Rebellion No More

I'm gonna tell you a truth that I am embarrassed about. I just want to get it out there while I am working to solve it. Here it is:

I am a compulsive and/or over-eater. I hate this about myself and it's been going on since I was about 12. I can trace it back to selling chocolate bars in middle school for a cheerleading fundraiser. For whatever reason, I ate a whole bunch of them one day alone in my room and it felt good. I felt sick, sure, but something about sneaking around eating something I wasn't suppose to gave me a rush. But the end of eight grade, to my surprise, my cheerleading uniform barely fit.

I understand a lot of people are emotional eaters. They eat instead of feel...or as it's been said, they eat their feelings. But my case is slightly different. Through years of discovery, I figured out my eating was some form of self-sabotage and/or rebellion. It seems to get worse the better I look. And most recently, the last 7-8 months, I look the best I ever have (due to kettlebells), and it's continually getting worse and worse. And it makes me feel crazy and hopeless. Like, why can't I let myself just look great? Why am I sabotaging this with calories?

Then I started reading this book, Women Food and God. It's good...like, really good. Close to the end, Geneen Roth (author), says something that hit home for me.

"It's never been true, not anywhere at any time, that the value of a soul, of a human spirit, is dependent on a number on a scale. We are unrepeatable beings of light and space and water who need these physical vehicles to get around. When we start defining ourselves by that which can be measured or weighed, something deep within us rebels."

Obviously, this is why I rebel. Because, deep down, I don't want to be defined by my body. But I allow that to be so. And since moving to Colorado, I've felt like I don't have a lot of other stuff going for me. I even said to a friend once, "My life is kind of crappy, but at least I look good." No wonder I am rebelling.

So if we stop defining ourselves by a number on the scale or a size on a tag, there is nothing to rebel against. We are all so much more valuable than what our vehicle looks like. I have to get in touch with my self-worth. You should too. We are, after all, unrepeatable beings of light and space and water. Unique.