Day 11 - Conversational Awareness

Recap from Day 10 - 

Well, I got the trip put away and the walls completed, and then my 9 year old daughter came to me with an itchy head. Now, something to know about me, I have four kids: three daughters, one with curly hair, the other two with long, thick wavy hair and one son. When someone's head starts itching, I just cringe. We ended up spending the entire afternoon at the Nit Fairies. Three of us were treated for lice (yes, me included), one was declared lice-free and one has to have his head shaved. Hahaha!! The rest of the day was spent on containment and cleaning, washing sheets, sanitizing hair brushes and teddy bears. Needless to say, the rest of the kitchen cleanup was put on hold. BUT, I celebrate the wins of trip-put away, Wall Declutter and Lice containment!

Day 11 - Conversational Awareness

I've always been a very positive, optimistic person, in general, but when I began to look at what was going on in my head I realized how negative it was. And had been for as long as I could remember. Turns out I was repressing most of my negative feelings, and they were festering. I was diagnosed with depression while pregnant with my third child, and was on SSIs until just a year ago, when that child was 8 years old. I've tapered off the medication, and have been managing the depression myself for the last year.

So, how is my inner dialog going now? Well, lots of the time, I'm good. In my head, there's really only one person. When I'm calm, the inner self-talk stays pretty calm. It's my mother's voice usually. In the past when I've been really anxious, I can actually hear clear as day my mother's voice telling me that I've already failed. I don't even think my mom ever said those words to me. It's the strangest thing.

But today...
I was challenged to answer... Who is it? What is it saying? Take notice of one conversation that you're having in your head and the result that it is having in you. How does it make you feel? What does it make you do?

So today, I was trying to figure out what to eat for lunch. As I stood in the kitchen looking in the fridge, the kids asked for their lunch. I started making them lunch instead. I made a couple of ham sandwiches, a peanut butter and jelly, cut up some apples, put out some pita chips and hummus. By the end of all that, the last thing I wanted to do was make myself lunch. So I sat in front of the fridge yet again wondering what to eat and my inner voice started to freak out. "What do I eat? What can I eat? I'm not supposed to eat that, I'm not supposed to eat this, what was Shawn Stephenson saying about water on that podcast I listened to again? what kinds of grains am I supposed to stay away from again? am I allowed to eat the skin on the chicken? Oh, shoot, I meant to make a broth out of those chicken bones. That's what I should do, pick the rest of the chicken so that I can make broth. But I can't start doing that now, because we're supposed to pick up that friend as soon as her hair cut is finished and bring her home...." and it went on and on. The next thing I know, I'm standing in front of the eclipse cake my daughter made a few days ago with a fork in my hand working on my second slice. So, I guess I felt out of control, and feeling out of control or confused makes me turn to sugar and "comfort" foods that don't bring me much comfort.

Lisa says that "self talk is not only influencing your life experience, it's creating your life experience", so I need to be paying more attention to what that self talk is and how it's affecting me. When it's illuminating something negative, acknowledge it, and agree, yes, it's a problem area. Even write it down if I want. But don't focus on it. Focus on something positive. Focus on how it will look or be or feel when its taken care of... "Feed yourself healthy dialog that is going to infuse your future with hope and faith."

In the spirit of acknowledging the negative... I acknowledge that stress, out of control feelings and confusion lead me to make poor choices in my nutrition. This is a problem area, and through this process with Lisa, as well as my 6 week "The Fat Code" program that I'm starting soon (thank you, Shawn Stephenson), I have a plan to nip this in the butt.

So, my something positive.... I am working through my personal transformation, along side the great Lisa Nichols and fantastic Shawn Stephenson, creating a happier and healthier me in 100 days. I am keeping accountable through this blog, my personal Freedom Journal and my family. I will create a happier healthier me by 1 - putting in place a solid nutrition plan personalized for my body's individual metabolic rate and sensitivities and 2 - consistently incorporating healthy self-care rhythms such as movement, sleep and prayer time into my daily life resulting in 3 - losing 20 pounds, beating depression for good, reducing stress and brain fog and increasing my libido.

Oh, and on the kitchen front, I will post some pictures tomorrow, but the walls look great. ;-)