It’s that perfectionism thing, during attempts to lose weight, that most overeaters struggle with day in and day out (and evenings too!). Do you find yourself caught in black and white thinking, particularly around eating? If you regularly speak of food as good or bad, you do. I have found that these ways of thinking rarely, probably never, do my clients any good in making positive changes regarding eating patterns or weight loss.

Although it’s reasonable to observe patterns in your choices and to look for ways you might improve, the good/bad mindset leads more often to bingeing, or other ways that you revert to uncomfortable patterns. The quote above reminds us that we are better beginning in any moment, rather than getting stuck in trying to do it all perfectly.

What is your experience around this? Do you find yourself waiting for a Monday, or the New Year, or after a certain occasion has passed to make changes? It’s a trap- you may be better off riding the wave of a moment of inspiration, a wish to feel better, or a vision of what it would be like to create freedom for yourself. Choosing an external, such as a Monday or the next morning, keeps the choice outside of yourself, where it will have little meaning, and therefore little holding-power.

Wishing you a lovely day-

xox

Lisa

Having a place to put all of my tools, and techniques and the flashes of inspiration I get to share with you is really fun for ME- a benefit I did not expect- it’s become something that I love adding to daily. I have been collecting so many things to inspire myself over the years, and now I am enjoying sharing these with you. My private clients have always been able to borrow books or tapes, or get recommendations for products and such, and now I get to recommend things to you all in a much more global and convenient format- very cool.

If you haven’t yet checked out the Sanctuary, go take a look, and let me know what you think, or if I have left something out that would make things even better.

Wishing you lots of love and every blessing-

Lisa

This is a reminder that if you are mulling over joining the IntuitiveBody Sanctuary, we are still offering a limited number of Charter Memberships.

The annual membership fee is only $197 plus it will never increase when you join as one of the first 29 Charter Members.

Not only am I discounting the membership fee for you (fees go up immediately once we have the first 29 Charter Members) but you also get:

* A special gift of my 14-page Spring Detox Report- includes easy to use tips to help you lighten up in every aspect of your life from your body to your home, and everything in between with some specific energy-healing techniques to show you how. Plus suggestions on what to eat during your customized detoxification- super helpful information you can use immediately.

* I am also giving you the mp3 recording (just click on the play button on your computer- nothing more needed)of my talk on “Creating Sacred Space” that I gave for a colleague’s teleclass a few months ago.

*Again, for Charter Members only, I am also offering a premium option at a special price- I will add a “90-Minute Inspired Breakthrough Session”, normally $197, yours for only $147.

Combining the membership to the Sanctuary with a 90-minute session with me, gives you absolutely everything you will need- a totally personalized and unique plan to get you started and keep you moving forward towards your goals.

We are really busy getting everything together for the big opening, and the Charter Memberships will be gone soon- don’t miss out on the special gifts that I know you will enjoy.

Remember, once the 29 special Charter Memberships are filled, prices go up immediately, and the special bonuses will no longer be offered. I want to make this as easy and valuable for you as possible, so don’t miss out.

One thing I know is that I will be pouring all of my knowledge, love, and experience, every powerful technique and tip that I have ever used or created into the Sanctuary- this is where I get to really have fun sharing everything old and new that my clients have gotten the best results from over the years. And since I am a lover-of-learning, I will be adding new stuff the minute I dream it up, or read about it or hear it in my travels.

I am providing one-stop shopping for women who want to kick the overeating, or the bingeing, or the purging or the obsessing - leave behind all of the fussing and fighting over your weight.

Come in to my Sanctuary- you will truly find whatever you need to live the life you dream of, free from overeating. If you have any questions, email me- and ask me absolutely anything.

Wishing you love and freedom,
Lisa

Plus- we will have all of my articles archived and organized there, audio clips you can click onto to hear guided medtitations and relaxation exercises from me, tips to inspire you and support you, recipes, and occasional teleclasses with me and other experts- you are going to get it ALL, baby!! Anything i can dream up to better support your journey out of overeating, it’s yours, for a really low annual fee.

Right now we are giving a special offer to the first 29 women that sign up as Charter Members, with great bonuses, and an annual fee that will NEVER increase- sound good? check it out- this is a really wonderful way for anyone to work directly with me- I even have clients from Europe, plus all over the States joining as Members.

I would love for you to be one of my 29Charter Members but you will need to hurry to get one of the spaces- with the bonuses and special price, they will go quickly. Just go to IntuitiveBodySancutary now and sign up.

Everything you want or need to break out of food-hell will be there, it’s ALL INSIDE. And it’s only going to get better as time goes on, this will be where ALL of my creative energy and ideas go- don’t miss out.

love and blessings to you-

Lisa

Guess what? It never works that way. Losing weight comes when you begin to care for yourself by finding ways to be happy- in other words, you can’t lose weight or go into deprivation-mode in order to make the other changes. You need to find ways to create more pleasure and more happiness and satisfaction right now, so that you can build a solid foundation of wellbeing that will inspire you to take steps to get healthier and release the weight and addictive-eating.

