The difference between Fasting and Not Eating

  On a recent coaching call, I explained the difference between Fasting and Not Eating.  There is a big difference.  In both cases there is underlying thinking under the behavior but when you don’t eat, you are not aware or even interested in the underlying thinking, even though it may sabotage your efforts. It might look like this:

Every time you think about eating you tell yourself you are not eating because____????___ (here there are conscious and unconscious answers) Conscious- I am not eating because I need to lose weight. I need to lose weight because I want to fit my clothes. I want to fit my clothes because when I don’t I feel fat. Unconscious- When I feel fat, I feel like a loser. When I feel like a loser, I feel bad about myself. I feel bad because I shouldn’t be fat. I shouldn’t be fat because fat people are lazy and undisciplined. If I’m fat so I must be lazy and undisciplined. If, I am lazy and undisciplined. I might as well eat a doughnut.

 The Sacred and Fit program includes a Fast in the fifth week. The purpose of the preceding four weeks is to prepare for the fasting week. Although there is a lot of preparation for the gradual fast (buying a juicer and a blender, planning the weeks’ menus of raw foods etc.) the REAL preparation is for the Intention for a Breakthrough. This is what differentiates a fast from “not eating.”  Each participant brings a different Intention to the Fasting Week.  The intentions are generated by participating in the contemplative practice of Lexio Divina. This practice teaches how to focus and discipline the mind, so that during the fasting week there is a foundation for obtaining a breakthrough.

What kind of breakthrough? Well, as I’ve said many times, a weight issue is really a thinking issue. Food is meant for nourishment, but people eat for many other reasons. The REASONS for those behaviors is the actual problem behind the weight. During the first four weeks of Sacred and Fit, through journaling and other introspective practices you slowly uncover unconscious, unspoken beliefs that are “feeding” the behavior of overeating.  A breakthrough is a change in those beliefs.

So, do you believe that it is God’s will for you is to be healthy?

It is God's will for you to live a peaceful life?

It is God's will for you to have joy and fulfillment?

If you are overweight, stressed out, unhappy and unfulfilled, then there is a part of you that is not acting on that belief. Somewhere deep down, you don’t believe that it is God’s will for you to be healthy, peaceful, joyful and fulfilled.

Fasting will help you change the belief.

Simply, Not Eating won’t.

For more information on S&F program, including the gradual fast, go to our website www.sacredandfit.com.

Bringing order to my chaotic mind

As I negotiate this period with my brother, I am finding it challenging to remain in peace and at the same time not get entangled in other aspects of my brother’s life. My role is to offer support during the cancer treatment with the intention of him living longer than the prognosis. However, I am so tempted to try to “fix” things in his life even though “fixing” other people’s problems can be extremely stressful…and most time futile.

At least I know that I have this shortcoming. “Hello, my name is Cheryl and I try to fix people’s lives.”

One practice that has helped me tremendously  is what I am sharing with others in the Sacred and Fit community: the contemplative practice of Lectio Divina. In S&F 101, I made it much too complicated by suggesting that the four parts of the practices be done four times throughout the day. With so much traveling,  I found it hard to keep up with all of that, so I just started assigning a day to a single aspect of the practice and that has been much more manageable.

Throughout the day and ESPECIALLY at meal time, I focus on a single verse of scripture. This is week #4 so it will be “Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the earth.” One Aramaic translation of this verse is

Healthy are those who have softened what is rigid within; they shall receive physical vigor and strength from all of nature.

This week, I will follow this schedule that I have also suggested to S&F102 members.

MONDAY -LECTIO- choose a verse and repeat/memorize the verse throughout the day and especially at every meal

TUESDAY- MEDITIO- make the verse your own, rephrase and personalize the verse.

WEDNESDAY-ORATIO- Pray the verse

THURSDAY- CONTEMPLATIO- Listen for the deeper meaning of the verse and answers to your prayer

FRIDAY- Record your reflections on how your life has been impacted by this week's practice.

During stressful times it is tempting to let my healthy habits go. I am too tired to exercise and too busy to eat right. Behaviors like this will always be preceded by thoughts run amuck with fear and worry.  A contemplative practice, such as Lectio Divina helps bring order to a chaotic mind and therefore helps keep the behaviors in check.

So far it is working. However, my brother starts chemo tomorrow.

And yesterday, our 75 year-old-mother was upset when he got into a big argument with his seventeen year-old daughter.  As a result of the fight, the daughter locked her self in the bathroom and called her mom, (his ex-wife) who was out on a date, to come and get her.

I’ll let you know how my practice is going.

Leaving a Legacy

Yesterday, my brother learned that the previous prognosis for six years was another mistake. Yesterday he talked to the oncologists, in Houston, who specializes in cancer of the pancreas and who will oversee his care. The prognosis is 12-15 months with aggressive radiation treatment, to be done in Houston and chemotherapy to be done in Miami. That is what the doctor’s says, but my grandmother would say “It’s the Lord that has the last say so.”

Given this news, I have been thinking about my brother’s legacy. He may have only 51 years or “If the Lord say so.” he may have many more.  Either way, he will leave a legacy.

 Like the responsible parent that he is, my brother is preoccupied with making sure that his daughters will be taken care of. He has saved for their college educations and one of his primary activities even during this difficult time has been to make sure that they have financial resources. Yet leaving their financial inheritance is not the only legacy he will leave.  He will now leave them these memories….these days, weeks, months and possibly years, in which he has lived with a cancer diagnosis.

I imagine that one benefit of having been given a prognosis such as my brother’s is that each day becomes meaningful. There is no time for petty grievances. The skills of patience, kindness and compassion would need be cultivated, if each encounter were possibly the “last” time.  I can only imagine the soul work one would have to do to leave a legacy of love, joy peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.  A person might become more longsuffering, wiser in cultivating these traits in the face of excruciating pain and medical uncertainties. In the end, these days could be more fruitful in terms of Spiritual fruit than all the years that preceded them. This certainly would be an inspiration for those of us not in pain, because all of us will have a last day. 

The legacy of a life well-lived is a worthy endeavor for as many more days as the Lord say so.