by Golda Poretsky, H.H.C.
www.bodylovewellness.com

Listen to the podcast of this post here:

Last week, fat activist and blogger extraordinaire, Marianne Kirby, asked her twitter followers to share some fat positive affirmations.  I loved watching my twitter account flutter with fat positivity!  Affirmations like, “Every body, fat or thin or whatever, is worthy of basic human respect,” “I’m awesome at any size I happen to be!” and “Happiness is not a dress size,” intermittently popped up on my screen throughout the day.

I loved seeing these affirmations, not only because they are positive, but because, to me, they represent the truth, and it’s a truth that we rarely hear.  People will have a reaction to statements like “Happiness is not a dress size,” whether they agree with it or not, because it goes against the grain of conventional wisdom.  Those of us who are steeped in fat acceptance might react with a “right on!” or a “I really want to believe that for myself” and those who don’t believe in fat acceptance would probably tack on a bunch of caveats or flat out say that it’s not true.

In the world of logical reasoning, statements are either true or false. The cup is either red or it isn’t.  Being fat is unhealthy or it isn’t.  But these statements aren’t true due to any inherent truth, they are true because we’ve deemed them true.  In the world of simple logic, we decide that certain statements are true and we proceed from there.  What we call statements of truth are really just assumptions of truth.

Similarly, so much of what we believe to be the truth about ourselves, our bodies, and our health is based upon assumptions that we believe to be fact.  That drum of “but fat is unhealthy” is just an assumption that gets beaten a gazillion times a day, so much so that the assumption seems like truth.  We do the same thing to ourselves, deciding that it’s the truth that we’re “too fat to _______” or “need to lose weight before we can  __________.”  When you look critically at what you take as irrefutable fact, you can break down any assumptions that may be limiting you.

Addressing Your Assumptions

Take a moment to fill in this blank for yourself.

“I believe that I am too fat to
___________________________________________________.”

(If this statement doesn’t apply to you, take a moment to think of some beliefs that you have about other areas of your life, such as relationships, work, or creativity.)

Let’s say that you came up with a number of things, and one of them was “I believe I’m too fat to wear sleeveless clothing.”  We’ll use that as an example.

Now let’s break that down by thinking about the assumptions that underlie the belief that you’re too fat to wear sleeveless clothing.  You might assume:

Wearing sleeveless clothing will make me look fatter.
People will notice how fat my arms are.
Fat arms aren’t socially acceptable.
Fat arms aren’t attractive.

Now let’s take a look at these assumptions.  Are any of these really the truth?  Can you think of situations or instances where these statement were untrue?  I know that I can.

Looking at your assumptions, particularly when those assumptions are limiting, is helpful when you can recognize that those assumptions are not the truth. They’re just assumptions that you heard enough or believed enough that you decided that they were true.  And, therefore, you can decide that they’re untrue.

Letting go of assumptions that hold you back is incredibly freeing and important for your well-being.  Clearing away negative assumptions about who you are or what you can do allows you to pursue and create your desires.

What are some assumptions you’d like to be free of?  Let me know in the comments below!

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Golda Poretsky, H.H.C. is a certified holistic health counselor who specializes in transforming your relationship with food and your body. Go to http://www.bodylovewellness.com/stay-in-touch/ to sign up for her newsletter and get your free download — Golda’s Top Ten Tips For Divine Dining.

Looking for more support with letting go of negative assumptions? Click here to sign up for your FREE Body Love Wellness Session.

Truth, Assumptions, & Everything In Between originally appeared on Body Love Wellness on April 19, 2010.

Asherah, Ancient Hebrew/Canaanite Goddess of Fertility & Renewal. Reprinted With Permission.

by Golda Poretsky, H.H.C.
www.bodylovewellness.com

Listen to the podcast of this post here:

Spring!  All Winter long you look forward to it.  You plan for it.  “As soon as the weather gets warmer, I’m going to go to the park all the time/rearrange the furniture in my apartment/ get new clothes/ never watch television again, etc. etc. etc.”

