The Fullness of Purpose

I am sitting here in my comfy chair with my little netbook near my belly, pondering its achy-ness. My relationship to food continues to irritate, perplex and, most recently, inspire me.

I’m finally reading Women Food and God by Geneen Roth. My first reaction to seeing the book on the bestseller shelf at Village Books nearly two years ago was positive. Then, as I opened it up and viewed more of the widely spaced text on each page, my faithful (faithless?) ego stepped in and stopped me from going any further.

A few days ago I found myself suddenly reinspired to pick up a copy. Thrilled to have an excuse to scoot on over to my new favorite secondhand bookstore after work, I popped in and inquired as to whether it was in stock. Success!

Successive successes followed as I perused the first pages of Roth’s latest book. It’s the first of hers I’ve read. I learned quickly that Ms. Roth follows the Diamond Approach taught by my teacher’s teacher and that she gleans wisdom from my parents’ guide Steven Levine. With newly inspired trust, I read on.

I’ve honestly been obsessing over my relationship to food since sixth–make that third grade. Oddly, during both times I was [un]inspired in my eating habits by one particular female peer who I will call “Sheila.”

When I was 8 years old, I literally remember hiding under a classroom table with Sheila and whispering about the fact that all she would eat that day were the apple slices in a ziplock baggie she clutched in one hand. At age 11, I recall the two of us feasting proudly on carrot sticks and ranch dressing, and later doing stretches on her back porch and evaluating our thighs.

It makes me sad to recall and share these stories, yet I also recognize the opportunity to let old demons go and possibly gain new perspective.

One thing I’m getting from reading Geneen Roth’s book is that most of us humans feel deficient in some way and that we clamber for a means to fill up our hollowness. Of course, for the majority of her audience the means to anticipated fullness is food.

That describes me so far, and makes me curious as to my own deficiency. What’s going on that leads me to eat when I’m not always hungry and look forward to food with seriously exaggerated anticipation?

I have about a million answers to that question bumping around in my head right now with “fear of dying” floating right near the top–but I won’t go that deep just yet.

It seems to me that in ten-year-old Tessa’s eyes, the opportunity she saw in paying rapt attention to food was to become somebody she felt good about. More importantly, it gave her a goal.

It feels pathetic to admit that and this: I have the most doggonned darned wretched time creating real goals for myself even now. The result? I walk aimlessly all the time all day long because I do not know where I am going. Now if that’s not something feel deficient about, I’m not sure what is.

The good news? In reading Women, Food and God I am experiencing an influx of insight, ya-hoo!, and finally waking up to the way I eat and why. I tell you, it is so much easier to go easy on myself now that I am beginning to understand my own motives. Compassion is actually setting in!

I’ll celebrate that breakthrough for now and begin making goals in the meantime. I suppose getting back on this blog is a good place to start. Thanks for reading.