We have tools to use on this journey toward intuitive eating. Some come naturally and some come with some pain, but they all lead to a closer relationship with the Lord and they all lead to healing if we do the work needed to get there.
It started with a negative emotion. Anger. I had an issue going on in my life that was making me angry. And, it wasn’t just the anger that was causing problems but the obsessive thoughts that went along with the anger. My thoughts and obsessions about what was going on was becoming an idol and they were making me want to break my eating boundaries.
I’ve been in this community for almost two years, so I know the right tools to use when these situations come up, but I wasn’t using them. I had grown accustomed to dwelling on the problem. Have you ever felt like that? Sometimes we are so comfortable with the bad feelings that it takes a special circumstance to get us to want to change.
My special circumstance is taking a small group of ladies through Taste for Truth by Barb Raveling. I felt as a leader that it was about time I use our tools to work through what I was feeling. So I did. The first thing I did was make a commitment to my small group to go through the Anger and Annoyance questions in “I Deserve a Donut” by Barb Raveling. I completed my commitment, but it was difficult. I was weeping by the time I finished just the first couple of questions. Wow, now I know why it is so hard to actually do what helps us! I have to admit that even though it was difficult, I felt better when I completed my task.
The next day our lesson was on Truth Journaling. I took what I had written for the first question and used that for truth journaling. This opened my eyes to some things where I was in the wrong and believed lies instead of the truth.
The following day, I went back to complete our lesson on Day 21. I once again used my anger issue for this lesson. Barb asked us on Day 21 in Taste for Truth to focus on a trial that is going on right now. Then read Hebrews 12:1-15 and record everything it says about how God wants me to handle this trial and what He is hoping I will get out of it. Here is what I learned:
Lord, You want me to lay aside the weight of this trial. It is not mine to carry.
Lord, carrying weight that is not mine to carry is a sin. It is in essence saying that I should take care of my own trial instead of taking it to You. Lord, keep me from being ensnared by obsessive thinking which draws me into sin.
Lord, You are calling me to endure this race I am running to You.
Lord, You are telling me that the way to endure is to keep my eyes on You.
Lord Jesus, You are the source and perfecter of my faith. I can’t grow in my faith without You.
Lord Jesus, You called me as Your own and You feel joy in that.
Lord Jesus, You endured the pain of the cross and suffered the shame of crucifixion for me, one of the sheep in Your fold. I praise You as You sit at Father God’s right hand in glory!
Lord, as I look at Your example I see that as I walk with You and lean on You that I will not grow weary and lose heart.
Lord, in my struggles against sin I am not doing well in resisting the pull. Lord, help me keep my eyes on You. Renew my mind as I turn to You.
Lord, I am Your child; Your daughter. Let me not take Your discipline lightly. I know that Your discipline shows Your love for me. You desire my growth into the likeness of Jesus and You want Your will and glory to show forth from my life. That’s what I want too Lord!
Lord, I can endure this suffering as Your loving discipline. Lord, show me what You want me to learn from this trial and show me how to use this knowledge to help others.
Lord, do not let me forget that I am Your child and that You love me.
Lord, I submit to Your discipline for my growth. Transform me and my life Lord. Make me holy for You are holy.
Lord, even though I feel emotional pain right now, I know that Your discipline will lead to and yield the fruit of peace and righteousness.
Lord, I submit and surrender to Your training.
Lord, strengthen my tired hands and my weakened knees. I want my life to reflect Your glory and to show how You grow and transform me.
After working through this issue using the tools we have at our fingertips, I felt healed from my negative feelings. I shared with my friend and accountability partner Deanna Lewis that I felt like I had been washed on an old fashioned wash board, put through a wringer and now I have been hung up on a wash line to hang in the healing light of the SON! It was hard. It was difficult. But it was so worth it!
If you are dealing with negative feelings and emotions that make you want to break your eating boundaries, may I introduce you to Freedom from Emotional Eating by Barb Raveling? There is more work for me to do and I am happy to announce that Deanna Lewis and I will be offering a group study of this book starting in mid-September that will end by the end of November.