IntuitiveBody is a way to holistically put all of the pieces together so that you have a life that brings you happiness and freedom right now- today, so that you can also take the steps and find the love for yourself that allows you to make the changes to break out of weight and eating misery.

I am about to roll out 3 amazing (if I do say so) programs at IntuitiveBody.com that are designed to support you in brand new ways, to get you powerful results immediately. You will want to stay tuned- I want to help you change your life- It’s totally doable- you know I would NOT joke about this.

We have been so busy redesigning the new website, getting all of the new programs ready, the Sanctuary ready, and we have had a few glitches. As you know, I am no techie-babe, plus Friday was my birthday and I was ready to play. Last year was the BIG birthday, so this year was easy. My kids were spending the week with their Dad, the weather was gloriously sunny and dry, and I got to have lunch with my favorite women on 3 different days, which is a total treat for me- I am usually housebound all week, writing, working, and such, eating my usual salad at my desk… Last week was a blast! And then my husband and I had a wonderful night out Friday-all in all a great birthday week!

I was reading an article in recent issue of Vogue while waiting to get my hair cut this week. The article had an interview with LeBron James(I know nothing about sports- seriously), the star basketball player. He describes how he keeps his edge in this paragraph:

“During a recent practice, LeBron looks and feels good….all goes well as he sinks ball after ball. And then- a bad shot, a little off. As the next ball reaches his hand, he pauses, just for a millisecond, as if hitting the reboot button. Next shot, and all the ones following- dead on. ‘It’s all about refocusing yourself’, he explains. ‘For me, it’s such a habit, and I know what I’m doing out on the basketball court, so if I do something wrong, then I know how to switch the switch and turn it right back on, to readjust myself. Right there and then. It doesn’t take me a day. It takes me just’- he snaps his fingers-’one play’.”

I was really struck by his ability to refocus and come back to center in each moment. As he said, it doesn’t take him longer than that.

What if you were able to be that focused on your goals? What if every time you veered away from your core intentions, values, desires, you became immediately aware of it? And what if upon finding that awareness you were both willing and able to pivot your attention back on course?

To be that CLEAR- that was what really just blew me away. The clarity of knowing what you want, and keeping that in the forefront of your attention, and IN-tention so that you could immediately sense when you were going in the wrong direction, and could quickly right yourself- with no fuss or resistance, no excuses or defensiveness. Simply notice and “reboot”.

These athletes know a lot about focus, intention, and desire. They keep their eye on whatever their prize is all the time- and they don’t spend much time analyzing, defending, explaining or getting distracted from where they want to be.

What if you were able to move through your days like that? Staying completely focused and committed to whom you decided to become- what would that feel like? Let yourself consider what living that way might do for you. What if you believed that you could choose to stay as focused on your goals and desires as an all-star million dollar athlete? Go ahead, try that on. That kind of ability to focus is your ticket to really getting where you want to go- whether around commitment to what you need to do to get out of struggling with compulsive eating, or anything else.

Wishing you love and every blessing,
Lisa

Perfectionism also drives overeating and other addictive, self-soothing behaviors- I would venture to say that every single one of my overweight or bulimic clients is a big-time perfectionist. Their perspective makes life hellish. They feel never-good-enough, try to do it all, get little or no pleasure or satisfaction out of any of it, and feel so drained from all of the efforting and stress that they…. start eating in ways that make them hate themselves more.

Much better to focus on movement towards your goals. Set gentle intentions that don’t leave you feeling like a massive failure when you are unable to meet them. Never set a goal that you cannot absolutely meet- if you make them small and bite-sized, you will feel encouraged, confident, and most importantly you will keep moving forward.

Perfectionistic goals are often punishing, impossible, intensify your negative self-beliefs, and are so overwhelming that you give up. Nothing good comes of this- trust me. I am an old perfectionist from way back, and I continue to have to modify these tendencies.

Life is no fun as a perfectionist- that perspective really does suck the life out of you and everyone and everything around you- it’s like wearing the Red Shoes from the old fairy tale- the girl who could not stop dancing, who had to go faster and faster until she dropped from exhaustion (I think that is the end of the story- anyone remember?).

What if you just aimed for “a little bit better”? What would some kinder, gentler intentions and goals look like? They may not give you the big “hit” of excitement and anticipation that you get when you set huge ambitious goals, but guess what? You never reach those goals anyways- they don’t get you anywhere, they usually paralyze you with fear and dread.

Just try it my way! What are some small totally reach-able goals you could set, just for today?  Even a goal like “will eat 2 servings of vegetables today” is a fabulous goal that will do you tons of good, and how totally easy is that? But if you meet that goal, and eat those spring veggies- I guarantee you will feel good about it, and you will be on your way!!

Another gorgeous sunny day here in the country- bliss.

xox

Lisa

A former client emailed me part of the transcript on overeating from the course- She wanted to know what I thought. I will enclose the part of the transcript she sent me so that you can see what I am responding to.

Transcript:

Oprah: For me it is always about food. When you eat it and you know it isn’t so good for you. A voice in your head says you shouldn’t be doing this.

