Spring Awakening!

Sunday was the first day of spring and what a wonderful God given day it was! Spring is such an empowering time as new life begins all around us in nature. And what a delightful way to begin anew inside each of us. How can you use this time to re-connect to the Being-ness inside of you? How can the life affirming changes happening all around you right now help you to take that first step towards losing the weight and obtaining and maintaining your ideal body? Remember, a flower doesn't bloom all at once. A tiny bud appears and through careful nurturing and tenderness, it opens it petals and blossoms forth up and out into the sunshine. Look to your village to help support you. Look to your Being-ness to help guide and nurture you. Here's a few quotes I like:

...there is no rose garden without manure!  

We can let our lives be directed by the same force that makes roses bloom--or we can do it ourselves!

And from Anais Nin:

There came a time when the risk to remain tight in the bud
was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.


A new post tomorrow: The Donkey and the Well—A Fable.

Happy Spring!!! 

The Person in the Mirror

I was recently working with a group of people who were struggling with emotional overeating. One woman who was part of the group had recently lost her son to a long illness. The stress was visible on her face and her body. At one point, after some time, I held up a mirror and said, “Look in the mirror and say I want to get to know me.” She said, “ I can’t.” The tears flowed.

“I know exactly how you feel,” I said. We find it so difficult to just look at ourselves, to look into our eyes. When we do, we see all the fears and anxieties surrounding our lives. But that’s exactly when you need to pick up that mirror and look straight in your eyes. We all need to pick up the mirror and say “I want to get to know you. I don’t want to fight anymore. I really want to be there for you. I’m here for you. You’re not alone. You can do whatever you want to do. You must answer all your heart’s desires. You’re right where you’re meant to be.”

To become is to release; release which allows your being-ness to come through. You can start to find the love for you. And believe me, it’s life changing when you do.

The password to peace is thank you. Whatever happens in your life, think of it as a pathway for growth and give thanks.

Today, look in the mirror and say, “Hello. I’m here for me.”

It Takes a Village

When we’re confronted with addiction challenges, oftentimes we feel we must do it alone. Whether it’s shame, embarrassment or any other reason, we approach our healing like a lone hiker climbing to the top of the highest peak. The path to recovery looms above us seemingly unattainable.

Let me tell you right now that recovery TAKES A VILLAGE!

I can tell you from experience that my recovery has taken a village i.e.; seminars, workshops, 12-steps, therapist, self help book, cd’s, coaches, church, gym, nutritionist, commercial weight loss programs, doctor, lawyer, Indian chiefs! Anything that helped close the gap between me and God, so I am not stuffing the gap with food. Without my village there is no way I could have gone from Obesity Survivor to Obesity Thriver and from Cancer Survivor to Cancer Thriver. How else could I have maintained my healthy body weight and undergone 5 cancer-related surgeries this past year and not put on a hundred pounds! Thank God for the village I have built up around me.  I am just a villager surrounded by an extended family of caring and helpful people. The very first step in creating your village is simply reaching out.

So today ask yourself, who’s in my village?

March 6 Workshop! "When It's On The Plate It's Way Too Late!"

I’m so excited about my newest workshop that I wanted to share it with you!
When It's On The Plate, It's Way Too Late! ~Flipping Your Thoughts to Weight Loss!

I have such a passion for helping people who are seeking freedom from the food and who want to regain the power of choice. 

Here's a little info below in case you know of anyone who could benefit from attending;

When It's On The Plate, It's Way Too Late! ~Flipping Your Thoughts to Weight Loss!
Saturday March 6, 2010 in Studio City.  $20

This workshop with Tele-series is a hands on how to win the battle emotional eaters suffer--I teach people how-to-stop canceling themselves out.  Take their power back in the moment, make peace with ourselves and our emotions, and stop allowing our insecurities and emotions to hi-jack our lives by ending up face down in a plate of food. Stop repeating the past; diets that don’t work, relapses that continue to hammer close the lid on our dreams.  I teach you the techniques that keep you connected to your power of choice and you will discover and experience that learning and being trained in this technique has plucked your pocket for your compulsion to emotionally overeat.  You will find that the drive to emotionally overeat has faded to the background and the real you is now living up and out front!! What a thrill it is to live this way!!!

Hope you will come to the workshop and sign-up also for the tele-series that follows. (The introductory rate of $20.00 per person is a no-brainer. It would be like working with me when I first started my coaching practice!)

Please register at the link below and please help me help others by keeping this email and flyer circulating to those people that you think could benefit from my experience. 

When It's On The Plate, It's Way Too Late! ~Flipping Your Thoughts to Weight Loss!
Saturday March 6, 2010 in Studio City

Register Now~
coachcherie.com/events.php

Hope to see YOU there! Let's stay in touch on Facebook and Twitter!

Blessings always to YOU!