Then Spring comes and you feel kind of off.  Maybe you’ve got pollen allergies that knock you out.  Maybe the weather shift feels weirder than you expected. Maybe you find yourself getting angry at people or situations that hadn’t bothered you before.

Both of these seemingly contrary effects are part of the energy of Spring.  Spring is about newness, movement, and beginnings, but it’s also about clearing out the old as a way to transition into the new.

In Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), springtime is the time when your liver is particularly activated.  Although the liver has about a gazillion functions in the body and even more functions in terms of TCM, anyone who took high school biology could tell you that the liver helps to detoxify the body.  When detoxification in the body goes into high gear, it can lead to both physical symptoms (digestive issues, skin issues, fatigue) and emotional symptoms (anger & sadness).

I know.  It’s a bummer!  So what do we do about it?

As a holistic health practitioner, I’m all about supporting the body rather than suppressing symptoms.  So here are some great ways to support your body and mind to release that which it needs to release.

5 Ways To Support Your Transition Into Spring

1) Add In Healing Foods & Water — What foods to you associate with Spring?  Chances are, those foods will support you and your liver.  Baby greens and parsley help your body to cleanse and tonify.  Citrus fruits are also cleansing and give you added immune support.  Adding these fruits and vegetables to your meals and snacks can give your body the added boost it needs to transition in to the new season.  In addition, drinking water at this detoxifying time of year is particularly important.  If you don’t love drinking water (or even if you do) add some lemon juice and a little agave nectar to create a delicious and cleansing lemonade that you can drink all day.

2) Get Your Anger Out Of You –It may not always be a good idea to communicate your anger to others, but it’s not a good idea to keep it to yourself either.  And, being that it’s Spring, writing in a journal about it might not be enough.  Do what you can to move the anger out of your body.  You can do this consciously by dancing and singing along to an angry song, adding some martial arts moves to your workout, or punching a pillow.  (Warning, you may feel incredibly goofy doing any of those things, but trust me, it’s invigorating to physically move your anger.)

3) Try This Healing Herb — Milk thistle is one of my favorite herbs.  It supports the liver in a very gentle way. Take it as a tea (available at every health food store), tincture, or supplement.

4) Wear More Colors — In the past, as a New Yorker, I had adopted the black and gray uniform.  And while black and gray may seem solemn and energetically protective in Winter, once Spring rolls around it just feels terrible.  Experiment with colors.  Wear what you like.  It can change your mood immensely.

5) Be Gentle With Yourself  — Just because it’s Spring, you needn’t overwhelm yourself with all the things you had intended to do when Spring arrived. Take it easy.  Enjoy the new season with all of your senses.  Be gentle with yourself as if you were the tender bud of a soon-to-bloom flower.

As always, lay some comments on me and let me know how it goes!

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Golda Poretsky, H.H.C. is a certified holistic health counselor who specializes in transforming your relationship with food and your body. Go to http://www.bodylovewellness.com/stay-in-touch/ to sign up for her newsletter and get your free download — Golda’s Top Ten Tips For Divine Dining.

Looking for more support with intuitive eating and getting off diets? Click here to sign up for your FREE Body Love Wellness Consultation.

Spring Forward! — 5 Ways To Support Your Transition Into Spring originally appeared on Body Love Wellness on April 12, 2010.

by Golda Poretsky, H.H.C.
www.bodylovewellness.com

Listen to the podcast of this post here:

I struggled a bit with this week’s post.  I thought I might write about fatshion, or my issues with Jamie Oliver, or why I think the phrase “food addiction” is a problematic misnomer.

But instead, I’m going to talk about one of the most basic tenets of my work.  The fact that it is okay to be fat.

Think those words to yourself:  “It’s okay to be fat.”  How do you feel?  Do you feel more relaxed?  Do you think that might be true, but not for you?

I’m going to let you in on a little secret about the “war on obesity.”  There’s a lot of money in it.  There’s a $60 billion a year diet industry in the U.S. that banks on your hatred of your own body for its profits.  There are major pharmaceutical companies who want you to take their diet drugs until it catches on that they’re deadly so they can push the next diet drug on you.  There are doctors who make their livings in plastic and bariatric surgery who might have to go bankrupt if you, collectively, decided that it’s okay to be fat.  Even our own government might not be able to push shame and blame on to fat kids in an effort to divert attention from two ongoing, interminable wars if we all decided that it’s okay to be fat.

