perfect timing

Last Tuesday I started a diet.

Those are words I'm pretty sure you've never read here before. One, I am not a big dieter. And two, I'm not a big one to share that type of stuff on my blog. Yet, I will share that with you because this time I feel a real committment and even an excitement about it and also because an interesting thing happened last Friday.

Last Friday I was overcome with the need to binge. I used to be a real binge-er. A fear of throwing up kept me from becoming a bulemic in high school, but it seemed that nothing could keep me from the binge.

For those of you who've never been a binge-er, the need to binge can literally take over you. It becomes overwhelming, all consuming. You can feel like -- not like you might die, but more like you might not continue to live -- if you can't binge.

My bingeing probably peaked in my early twenties, but it has reared its ugly head here and there over the years since then. I've learned that dieting -- restricting the amounts of food I am intending to eat -- invites the need to binge. However, it had been so long since I had binged -- or needed to or whatever -- that I had kind of forgotten that it could be a problem. Or even what it felt like.

So, Friday late afternoon/early evening when the binge need began to take over my thoughts and become this all encompassing, overwhelming focusneeddrivepurpose, I decided to just go for it. Just do it. Not have a mental judgment day against myself, not call out the discipline police or whatnot, and just give in.

So I did. And you know what? It wasn't that bad. I didn't go that overboard. The need was quenched; I didn't eat that much; I didn't feel so crazy or out of control. I didn't really watch what I ate the rest of the weekend, but I didn't go so out of bounds either.

Anyway, I share all of this because it did bring up a few ponderings. One, when you are in the middle of that type of momentum, it can be difficult to think that you actually have control over the situation. Or that you can ever change. Or that you have a choice. It can, in fact, feel as though you are obeying a whole nother master who is quite more powerful or ferocious than you could ever meet face-to-face in a dark alley.

And I began to think of that, because, as a student of Buddhist thought, I know that's not true.

I know that my thoughts aren't reality. I know that somehow I do not have to be a slave to impulse, to cravings, to emotions, to opinion or to my habitual patterns. It's all just.... a habit.... a tool that my crazy mind has created. Something that actually makes me feel safe and secure and protected, despite the fact that it is bad for me.

And I realized this morning, I might be strong enough, or even just open enough to being present the next time that happens. Showing up, emotionally. Not backing down. Not being afraid. Not buying into this notion that life may not continue if I don't stuff my face right this minute.

These are the things I've been pondering this morning. And then, beautifully, sereptitiously, the following was delivered to my email inbox:

How hard it can be to turn our attention within! How easily we allow our old habits and set patterns to dominate us! Even though they bring us suffering, we accept them with almost fatalistic resignation, for we are so used to giving in to them. We may idealize freedom, but when it comes to our habits, we are completely enslaved.

Still, reflection can slowly bring us wisdom. We may, of course, fall back into fixed repetitive patterns again and again, but slowly we can emerge from them and change.

— Sogyal Rinpoche

Light bulb. Aha. Oh yeah. And thank god.

It's not that I need to judge my habitual pattern as good or bad. It's more to just remember that I've grown out of it. I don't need it. And I don't need to respond to it as if it rules my life.

Baby steps. I'm really excited about changing my ways to a more healthy body -- lean and strong -- and it'll be interesting to watch these little self-sabateurs make their appearances throughout the process. I think the only response is to pat them on the head, say oh yes, I remember you. Pull up a chair, but you are no longer the ringmaster here anymore.