The past two days have been so great that I thought to myself this morning, "Wow, maybe these 100 days will just be super easy and no big deal, and I won't be confronted with any of my shit at all. What am I going to blog about if this continues to be effortless?"
HAHAHAHAHA. Nice try. Because of course the moment I thought that, the universe handed me a challenge. I ate something this morning that I didn't realize was a trigger food, and right after I ate it, I was right back to my cycle of destructive thoughts.
They go something like this:
"Oh shit. I can't believe I ate that. My entire day is ruined. This is going to fuck up my eating for the rest of the day. It's only day three and I'm failing. I broke the rules; I ate something I should be giving up. I'm not really doing this 100%....etc."
You get the idea. The good part is that I'm aware that these thoughts are not me, they are just thoughts. I used to think like this all the time and didn't know anything was wrong with it. When these thoughts really started to come in, I tried to counter them by telling myself that at least now I know about another trigger food, and I can cut it out from now on. But the energy it took to talk myself out of my reactive thought patterns is something I don't want to have to do everyday, and it bolstered my confidence in this project.
There are still so many foods that I do feel good about eating, and even though it may seem like I'm being very strict, it doesn't feel that way to me. It feels like freedom. Freedom in knowing that if I don't eat foods that I'm emotionally attached to, I can let go of the drama. I'm reminded of the Yoga Sutras here. Yoga Chita Vritti Nirodhah. Yoga is the cessation of the fluctuations of the mind. And in this way, abstaining from trigger foods is a part of my yoga practice, because it is a practice in releasing the thought patterns that do not serve me.
In the yoga class I went to this afternoon, the teacher asked us to offer out whatever we want to let go of as we move into the new year. I offered my chita vritti, my "mind-stuff." What a relief it is to let that go.
Beautiful, honest, and powerful post. Thank you Nina. It is amazing to watch these thoughts as they cycle through the mind and to see how wave-like our psyche is. This work is really inspiring. Thank you for taking this challenge head on and I send you love and support as you flow through this practice. Sat Nam <3
ReplyDeleteSo proud of you! such an good inspiration to let go....
ReplyDeleteThank you both so much for reading! You are both such powerful women, and to have your support gives me strength! xx
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