I’m not a conspiracy theorist by any means.  These are just facts that are in plain sight.  Diets don’t work.  They cause more problems than they seek to fix.  There are some benefits to being fat, just like there are some benefits to being thin.

There is no money in telling people that they can be happy just as they are.  There are no dangerous side effects, and no drugs to create to lessen those side effects.  All that there is is a peace found within, a deep knowing that you are valuable no matter what the scale might reflect back to you.

So knowing that it is okay to be fat, to look like you do, to move like you do, how might that change your life?  Remind yourself that it’s okay to be fat today, and let me know how it goes in the comment section below.

And I hope you will bring your hot, fat selves to my next Re/Dress NYC workshop: Attracting Love By Loving Your Body, Wednesday, April 7th! I would love to see you there!

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Golda Poretsky, H.H.C. is a certified holistic health counselor who specializes in transforming your relationship with food and your body. Go to http://www.bodylovewellness.com/stay-in-touch/ to sign up for her newsletter and get your free download — Golda’s Top Ten Tips For Divine Dining.

Looking for more support with intuitive eating and getting off diets? Click here to sign up for your FREE Body Love Wellness Consultation.

It’s Okay To Be Fat originally appeared on Body Love Wellness on March 29, 2010.

by Golda Poretsky, H.H.C.
www.bodylovewellness.com

Listen to the podcast of this post here:


In my workshop last week, one of the participants brought up the fact that she sometimes doesn’t like to eat leafy greens because they remind her too much of her dieting days.  Whenever she eats greens (salad in particular), she feels what she used to feel while dieting — restricted and annoyed, and even a phantom-like feeling of hunger.

How many of you can relate to that feeling?  I know I can!  When I first started working with the concept of intuitive eating, I felt like I was fighting a never-ending battle with a variety of food rules, even food rules that conflicted with one another.  I had spent significant portions of my life as an Atkins dieter, an Overeaters’ Anonymous member, a low carbohydrate vegetarian and a Weight Watchers’ points aficionado.  As you can imagine the Atkins part of me and the low carb vegetarian part of me had some things in common but highly disagreed with the Weight Watchers’ point keeper and the O.A. dieter!  Did I believe in low carb or low fat?  Was a scooped out bagel a good choice or a terrible one?  Was I overdoing the olive oil or should I slather it on?

And while I have come to terms with my diet rule demons, as a counselor who often talks about intuitive eating, I can run into some problems.  In my class last week, I started to talk about what foods were good to consider when you’re suffering from low energy, but whenever I talk about food in this way, I often have to work my way around my own fears of sounding like a Weight Watchers or O.A. leader.  Whenever I talk about leafy greens and added fiber and drinking adequate water,  I get a creepy feeling that I’m imposing food rules on my clients, even though I have no intention of doing so.  To me, I care more about how my clients actually feel when they eat certain foods than how they should feel or what they should be eating.

Diet rules impede intuitive eating because they stop you from connecting with your body’s wisdom.  Whether you’re confining your eating habits to old diet rules or avoiding food that reminds you of your dieting days, you end up being a slave to diets.  I’m sure that wasn’t (or isn’t) your intention if you’re breaking away from diets!

So here’s how to lose those diet rules…

1) Call Them Out! — Take a moment to write down all of the diet rules that still haunt you.  They may be conflicting, nonsensical, or sometimes sort of sensible.  Whatever they are, get them all out on paper.  Then decide if any are worth keeping.  Only keep the ones that really honor your body and its changeability – such as getting adequate water, eating some leafy greens here and there stuff like that.  Throw out any rules that limit the types of foods you can eat (unless you have allergies or other health concerns) and definitely toss the calorie and carb counting.