Caller: I am 27 years old Ekhart. My question is…how do i manage things that I label; things that
are bad for me. Like eating French fries and potatoe chips. I always eat these and often, overeat
and eat way more than i should have, I know that i shouldn’t and feel bad afterwards.

Ekhart Tolle: A lot of overeating has a lot to do with the ego. Because the ego state lives in a state of ‘not enough’. The need for more that is built into the ego and it gets transferred into the body, much more than the body wants. To eat consciously, is the way out of it. I would suggest
that when you eat your French fries to make a meditation out of it. To eat them consciously.
Without having a 2ndary entity in your head that says you shouldn’t be eating them. Eat them fully and consciously, and at the same time, feel how your body feels while you are eating them and
after you have eaten them.

Then you bring some presence into it. And you may realize, in some cases, you will notice that it wasn’t your body that wanted to eat it them, it was your mind that wanted to eat. Eat consciously is the way out of it. If you eat a sandwich, if you go to the fridge, if you get up in the middle of the night, they open the door and they reach in “I have to get something” you are trying to feed something. The body doesn’t need it.

Stop resisting it. Because the French fries are not bad. It is the thought in your head that has
told you that the French fries are bad. If you sit and consciously make it a meditation, you won’t
eat 2 bags of French fries unconsciously. That you will enjoy every single french frie. You will eat
5 or 10 or 20 and it will be pleasurable. Enjoy it, feel it, sense it, allow your whole body to be with
it and when you are done with the pleasure of it, let it go. You can sense your body and your body will often tell you “no more”

ET: You don’t become overweight or even intoxicated as long as you are acting consciously. It is when you become unconscious, is when you eat too much unconscious, is when you drink too much unconscious, is when you take drugs unconscious, is when you become obsessively indulgent with things. All these addictions are unconscious.

Enjoy your French fries. Enjoy a glass of wine! Consciously.

=======================================

Ok, here are some of my thoughts. I know that every single one of my clients would sell her soul to be able to eat fries or icecream of whatever with conscious enjoyment, as a meditation. But they can’t! And although I understand what Tolle is suggesting and why, I still believe that most  people do not truly understand addictive responses and reactions.

If my clients (or I ) were to try this, we would likely end up feeling like failures. Because in all likelihood we would want to keep eating, and the eating would go from a meditation to a frenzy.

Here is the analogy that I know most will understand-would you encourage a heroin addict or an alcoholic to have just a little “hit”, and enjoy it, really consciously focus on the pleasure? Why not?

You probably would not do this because inherently you understand that there is a chemical reaction or an alchemy that occurs that takes conscious choice and moderation out of the equation- in an instant. Is that because the heroin-addict is “unconscious”? Well he is, he is high and disconnected, but his body will crave the drug regardless of his state of mind.

Many of you with issues of overeating or weight, have tried these approaches- making the table pretty, putting on quiet lovely music, preparing the dinner lovingly and making it sensually appealing. But there is something about the food interacting with your particular chemistry, memories, brain and neural network, personal belief system and more that may cause you to overeat, every time.

I still advocate total enjoyment, as much consciousness as possible, and blessing something rather than judge it if you are going to take an action. But I think for people with longstanding histories of overeating or abusing food, are going to be unable to follow Tolle’s suggestions.

And while I don’t label foods as good, or bad- a french fry is hardly a shining example of a culinary pleasure- it’s a learned taste, with many associations- we might not even be that turned on by a simple french fry if it wasn’t so forbidden.

I believe you are better off savoring the true pleasures and bounties of the Seasons- right now it’s all about greens, and fresh food coming back, and breaking away from the heavier starchier foods of the winter hibernation. I bit into a tiny gorgeous bright red grape-tomato the other day and it was incredible.

So with all due respect to Eckhart and Oprah, I think the advice was lacking.

Hope your local weather is as glorious as here in Massachusetts- we are on a run of magnificent sunny dry days- it was warm enough for me to walk at 8 am.

xox

Lisa

We love these kind of success stories- but they are extreme and who knows if they hold up in the long run. For now, try keeping small daily promises to yourself. Big swings in behaviors are uncomfortable and we don’t stick with them.

Let me know what you thought of all this, and what you are doing in your own life to lose excess weight or improve your health and well-being.

Sending love and blessings,

Lisa

How many times have you set a goal, or told others of your intentions or plans, only to feel shame or embarassment when you don’t? This is such a common piece of the weight management game. And it really costs you!! It’s terribly demoralizing to your spirit and self-esteem, to consistently break your promise. One almost becomes used to failing- you lose your belief that you can keep your promise. Maybe you even stop trying.

You may need to go a different route- diets, as they say, really don’t work. Taking care of yourself, and having a plan for your body, your heart, your spirit, and your mind is vastly different from a diet.

If you have a history of trying and being unable to stay the course, get some support. Somebody that will hold the faith for you, even when you have doubt that you can make the necessary changes. The necessary changes go way beyond food- and that is often the scary part.

Take a small step towards keeping promises to yourself, even a teensy eensy one will feel better than turning your back on what you want.

Wishing you love and every blessing-

Lisa