A new path on my journey

I had a long talk with one of my friends who suggested that I return to blogging as a way to record my journey along my weight-loss path. I had started to write a daily food journal on DWLZ but after a few days it felt very uncomfortable because the entire journey I am taking is to become a "normal" eater - and what normal eater logs every morsel that goes into his/her mouth? (And besides Dotti would have to increase her bandwidth 10% to accommodate me! lol) I could ask a normal eater at 4PM what s/he had for breakfast or what s/he had for lunch yesterday, and I guarantee you that unless s/he is tracking some sort of food plan in his/her head s/he won't remember. What I need is more of an exploration journal and less of a food journal. So here I am back again, but with a definite direction and inspiration.

For a couple of years now I have been moving toward a more spiritual way of approaching not just my life in general, but eating, in particular. It seems to me that there has to be something more than just the frantic efforts at weight loss that will actually move me towards PERMANENT weight loss. In my very first entry on this blog I listed all the different diets I had followed at various times in my life, and I ended up feeling very comfortable with the South Beach way of eating. A further step in that process is the "Eat-Clean" way of eating. I have found over the past few months that it is the most fulfilling and natural way of eating. The step beyond South Beach that it takes is the elimination of artificial ingredients. But, other than that, they are virtually the same (as far as I can see) and I have been cooking out of both cookbooks and eating from both view points.

However, I have taken the biggest step of all. This past weekend I have made the decision to stop drinking diet soda. (I haven't given up the carbonation though - I have switched, for now, to flavored sparkling spring water... maybe when I can take the next step I will switch to "just" water.) I felt that I couldn't be true to my journey unless I was willing to stop putting so much poison (in the form of aspartame, saccharin, etc.) into my body. What am I to do with the six pack of large bottles of diet Pepsi in my trunk? lol I have a girlfriend who drinks gallons of diet Pepsi - she's in for a surprise when she gets my stock!

This is the direction I am taking (eating clean) but what about my inspiration? I have been reading the Tao te Ching for a couple of years now. In actuality, it is 81 pages and can be read in an afternoon. So maybe I should say studying instead of reading (well I actually have been reading the Tao of this and the Tao of that - lol - many creative people have found the Tao - which means the way or the path - has clarified their approaches to things) . I may have talked about this in an earlier blog, but just to introduce it again: The Tao te Ching was written by Lao-tzu, a contemporary of (but much older than) Confucius. It is a book of 81 verses, and has been translated and published only second to the Bible. The verses offer guidance for a balanced life. Because returning to health (and then living in health) requires balance, it seemed to me that instead of making myself crazy counting and measuring and writing (be it "Points," calories, grams, etc.) that it would be more prudent, in the long run, to calm down, and accept the wisdom of a natural balance, with all the goodness that this great earth's food can offer me.

I see the direction and inspiration for this blog coming from looking at each verse and seeing how it applies to my life with regard to the balance necessary to return to health. There are some verses that are very perfect and obvious, such as Verse 9: "To keep on filling is not as good as stopping. Overfilled, the cupped hands drip, better to stop pouring." (There are many translations of the Tao de Ching - I don't have my books with me and so cannot here ascribe it to the translator - but I will come back and edit this post when I have the correct translator.) This resonates so deeply with the "stop eating when you are full" instructions that so many dieters are terrified of. They have eaten according to external cues for so many years they do not know how to trust themselves... but I digress. I was saying that some verses jump out as directly having to do with dieting, but I think to approach this journey correctly (well, correctly for me) I would like to just start at Verse 1, and spend a few days living it and relating it to my weight-loss journey.

This idea comes directly from Wayne Dyer's "Change Your Thoughts Change Your Life - Living the Wisdom of the Tao." He did just this. He deliberately lived the Tao for a full year, taking one verse at a time, and living it for four days. I have always had great respect for his writings up to this point - but in following his work since the writing of this book, I have to say that he moved to the next level in all respects. So FOR NOW (we know how things change) I would like to try this on for size for myself.

One last thing I want to share with regard to why I feel I need to make this shift from dieting to just being: There is a quote from Carl Gustav Jung that can explain it more than my own words: "Thoroughly unprepared, we take the step into the afternoon of life. Worse still, we take this step with the false presupposition that our truths and our ideals will serve us as hitherto. But we cannot live the afternoon of life according to the program of life’s morning, for what was great in the morning will be little at evening and what in the morning was true, at evening will have become a lie." Dieting was the morning of my life. I am ready to move on to my evening.

So tomorrow will start my plunge into the Tao. Don't worry though - I'll still share great recipes, and fun stuff! lol I have the feeling though, I'm in for quite a ride!

Samida