2) Listen To Yourself — We all have a voice within us that tells us what foods nourish us and advises us as to our hunger and fullness.  Note, we ALL have this voice.  Sometimes this voice has been stifled by pushy parents or diet rules or our emotional torment, but trust me, it is there.  Take steps to actively listen for this voice.  Honor it no matter how quietly it speaks.  If you think you heard it and turned out to be wrong, listen for it again tomorrow.  Trust me that it is safe to trust yourself.

3) Pay Attention — Notice which foods feel best to you.  Do you like a muffin and coffee in the morning or an apple and almond butter and tea?  Does it depend on how much sleep you got, how much stress you’re under?  What time of year it is?  Are comfort foods comforting sometimes and sometimes not so much?  Notice the effects on your energy levels.  Notice comfort and discomfort.

Continually repeat the above!

In truth, the only rule is that there are no rules.  You make the rules.  It’s okay to be heady with that power as long as you let your body lead the way.  And if you live in NYC and want some more support on intuitive eating, please join me for my next workshop: Heal & Transform Your Relationship With Food, Tuesday, March 23rd! I would love to see you there!

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Golda Poretsky, H.H.C. is a certified holistic health counselor who specializes in transforming your relationship with food and your body. Go to http://www.bodylovewellness.com/stay-in-touch/ to sign up for her newsletter and get your free download — Golda’s Top Ten Tips For Divine Dining.

Looking for more support with intuitive eating and getting off diets? Click here to sign up for your FREE Body Love Wellness Consultation.

How To Lose Your Diet Rules originally appeared on Body Love Wellness on March 22, 2010.

by Golda Poretsky, H.H.C.
www.bodylovewellness.com

Listen to the podcast of this post here:

Earlier this month, I attended a group led by one of my mentors, Rick Jarow. The group was comprised of more women than men, with an age range of about 30 to 80. As we passed a talking stick around the room, more than half of the attendees complained of feeling excessively tired this week.

I knew just how they felt, because just a few days prior, I had felt the same pull of lethargy and fatigue. For about 2-3 days I felt like staying in bed, watching mindless television, and ignoring as much responsibility as possible.

Can you relate to this?

In our society, being tired can be a source of shame or a badge of honor. Either way, it’s omnipresent. We work crazy hours, stay out late, spend nights watching television as minutes drift by. We wake up with coffee and drink more as the day goes on, we eat sugary stuff to keep us going, and spend millions of dollars on energy drinks and supplements in the hopes that we’ll make it through our day. In the end, we are left with burnt out adrenal glands and a nagging fatigue that dogs our lives.

I’m not writing this to blame you or anyone. Not at all. A lot of us are pressed with an array of commitments that seem to constantly grow and expand.

But what if we were to take a moment, just a short moment, to listen to our tiredness? What if we asked our tiredness what it was trying to tell us? What if we got into agreement with our tiredness, our right to be tired, and kind of went with it?

Last week, after fighting a losing battle with my tiredness for about a day, I decided to listen. And my tiredness was telling me a few things. It told me that I had had a few ups and downs that I needed to process and that my immune system was fighting something that could get worse if I didn’t rest a bit. I checked my Witches’ Datebook and saw that the moon was in its 4th quarter, a waning moon, which, traditionally, is a time for letting go, going within, and having more quiet time.

So I decided to listen to what my fatigue was telling me. I rescheduled one or two things. I took an extra day to get back to emails. I basically did the work I really had to do and set aside anything that didn’t feel nourishing or relaxing. I watched some silly television shows. I spent some time relaxing with creative visualization. I wrote in my journal.

And within about a day and a half, I felt like myself again. I had revived myself by trusting my body and acting on its messages.

In Romeo And Juliet, Romeo begins to swear his love to Juliet by swearing upon the moon. But she protests, “O, swear not by the moon, the inconstant moon/That monthly changes in her circled orb,/Lest that thy love prove likewise variable.” All subtext and literary criticism aside (and putting aside that Juliet, of course, is a fictional character) her distaste for the variability of the moon always irked me. The moon changes each night but she does so in an understandable rhythm. And just as the tides ebb and flow and the moon waxes and wanes, our bodies’ hormones ebb and flow and our energies wax and wane. Our bodies are more like the rivers than like the rocks, more like the oceans than like machines. The more we can respect the cycles and changes and needs of our bodies, the more we can move with the flow of our lives.

