is for both of us to put our drag on the table, out in the open. Name it, look at it, let it go and in doing so take away its power. I invite you my dear readers to comment and in those comments, throw your “drag” on the table as a way of letting go of old things that no longer serve you and while you do repeat after Glinda, “You have no power here, now be gone!”

Eat, Pray, Love Movie Trailer

Well, the trailer is finally here. Unfortunately,  the movie doesn’t come out until August.   I can see from the websites that have this video posted there are a myriad of reactions to the movie but more importantly to the story.  Reading this book was life-changing for me but much to my surprise, there are a lot of women out there who hate this book.

It’s hard for me to fathom that a woman could have such a vehement reaction to another woman’s soul searching story.  My psych 101 theory comes into play and tells me that whenever something that doesn’t directly involve or affect you causes a strong reaction, it’s not at all about the other person, it’s all about your stuff.

And what is the nature of this “stuff” you ask?  The stuff is not envy about Elizabeth Gilbert having the resources to take off work and travel the world for a year–it’s about her listening to what she really needed in her life and then following that vision. It’s about her saying yes–to herself.

If you feel stuck; in your relationship, in your job, or in your life, then seeing another woman answer her own longing will be very threatening to you.  You will see this book and her story as self-indulgent and obnoxious and you’ll go right back to your to-do list of things you should and must do, back to the grind that is your life, and back to feeling angry and resentful that you’re not living the life you want.  There is so much that I can say at this point of this post.  But suffice to say that there are so many small ways that we can start saying yes to ourselves and answering our longings–because if you don’t answer the small ones, chances are you won’t answer the big ones unless like Elizabeth Gilbert, you’re driven to do so  through a near-nervous breakdown.
As for myself, I’m looking forward to the movie.

As the creator of the Feed Your Soul, Feed Your Body workshop, I have done a lot of work on finding ways to feed the soul that don’t involve food. I think it’s really important to know what to do for yourself to feed your soul but there’s also a way to allow food to feed the soul without eating for emotional reasons. For years, I saw food or the enjoyment of food as the enemy. I thought that if I allowed myself to eat something that I enjoyed, I would never stop eating it. I didn’t understand that the enjoyment doesn’t always come from eating fun, fattening foods. It comes from the circumstances around the food that you’re eating. It’s what the Buddhists call “mindful eating”. I had a wonderfully spontaneous example of this when I was in Mexico last year, and I know just like everything else– it works if you work it.

I’ve had a a lot of resistance to bringing more attention to my eating because for years I was hyper obsessed with it. But I was putting the wrong kind of attention on it. I was mainly focused on eating what I thought were the right foods whether I liked them or not. My focus was on eating the lowest calorie foods that I could find and not deviating from my food program–needless to say I didn’t experience a lot of pleasure during meal time. Mindful eating is not about eating fattening foods and getting the pleasure from them, it’s about eating healthy foods and taking the time to sit down, use a plate and proper cutlery and experience the food that you are eating without distracting yourself by reading or watching TV while you are eating. I have to say that this is very hard for me to do most of the time and I’m really not sure why. I think some of it has to do with always being in a hurry and if I’m being totally honest there is still a part of me (and I know there are millions of you out there) who feels guilty about eating in general. Wow, that’s a big realization. I actually had no idea that I still felt that way but it totally makes sense. If it were published I could refer you to my play: Thin Body, Fat Mind: One Woman’s Lifelong Struggle with Dieting, Bingeing, and the Pursuit of the Perfect Fit and you could find out exactly why that is, but I have told that story so many times that I just can’t revisit it now. Maybe in 10 years I’ll do a revival.

In the meantime I’m working on mindful eating. Savoring my food, taking in my surroundings while I eat and just crafting a whole new experience out of the whole thing. You’re not going to find me using my car keys to cut into a frozen Sara Lee cheesecake and wolfing it down while I’m driving home from the supermarket because I don’t want to wait until I get home to eat it. Nope, not me sister.