This class is for people who already have the basics of Thin Within down and are ready for the next level.
We will not be discussing weight, diets or any jargon regarding good or bad food choices. This way, we can be free to not be tempted to return to diet mentality while God is healing us from emotional eating.
Right now I am involved in a study called “A Taste for Truth” by Barb Raveling. It’s a great way to learn to renew my mind and fits nicely with eating “intuitively”, or 0-5. A few days ago, I joined the discussion on the chapter regarding emotional eating. My good friend Deanna Burris, who is leading the class asked us some questions and gave some advice that I wanted to share with you.
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Do you remember the first time you ate for emotional reasons?
Gals, we have tools to use that will sidetrack our desires to eat emotionally today. We can renew our minds before we eat out of our emotions. If we miss renewing our minds before eating, we can renew our minds after and that will bring us closer to making this a habit.
Barb says at the end of this lesson, “When we stuff our emotions with food, we miss out on so much. We can change that by developing a habit of going to God to talk through all those hard situations in our lives that make us want to eat for emotional reasons.”
Share what you discovered about those “Hard Things” in your life as you worked through today’s Bible Study.
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Emotional eating came early in life for me.
I was put on a diet at 5 yrs old and wasn’t allowed to have sweets. However, my sister was allowed to have them because she was skinny and I was not.
I remember feeling ugly and unloved while my sister was the favored one.
The first memory I have of emotional eating was probably when I was around 8 years old. My family was visiting my aunt’s house and she had a bowl of candy on her coffee table. At one point I was alone in the living room and so I saw an opportunity to eat candy. As I was eating it, I remember how good I felt and powerful and loved! Thus began my pattern of sneaking food. This is the beginning of my unhealthy relationship as food being my friend and comforter.
From the time I was a child, I learned that food helped ease the sadness and feelings of being unloved or insecure with myself. It made me feel like I had power when I would sneak food. I have learned now that I have done this into adulthood without even realizing it. As I used food to cope since early childhood, it became ingrained in me to respond to emotions with food.
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··· God Gives Hope! ···
God has opened my eyes to my emotional eating thru the book “HUNGER WITHIN”. He continues to show me ways to STOP this behavior thru the study of the book “A TASTE FOR TRUTH”. Renewing my mind about my identity in Jesus helps me a lot. Scripture about God being in control and His love and provision also keep me feeling secure in Him and I don’t reach for the food. I have learned that food is a lier. It is certainly NOT my friend and DOES NOT love me back! I am learning with these tools God has given me that only HE truly satisfies.
He loves me right now, right here wherever I am on the journey.
Food is just a tool for nourishing my body.
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.God has more work to do with me regarding emotional eating. Because of this, I am excited to announce that Deanna Burris and I will be offering a group study of Barb Raveling’s book “Freedom from Emotional Eating”. We will start in mid September and end by the end of November.
This class is for people who already have the basics of Thin Within down and are ready for the next level.
We will not be discussing weight, diets or any jargon regarding good or bad food choices. This way, we can be free to not be tempted to return to diet mentality while God is healing us from emotional eating.
Do you wonder how you can navigate the principles of Thin Within, draw closer to the Lord, and finally release the weight? It is wonderful to build our intimacy with the Lord and that may be, in fact, why many of us are led by God Himself, to Thin Within (and we thought it was about our weight!).
Well, because of my experience imperfectly applying the Thin Within principles, sustaining victory for the better part of of 7 years and now finding myself having been bucked off the horse and wallowing in the dirt, all while claiming to still be doing “just fine,” I am eager to share with you all what caused my personal “undoing” and how to avoid it yourself! (My updated testimony is found on this page.) When life throws you trials and curveballs how can we not revert back to old thinking and eating behaviors? What can we do to proactively work to prevent a slide spiritually, emotionally, *and* physically?
Starting on Monday, July 25th, I will be leading a Thin Within workbook study class on Facebook. We will get a running start on the holiday season, concluding this class in the last part of October. The details about how to join in can be found on this page.
Here, I share a bit about what’s to come!
Find me on Facebook. Request to be my friend and send me a private message asking me to add you to the Combo class.