In other words, swear by the moon.  Or, trust your body.

So this week, ask your tiredness what it is asking of you, and act upon it. As always, please share your experiences in the comment section below.

Want to learn more about re-energizing your body?  Then click here.

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Golda Poretsky, H.H.C. is a certified holistic health counselor who specializes in transforming your relationship with food and your body. Go to http://www.bodylovewellness.com/stay-in-touch/ to sign up for her newsletter and get your free download — Golda’s Top Ten Tips For Divine Dining.

For more tips on how to increase your energy, join me for Re-Energize Your Body Simply & Naturally this Tuesday, March 16th!  Click here for more info.

Looking for more support with intuitive eating and getting off diets? Click here to sign up for your FREE Body Love Wellness Consultation.

Swear By The Moon originally appeared on Body Love Wellness on March 15, 2010.

by Golda Poretsky, H.H.C.
www.bodylovewellness.com

Listen to the podcast of this post here:

This week, I’m bringing back an oldy but a goody.  I hope you enjoy!

The subject of feelings is near and dear to my heart, as I spent many years as an attorney who was more likely to spend her evenings in her office than having fun. In those years, I honed a skill that many of us know all to well: hiding and ignoring my feelings.  I got so good at this that I only expressed emotion every once in a while, when a television ad with an adorable puppy would send me into torrents of tears.

Frankly, I thought I was nuts – but I wasn’t really. I’d just made no room in my life for an emotional reality, so my emotions would corner and overwhelm me.

I’ve since learned that acknowledging how I feel throughout the day allows me to enjoy the flow of my life and to stay in touch with my truth. Acknowledging how something makes me feel allows me to either change the situation or look at how I might feel better about it.

For example, if you have a friend who talks negatively about everyone and you find that being around that person makes you feel drained and annoyed, you can do a few things: (a) tell your friend how you feel, (b) spend less time with your friend, or (c) decide that you’re no longer going to let that person’s negativity affect you. However, if you never spent the time to acknowledge your feelings about this friend, you might never realize the variety of actions you could take.

Acknowledging your feelings is also a key component of breaking patterns you’ve been using to numb your feelings. For example, if you’re looking to disrupt a pattern of spacing out for hours and hours playing computer games or eating mindlessly, try stopping whatever you’re doing, taking a few deep breaths, and asking yourself, “How am I feeling?” “What am I avoiding?”

Once you’ve identified your feelings, try to actually feel them in your body. If you find that you’re feeling sad, maybe you just need to relax and cry or ask a loved one for a hug. If you’re feeling angry, you may need to tell someone how you feel or punch a pillow or yell at the top of your lungs for a minute. You may even find that once you’ve acknowledged the feeling it goes away, changes, or even reveals something else deeper and more important to you.

Whatever you are feeling is perfect and alright. You’re not too emotional and you’re not being unreasonable so there’s no need to judge yourself. You’re just feeling. Your emotions connect you to you, to your truth and to your desires.

Experiment with identifying your emotions throughout the week and notice how it affects your life.

Please share your experiences implementing this tip with me and the community by commenting below. Also, feel free to ask any questions.

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Golda Poretsky, H.H.C. is a certified holistic health counselor who specializes in transforming your relationship with food and your body. Go to http://www.bodylovewellness.com/stay-in-touch/ to sign up for her newsletter and get your free download — Golda’s Top Ten Tips For Divine Dining.

Golda’s Tuesday night classes start TOMORROW!  Click here to learn more or to register.

Looking for more support with intuitive eating and getting off diets? Click here to sign up for your FREE Body Love Wellness Consultation.

Don’t Forget To Feel Your Feelings originally appeared on Body Love Wellness on March 8, 2010.

Hello, dear readers! It’s good to be back! And just in time for Thanksgiving!

The holidays can bring up a lot of stuff. For some, it’s a joyous time of friends, fun, and delicious food. For others, it’s difficult and even traumatic. And of course, for many people, the experience of the holidays falls somewhere in between.

