At some point in your journey out of food, you’ll probably find yourself feeling uncomfortable. This is when you’re feeling the urge to eat rather than feel your feelings of sadness or anger and it just hurts; when your heart says, “Go to the gym – you’ll feel better,” and your mind says, “I don’t want to.” This is when you’re having a craving, and it’s an itch you really, really want to scratch….. This is when you’re staring at the fridge and you feel like you’ll die without the brownie or the treat…..
Discomfort in an inherent part of growth because we’re forcing ourselves to change. We’re changing our patterns, our habits, our ways of being. We’re choosing to do the opposite of what we typically do, and every cell in our being wants to take the easy way out and chuck this path of newness, reverting back to what’s familiar and comfortable. Change can feel all inside out and “wrong” – even when we’re making positive changes.
How can we care for ourselves when the path is feeling uncomfortable?
One of my favorite ways of doing this is to practice self compassion – in particular, to use compassionate self talk to self soothe my pain. I have a very, very active nervous system, and my fight or flight brain likes to think that discomfort means there’s something wrong. (It likes to say to me – in so many words (or feelings) – The sky is falling! The sky is falling!) That’s okay – it’s just trying to protect me. It’s just trying to keep me from being hurt; it just wants to stop the hurt.
Fortunately, when our fight or flight brain tells us that the sky is falling, we don’t have to stay in that place of panic. We can shift out of the fight or flight brain by reminding ourselves that we’re okay. It’s a form of self soothing. I do this by telling myself this phrase when I’m feeling uncomfortable: “Just because this feels uncomfortable doesn’t mean it’s wrong.” (I started using that phrase when our family moved across the country and pretty much every day was excruciatingly uncomfortable…)
Whew. That feels so much better. I don’t have to make my discomfort – or even my pain – wrong. When I don’t make the discomfort wrong, it’s doable. I remember that it passes and that it won’t always feel this way. It feels workable, and in that workability I find freedom – the freedom to respond to discomfort kindly, with love.
Discomfort is a part of life. It’s definitely a part of habit change, as your heart and mind is stretched through the growth process. I suppose it’s our own form of birth pains, our own personal birth canal.
And yet I find it so beautiful – so powerful – that we can choose to respond to this discomfort with compassion, with nonviolence, with a full heart. We can choose to say to our discomfort, “Rest in me. Let me care for you.”
We can even love it.
Wanting more hands on help?
- This post in an excerpt from Overcoming Sugar Addiction: the 30 Day Lift, a structured audio program to get through the first few weeks of a no sugar or low sugar diet. In this program, you’ll learn tools for gentle, compassionate habit change – how to grow out of painful/old habits without cracking the whip, white knuckling it, or beating yourself up. If you’ve read Overcoming Sugar Addiction and have struggled to put what you learned into action, this program is the next step, a map for how to get from here to there…
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I needed your post today. Thank you!
You’re so welcome, Katrina!
Hi Karly- great post as always! I particularly like the line about how in order to truly change we have to feel discomfort sometimes- it’s so true and is something I forget.
I do have a question though- I incorporate your techniques when I am feeling anxious or sad- namely the “it’s Ok to feel this right now” and while it does make me feel better, I’m at a loss for what to do next! Sometimes I’ll go for a walk, drink a cup of tea, or talk things out with my boyfriend but it still doesn’t help and I still feel anxious- The craving for something sweet to comfort me is just so strong! I am trying to abstain from all sweet flavors as even artificial ones cause me to crave more. Do you have any advice?
Hi April,
Oh, I appreciate the honesty and realness of your question. That’s the hitch, isn’t it? Those feelings can be so intense and sticky and the cravings can feel so strong. How do we sit with them?
When I get caught in cravings, I’m often resisting my feelings which tends to make them stickier. I’m often forgetting that they’re temporary and that they will pass! I tend to attach to them and think they are “me.”
So what helps me is remembering that everything – even cravings, even anxiety, even feelings – will move if I let them. This tends to create the space for my feeling to soften and ease….
I also let myself actively feel the feeling itself – the craving, the wanting, the fear – instead of bracing myself against it, fighting it or resisting it. I turn towards it. I name it – I may even say to it, “I see you anxiety,” or, “I see you craving.” Or, “Thank you anxiety. Thank you craving.” I feel it, knowing it’s not “me” and knowing it will pass if I allow it.
I try to be very, very kind to whatever I’m feeling.
I also detach a bit with this language – I’ll say “a part of me is feeling anxious right now” so that I remember not all of me feels anxious. A bigger part of me is okay.
After I feel the feeling itself, I’m able to relate *to* the fear or anxiety or craving instead of being caught in it. It’s a bit of separation that gives me the space to respond with care and love rather than react (“Eat the ice cream!”)
So rather than finding healthier ways to care for my feelings (like reading, talking with friends, etc.) than eating sugar/food, my learning curve has been directly feeling my feelings themselves. And that has been quite a learning experience, one I imagine I will be processing for a long time, perhaps my entire life…
I unpack how to do this in more detail in Heal Overeating: Untangled and in the sugar programs (The 30 Day Lift offers tools for this.)
You can learn more here:
-http://healovereating.com/
-http://www.sugar-addiction-book.com/30-day-lift/
I hope that helps!
Warmly, Karly