I hope that you woke up this morning with this thought on your heart…
I am fearfully and wonderfully made!
We can believe it!
You know what? Here’s the thing… If our God is awesome (and I bet not one of you reading this would say you don’t agree with that), if He is so creative and powerful and clever (and I bet you all agree with that), then He has made our bodies reliably, too!
Like a Thin Within class participant said
He has created our marvelous, fearfully and wonderfully-made bodies to give us signals about when we need sleep, rest, when we are in pain, when we need to expel something from our bodies, and when we need to drink or eat, as well as when we need to STOP eating or drinking.
The trick is that often, over the years, either through carelessness or dieting, we have “shut down” those hunger and satisfied signals.
We want to get in touch with those signals again because they are a reliable means for eating the right amount of food: Eating to live, rather than living to eat.
When I get back in touch with those signals (this may take work, so please be patient and extend grace to yourself!), I find that I will release extra weight to my natural God-given size and then maintain it. No hocus pocus. No counting. No weighing and measuring. Just a naturally, calm, worry-free, way of living for the rest of my days.
Sound good?
I knew it would. I know it does to those of you who already subscribe to this approach.
In Thin Within and Hunger Within, we use the Keys to Conscious Eating to help us get back in touch with the signals of hunger and satisfaction.
These are not “rules” but rather are intended to provide boundaries:
Keys to Conscious Eating:
1. Eat when your body is hungry. 2. Eat in a calm environment by reducing distractions or calming your mind. 3. Eat when you are sitting. 4. Eat when your body and mind are relaxed. 5. Eat and drink the things your body enjoys. 6. Pay attention to your food while eating. 7. Eat slowly, savoring each bite. 8. Stop eating before your body is full.
Each time we eat – as in each and every time we eat – we try to use each of these keys as boundaries.
• Numbers 1 and 8 are the primary boundaries of eating between physical hunger (called a “0”) and physical satisfaction (called a “5”).
• If we use numbers 2 through 7 as secondary boundaries for ourselves, it helps us to succeed at #1 and #8.
• The goal is to be intentional each time food crosses our lips.
If we set a place for Jesus at our tables and imagine His presence there, if we foster a heart of gratitude and thanksgiving for the abundance that He supplies and that He has made our bodies fearfully and wonderfully, we can do this.
We can get back in touch with our body’s signals and discover a stress-free way to release the burdens of our hearts and the burdens of our life. They are so often connected!
Let’s eat when we are hungry.
Let’s stop when we are no longer hungry.
And let’s run to God for all the other things that ordinarily draw and lure us to food.
Ya with me? 😃
How are you doing with eating between 0 and 5 being your primary boundary? Which of the secondary boundaries do you think could help you more effectively abide by your primary boundaries? Which is hardest for you? Select one of these today to ask for God’s special help with. How can you plan for success?
We are sure you want more out of yourself and out of life than empty New Year’s resolutions — which are often promises made because everyone at the office is making them or because all the family members are sharing theirs.
Instead, let’s start off the first full week in January of 2016 with actionrather than just talk!
But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.
James 1:22
One way you can do that is to join our first Thin Within class of 2016, a study of “Discovering God’s Master Plan” which is the first workbook in our four-workbook series called “Rebuilding God’s Temple.” Our bodies are the temple of the the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). It’s an amazing truth! So let’s commit this year to living like this is the truth (since it is).
Visit our online classes page and sign up. We would love to have you and walk with you through the first three months of this new year. Registration closes on Friday, January 8th.
If you don’t want to be a part of a Facebook group, consider joining our Thin Within trade book study. Find the chapter you are on in the book and dive in any time. We are trying to encourage people to post comments to establish a community for support. Won’t you help us out? 🙂
How About You?
What will you do to not merely be a hearer only, but a doer?
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If you are dealing with negative feelings and emotions that make you want to break your eating boundaries, may I introduce you to Freedom from Emotional Eating by Barb Raveling? There is more work for me to do and I am happy to announce that Deanna Lewis and I will be offering a group study of this book starting in mid-September that will end by the end of November.