The messages we get about food around the holidays can be confronting as well as contradictory. You might have one relative who feels insulted when you don’t have seconds of their candied yams, and another relative who admonishes you for how much you’re eating. Even if you’re now an adult and family members don’t feel comfortable actually telling you what to eat, the holidays can bring up those feelings and experiences from childhood and cause you to relive them all over again.

I’m going to share a tip with you that is great to use at the holidays or any time when you’re getting contradictory information about what to eat. Sometimes the contradictory information is external (friends or relatives talking about what you should eat) or internal (diet rules from that cabbage diet you did five years ago getting in the way of what you need now).

This Thanksgiving, I want you to talk to yourself and treat yourself as a kindly parent would. This means that you ask yourself what you want to do in a situation, and then follow through and take care of it.
As an example, imagine you’re at Thanksgiving dinner. Your Aunt Sally is pushing you to try her pumpkin pie and your father is shooting you a “you had too much food already” glance. Aside from telling them both to shove it, what can you do? Using this tip, take a moment to ask yourself, in a kindly voice, if you would like more pie. Listen to the answer. It might be that you don’t want more pumpkin pie, but want more cake. It might be that you’re not hungry anymore. Or it might be something else. Listen to the answer and act upon it, knowing that you are doing what you want to do and you’ve made the best choice for you.

The goal of using this technique is to listen in to what you want to do by treating yourself with love. The point is not to pressure yourself into a decision. In fact, in the example above, you could tell your aunt that you’re not sure if you want more pie and want to take some time to see if you do.

This tip is also great to use if you have food allergies or other health concerns where eating what you think you want can be difficult. For example, when I eat wheat, my stomach gets upset and my skin gets itchy. One might think that that would be enough to keep me away from wheat, but I love bagels and bread with a love so fierce that I am loathe to speak of it. About 95% of the time, I’m able to avoid it by enjoying other foods and having the occasional gluten free English muffin. But it ain’t easy. So I use this technique often and recommend it to my clients often. For food allergies, I recommend using a loving voice and reminding yourself of why that food is problematic for you. In my case, I would think something like this, “Honey, I know you love bagels but remember how you feel when you eat them? You don’t want your stomach to hurt when you’re on the phone with your clients. What would you like to have instead?” And then I act on my internal response. Again, the point of this is to treat yourself with love. This technique reminds you that your health is important and that you are loved. You ask yourself lovingly what you need and then give it to yourself lovingly.

When you treat yourself with love by talking to yourself lovingly and acting lovingly, you’re better able to stay aware of your true needs and treat yourself in a healing manner.

As always, try this tip and let me know how it goes!

For other tips on getting through the holidays, check out these other tips on blessing your food, intuitive eating at parties, and taking in the sweetness of life.

By the way, we have lots of new and exciting offers at Body Love Wellness! Starting in less than 2 weeks, I’m teaching a 3 week teleclass to support you in your intuitive eating and body love journey. It’s only $60 for 3 classes!

And as always, let’s stay connected. Please stop by my Facebook group and become a member of the Body Love Wellness Group! You can also follow me on Twitter.

Have A “Food Coma” Free Thanksgiving originally appeared on Body Love Wellness on November 23, 2009.

Please join me for the Body Love Boost Teleclass this December!

Here’s what you get when you join us!

• Learn how to eat healthfully without dieting.
• Learn how to eat intuitively and connect with your body’s needs.
• Create a peaceful and stress free relationship with food and eating.
• Feel comfortable in your skin, no matter what the situation.
• Gain new confidence in yourself and your choices.
• Be as healthy as you can be, no matter what size you are.
• Be welcomed into a community of people who desire to create similar changes in their lives.
• Recordings of each class so that you can listen in whenever you’d like!
  

Body Love Boost Teleclass Is Starting Soon! originally appeared on Body Love Wellness on November 17, 2009.

by Golda Poretsky, H.H.C.
www.bodylovewellness.com

This is an oldy but a goody.  The Body Love Wellness Blog will be back next week with more new stuff!
 