~Cherie

P.S. Please help me help others by keeping this email circulating to those people that you think could benefit from my experience.

Flipping Your Thoughts

I want___________ equals the first thought.

They/Them (Thought, Having, Emotional, Madness) say ___________. This equals the second thought.

Let me explain. I tell myself I want love in my life. That’s the first thought. But T.H.E.M. comes along and says no; you don’t deserve love.  That’s the second thought. A thought that is having/experiencing emotional madness.

If we stay focused on the second thought, then we go into “Circular Thought Thinking.” You know that voice that chatters on and on—spinning—inside of our brain.  Sometimes it gets so loud, I’m sure everyone can hear it. So in order to stop those thoughts, the feelings, the fear, we have to eat. We eat to stop the cycle of feelings those thoughts have stirred up inside of us.

We wouldn’t emotionally overeat if we weren’t afraid of our thoughts. Just writing this makes me want to get up from my desk and do something to stop thinking. I’m so afraid of my thoughts the very question makes me want to bolt.

But if I’m afraid of my own thoughts, does that mean I’m afraid of me? You? God? Life?

I know I must deny this urge in me. I tell myself to settle down. Just sit and be with me. Sometimes just sitting and allowing myself to “feel” my thoughts is the most difficult thing I will do today.  If I can commit to not run for just this moment, I can feel my way out to a better feeling, to a thought that holds peace. I tell myself to stop. Just sit and be with me. Go towards that thought that holds peace. Re-connect to my being-ness.

When we’re in this space, we have to learn to flip the thought. Pry it loose with a spatula and get up under it carefully. Need help? Grab a spoon and scoop it out. Treat it gently so it doesn’t break apart. Get yourself into a position where you can hold on to your intention. Focus on the end result.

I know that when I betray myself, my thoughts, I have to eat. And eat. And eat. My message to you is to guard your thoughts and their results. Guard your thoughts like your money. Like your life. Like your loved ones. It’s that important.

The most fundamental law is that of cause and effect. As emotional overeater’s we’re told that it’s the food we put in our mouths that causes the weight gain. It’s our body that creates the problem. But the body can’t create anything without the mind. The cause is the 95% that is on the plate in our mind; the other 5% is the plate of food sitting on the table.  It’s T.H.E.M. that leads us to seek out the nearest fast food restaurant or convenience store to quiet the pot of boiling thoughts inside.

Tell T.H.E.M. that you want your power back; you refuse to let your emotions be hijacked anymore.

Next week: When it’s Okay With You, It’s Okay With Everybody

Looks Right and Feels Wrong versus Looks Wrong and Feels Right

I want to go back to a concept that I wrote about earlier. For those of us who are waging war with emotional overeating or other addiction, it’s usually because we’ve spent a lifetime living from our human-ness rather than our being-ness. Why is that?

As I mentioned, it’s very easy to teach a child not to trust their feelings, to trust that what they’re feeling is real and true. Children hear from their parents, their teachers, even their peers that they’re not good enough, or not as pretty as the other little girl, not as smart as your brother. We’re taught that the feelings and fears we’re having, whether they’re coming from a specific source or not, is false and not real. So as adults, we naturally won’t trust that what we’re feeling is real and in need. Our inner voice pops up and repeats all those hurtful things we heard as a child. We trust what other people say and we seek validation from them. We learn to please She, He, It, Them. I know when I’m tethered to She, He, It and Them, then they have all the power. And they have the power to make me feel good about myself--and feel bad about myself. And when I give them the power, I turn to stuffing myself with three pizzas and 6-8 candy bars.

When I work with people, I ask them: “Do you do what feels wrong and looks right or what looks right and feels wrong?” As children, we’re reinforced to do what looks right and feels wrong. Play the part everyone else wants you to play. But deep inside you know it just doesn’t feel right.

When those feelings arise ask yourself, should I go with what looks right and feels wrong? Or should I live from that gut feeling where my power emanates—from my being-ness. It may look right but you know inside it feels wrong. And you know sure as the sun shines that society will tell you, “go with what looks right.”

But what about when it “looks wrong and feels right?” “Do I trust my feelings or what others say?” I say trust what your heart and soul says. Stop the chatter and re-connect to your being-ness. Ask yourself who’s having this conversation here? Who has to live with the decisions I make?

Intense training negates instinct and because of the intense training we received as children, we negate our inner, true feelings. Learning to live from our being-ness requires re-training.

So rather than turning to the food, take the risk and go inside and feel what you’re feeling. And know that if you feel one little uncomfortable feeling and you don’t die, you can experience another painful feeling and know that you’re not going to die. Starting with baby steps you can begin to build a healthy foundation from which to live.

The battle is won or lost in our minds, not on the plate. Lose the mental weight to lose the physical weight. Go with what feels right.

Next week: Flipping Your Thoughts