Back when I was a teen in the throes of my eating disorder, I often despaired that I wasn’t an alcoholic instead of a compulsive binger and exerciser. I lamented not being able to simply stop eating, swearing off food and all the decisions it required of me. Or pills, I thought, that would be okay too. I could stop taking meds forever. But no, my addiction revolved around food, the second most important ingestible to my survival.
Today, however, I am thankful for my history with food. I can see that by learning to negotiate outings, desserts, rest-stop snack options and all the emotions and anxiety they conjure, I have grown. I see that the beauty of my struggle lies not in denying myself certain experiences, but in learning to be in relationship with them.
This rush of gratitude came on the heels of hearing a classic Chinese Zen tale about an old woman who graciously housed a monk on her property. After many years of witnessing his austere practices and delivering a daily meal to his hut, the woman one day decided to send a beautiful maiden in her place, instructing the girl to embrace the monk very warmly before leaving his hut. Later, the old woman questioned the monk about the test, asking how the girl’s warm body felt pressed against his. The monk replied, “like a withering tree in the winter”. With that, the crone cursed the religious man, called him a fraud and kicked him off her land, very angry he had learned nothing in all that time.
This story hits home to me in a very visceral way. As I continue mindfulness studies and exploration, I am beginning to understand that spirituality in no way requires perfection or shutting off a part of ourselves like the monk in the tale. Instead, spiritual growth is entrenched in humanness. Humans respond to beautiful young bodies, just like they respond to warm loaves of banana bread fresh from the oven. Human bodies make all sorts of gloriously sticky messes and human minds make all sorts of holy and elaborate mistakes in their never ending quest to seek positive feelings and avoid negative ones.
The art of being a spiritual human is not to not be tempted, to not make mistakes or to not feel uncomfortable, sad or fearful. The art of being human is to feel all those things, but to know deeply, at the same time, that all is okay, even if the physical body is in distress, the emotions are overwhelming or the ego is begging for something that could potentially be dangerous.
Had I been an alcoholic like I’d once wished, perhaps life would have been more cut and dry, a little more black and white. Perhaps I would have learned much quicker how to deal with difficult emotions once cut off from the bottle. Or perhaps that learning curve would have been too steep and those I love would have had much bigger and more painful repercussions to deal with as a result of my addiction. Luckily, that was not the case, and luckily, having to navigate the world of consumption has provided me ample opportunity to learn, grow and pay attention to my body and its messages, though they haven’t always been so obvious.
With time, binging morphed into limiting calories. (Who has time and energy to run all those miles to burn them?) Restriction eventually led to avoiding hunger. Grasping for a feeling of ideal satiation led to hoarding nuts like a squirrel. A high-fat diet eventually led to an angry gall-bladder. And this sensitive organ now speaks to me very clearly about my food choices, my increasing tolerance and my physical and mental health.
What a ride!
Different than the monk living in isolation and deprivation, my journey with addiction has allowed me to transform while also staying connected to the world, to my body and to the people I commune with over food and drink.
And the journey continues.
Lately it is providing me insight regarding more general discomfort and pain. I have discovered I can go hours without eating and be okay. I have realized I can be really hungry and be okay. Surprisingly, I can be very full and be okay too. And the beauty lies in these discoveries seeping out of my food world and into my emotional life. I am finding that I can be angry and be okay. I can be sad and be okay. I can be confused and overwhelmed and be okay. I can even disappoint others and be okay. I do not have to stuff the feelings with food, purge the feelings with exercise or completely lose my shit to shake up overwhelming emotion. I can pause and ground my body by sensing the breath in my belly and the weight of gravity holding me securely to the earth. By tuning in and paying attention, I can perceive information the body gives me about my experience, which is vital, as the body seems to know long before the mind can comprehend.
For this growth I am grateful for my complicated, yet slowly simplifying relationship with food as well as for my yoga practice, which teaches me time and again how to return to my corporeal home, physical proof of my humanness and glorious gateway to the spiritual.
Namaste. Cheers. And buen provecho.