Do you really listen to your body? Do you value what it tries to tell you?
In that a lot of my adult life I have been holding onto disorder eating, I came to realize that I was a worried mind seemingly detached from my body. I ignored it! If it was hungry, tired, sore, or sick I rarely stopped to listen to it. I was so into the disorder that dictated what I should or shouldn’t be eating, how much I ate or whether I needed to purge it out ~ I essentially tuned myself out.
Now, after doing a lot of personal work with some amazing coaches, I live in my mind/body/spirit connection. They all work in unison. I use my lovely body as my compass that will direct me in living my right life.
Last weekend as I tried to climb a mountain ten miles high, part of it in the snow, I forgot about paying attention to my body. I have always compared overcoming my eating disorder to that of ascending a mountain, envisioning that if I ever worked my way to the top, I would have the eating disorder under control. So last weekend, I told myself “this adventure represents the mountain of your life and you have to make it to the top. (One of my life’s lessons has been that it is not ever a good idea to say “I have to”).
Most of the climb went well as I hiked up to the top, but at 7500 feet the climb was much, much harder than I had imagined. At that point, I got very dizzy and weak. My fingers were frozen and hurting; my body did not want to move, however my stubbornness didn’t listen to my body, even as I kept sliding back down in the snow.
I finally sat and tried to be calm by taking deep breathes to soothe myself. As I sat there in the stillness, it dawned on me that I was not listening at all to my body. Did I ask its opinion? Did I trust that my body would give me guidance along this pathway? No, I treated it as if it weren’t a part of this adventure; like it didn’t even matter.
I had forgotten about my mind/body/spirit working together. Once again, it was my mind disconnected from my body. I truly believe I can do anything, when I trust my amazing body and listen to what tries to tell me.
I ended up walking back down the mountain. I felt much better at the lower elevation out of the snow. No, I didn’t make the climb that day, but I will be back after the snow melts. The lesson learned that day totally overshadowed making it to the top ~ stay in touch with my body!
We all descend mountains everyday in our lives, be it overcoming something like an eating disorder, working at a job that we don’t like or anything else. Every day we give it our all. Our bodies signal us every day when it needs rest, food or maybe it just needs for us to stop and feel a feeling that we have been pushing away.
Mind, body and spirit ~ we think, we listen to how our bodies feel, and we have spiritual time. This trio makes mountain climbing so much easier.