Most of us have trouble staying present.  We’re either upset or focused on things that have already happened or worried about things that might happen in the future.  Writing out our desires allows us to envision a future that is different than the future we fear might happen.  It grounds us in the fact that the future has not happened yet and that it could be as wonderful as the breadth of our imaginations.

Writing out what you’re grateful for takes you to the present and re-envisions your past.  When you feel grateful for what you have, you ground yourself in the present moment and acknowledge all of the good that you’ve received.  Your list of “gratefuls” can be big or small.  You may even find that you’re grateful for experiences that were otherwise difficult.

To get you started on your “gratefuls” list, here are some examples of the diversity of things you could include.
1) I am grateful for my apartment that is so bright and sunny.
2) I am grateful for my friend Lisa for being such a good friend to me throughout my life.
3) I am grateful for my history degree because it helps me understand the world.
4) I am grateful for my pretty new scarf.
5) I am grateful for being laid off because I know that it is advancing me towards my real career goals.
6) I am grateful for my laptop for being so reliable.
7) I am grateful for the delicious sushi I had for lunch.
8) I am grateful for the car accident I had when I was 17 because it made me the safe driver I am today.
9) I am grateful for all the health difficulties I’ve had because they’ve led me to my passion for holistic healing.
10) I am grateful for the money in my bank account.

As you can see, your “gratefuls” can be about anything and everything.  You can write them or say them aloud or even just think them. They are especially helpful when you find yourself feeling depressed about the past or anxious about the future.  Thinking of everything that you’re grateful for is the key to staying present and opening yourself up to more and more good stuff! 

Try it right now and see how it makes you feel.  Comment below and share with us!  I would love to see your gratitudes!

Now that you’ve grounded yourself in the present, prepare for a better future by reading the Word of the Week, hope.

The Gratitude Attitude originally appeared on Body Love Wellness on November 16, 2009.

My Experiences Not Identifying Emotions

Feelings are a subject that’s near and dear to my heart, as I spent many years as an attorney who was more likely to spend her evenings at her desk than having fun. In those years, I honed a skill that many of us know all too well: hiding and ignoring my feelings. Well, that is, until every once in a while a television ad with an adorable puppy would send me into torrents of tears.

Frankly, I thought I was nuts – but I wasn’t really. I’d just made no room in my life for an emotional reality, so my emotions would corner and overwhelm me.

I’ve since learned that acknowledging how I feel throughout the day allows me to enjoy the flow of my life and to stay in touch with my truth.  Acknowledging how something makes me feel permits me either to change the situation or look at how I might feel better about it.

For example, if you have a friend who talks negatively about everyone and you find that being around that person makes you feel drained and annoyed, you can do a few things:
(a) tell your friend how you feel,
(b) spend less time with your friend, or
(c) decide that you’re no longer going to let that person’s negativity affect you. 

However, if you never spent the time to acknowledge your feelings about this friend, you might never realize the variety of actions you could take.

How To Apply This Tip In Your Life

Acknowledging your feelings is also a key component of breaking patterns you’ve been using to numb your feelings.  For example, if you’re looking to disrupt a pattern of spacing out for hours and hours playing computer games or munching mindlessly, try stopping whatever you’re doing, taking a few deep breaths, and asking yourself, “How am I feeling?” “What am I avoiding?”

Once you’ve identified your feelings, try to actually feel them in your body.  If you find that you’re feeling sad, maybe you just need to relax and cry or ask a loved one for a hug.  If you’re feeling angry, you may need to tell someone how you feel or punch a pillow or yell at the top of your lungs for a minute.  You may even find that once you’ve acknowledged the feeling it goes away, changes, or even reveals something else deeper and more important to you.

Whatever you are feeling is perfect and alright.  You’re not too emotional and you’re not being unreasonable, so there’s no need to judge yourself.  You’re just feeling.  Your emotions connect you to you, to your truth and to your desires.

Experiment with identifying your emotions throughout the week, and notice how that new-found identification affects your life!

Please share your experiences implementing this tip with me and the community by commenting below. Also, feel free to ask any questions.

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Feeling The Feeling of Feeling originally appeared on Body Love Wellness on November 9, 2009.