Our Body’s Innate Intelligence
By
Lesley Wirth
When you are
gearing up to fuel your body what part of yourself are you listening to? Many
of us get caught up in the cravings that our mind has, be it for sweets,
caffeine, or alcohol. We do not listen
to what our body wants. What if we took
a moment and got in tune with what our body
is craving? What if we listened to it as though it is its own entity separate
from our emotional and mental wants?
I remember a
couple of years ago asking my body what it wanted. What came through surprised me a little. This
is what I heard: I am your temple. I want acceptance. I want love and nurturance. I want
clean air, movement, and for you to respect me. I want you to honor me by
feeding me nutrient dense foods that will replenish me and make me strong. I
want a highly alkaline diet so that I can perform optimally. When you eat meat,
please make sure the animals were treated humanely. This is important to me. I want what goes in
me to be treated with love and want you to treat me with love.
I thought I
was going to get some answer like, “stop eating Cheetos and could you please
add more greens?” I guess not. I found out there was so much more
information and wisdom for me to be paying attention to. Today I smile as I write this because this
answer was much different than what my mind wanted at the time. I wanted to know exactly what to do and how
to do it; a roadmap with all the correct turns and shortcuts. I also wanted a
genie to grant me the wish of making all the changes in my diet easy for me. A
Siri of sorts. In other words, I knew I was not happy with the way I had been
eating but I did not want to have to make sacrifices, change, or feel
challenged in any way.
Although
there was a huge part of me that wished for better eating habits, there was a
larger part that wanted to be jolted with caffeine and sedated with chocolate
and wine. And this part that wanted to check out was afraid to fully listen to
what my body wanted. To be honest the
part that wants to check out still exists in me. It has just lessoned more and more over
time. The more inner work I do, the less
it pops up. My practice has become
accepting the part of me that wants to check out. If I make it wrong and fight
it, it just gets worse. If I can accept this exists within me, I soften around
the whole thing; I stop judging and making myself wrong. By accepting that
there is a piece of me that wants to tune out, I take my power back from it.
Food and
eating has been an on-going place of growth for me. As I have continued to do
my inner work, the way I eat has evolved and what I organically want to be
eating and doing continues to shift. I balance pleasure and allowing myself to
have things that may not be the very best for my body, with eating very
nutritiously. I do this because I want
to honor my body’s guidance while also continuing to live life in a way that is
not taking everything so seriously. It really is okay to allow myself the
pleasure and joy of things that may not be considered the healthiest. My motto
is everything in balance and as I am balanced inside my food is balanced on the
outside.
The simple
exercise of asking our body what it
wants provides us with a wealth of information.
The next step becomes working through whatever may be in the way of us
being able to step more fully into honoring it.
It has been my experience that it is never about willpower. It is always
about fears. If these fears are
addressed and new ways of coping can be integrated a radically different
relationship with food is possible; one that integrates honoring our body as
well as our mental and emotional self. I
am here to tell you that it does not have to be either or. It really can be
both. You can have it all my friend!
The head
does not have the answer. But your
body’s wisdom does. Use your heart, your inner-guidance, and your intuition to
lead you to the people who can help you discover the way to create an
empowering relationship with food and your body. Trust those who make claims
that are actually worth trusting. If someone “has all the answers,” then be
weary. Why? Because YOU are the only one with your body, mind, and life
circumstances that influence your relationship with food. All of this must be
taken into consideration for lasting change to occur. Otherwise you might as
will hit the repeat button. I say it is
time to try something new. It is time to become your own health advocate. Only
you can say “yes” to investing in yourself and in your health.
If you would
like to learn more about the approach that has transformed my relationship to
food after 14 years of every type of eating disorder a person could experience
(from anorexia to bulmia to compulsive eater) please visit me at http://www.lesleywirth.com.
Lesley
Wirth, MA Spiritual Psychology
Transformational
Coach and Spiritual Counselor
