Should I Eat the Cookie?

On an online question and answer forum, where people pose questions to the entire web audience, I noticed that someone had asked (essentially), “Should I eat the cookie?”

The number and variety of responses alone was enlightening. It was like reading a transcript of all the voices that compete for my attention when I ask myself that very same question. Eating the cookie can become a debate by committee.

After reading most of the long list of answers, I mused at the number of people vying to offer the “right” answer, knowing that none of the responses would ever be the “right” one.  When the debate begins in my head, I’m often searching for that illusive “right” choice. I’ve been around long enough to know that such a thing does not exist.

The answer to “Should I eat the cookie” is completely irrelevant, because the question itself is the only wrong thing in this scenario.  Why is the question not: Am I hungry?  Do I want the cookie?  Can I afford the cookie?  Is the cookie fresh?

“Should I eat the cookie?” encompasses all of those questions, but it also masks all of them.  When “Should I eat the cookie?” is the question, eating the cookie becomes a test—something that will determine whether we or our decisions are good or bad. 

When we ask, “Should I eat the cookie?”, we bury all of the questions listed above under a moral debate.  However, I tend to think that we aren’t as concerned with burying those questions as the questions we’re more ashamed to ask, like:

Will others approve of me eating the cookie? Will this cookie lead to five more cookies?  Would a “healthy” person eat this cookie? Would a “good” person eat this cookie? Am I a good person?

Instead of hiding the questions you want to ask, siphon through the ones that come to mind. Ask the appropriate questions.  Ask the questions that matter, and don’t hide behind “shoulds.” Admit to the hidden questions and move past them to answer the most important ones: Am I hungry?  Do I want the cookie?

Eating or not eating a cookie does not determine your worth. If the decision of whether to eat it is not a simple one for you, use the choice as an opportunity to ask yourself, “What am I hungry for?  What do I really want?”  The answer often isn’t food…  even though sometimes it is ;)

Perspective for a Better Day

The difference between a good day and a bad day for me is sometimes as simple as this:

On a bad day, I constantly wonder how I'm going to make it through.

On a good day, I know I will make it through and that the adventure is watching how it happens.

Uncovering the Color

I just want to add one more thing about painting today.

At one point during the painting process, I covered everything in black. This was a heartbreaker at first. I’d spent so much time on the color work and decided to cover it up. It seemed so morbid and wrong.

But as I painted on the black, I recognized a persistence of color. I took my fingers and scratched at the canvas. The colors reappeared in all their vibrance, peeking through the dark overlay. It looked fantastic. I couldn’t believe it. Even the black itself wasn’t really black. It was a glossy, purpley mix of everything underneath.

That final creation—vibrant color peeking through black and gray, embodies much of what I’m about. I believe in the power of darkness to drive us to new heights of life and light. I believe that we each hold massive amounts of color and joy within us, but it must be uncovered. Life is not only growing and adding and finding new color. It is revealing the color that already exists within us, and that color is part of the darkness. Black is actually EVERY color combined. It’s not an empty thing. It holds everything. It holds all possibility.

Also, about covering up the color: Is the color worthless if no one sees it? Or does it create form and texture that the painting would lack without it? The artist wouldn’t have gotten to the final purple-black finish without all the color beforehand.

I understand Rothko’s chapel paintings a little more now. Endless color rests beneath the dark finish. And even though I’m curious and wish he’d unleashed the color to the world, at least I know that the color exists.

With Rothko, though, I wonder if he got to the point where he couldn’t see beyond the mass of color that turned to black. He couldn’t separate all the color he saw into different pieces. I wonder if, in a way, he might have been trapped inside the mix of color. He couldn’t make sense of it and so felt he had to leave us (committing suicide).

It isn’t bad to feel confused or dominated or overwhelmed by the colors and thoughts and ideas of the world and within ourselves, but it does make it more difficult to cope with life. That is the curse of the artist: a million ideas. What do we do with them? And when we do something with them, the onlookers tend to critique them to death.

What’s more, the thing we as artists create rarely if never fully expresses the idea within. Artists who can accept this and the reinterpretation of their own ideas by others thrive. Those who obsess over getting across EVERY nuance or who feel shot down when their ideas are interpreted in an unsatisfactory way have a much more difficult time.

I want to accept my thoughts and the thoughts of others. I’d like to have a conversation with uncomfortable ideas instead of immediately shoving them away. I want to recognize that everything holds color. It all shines, even the darkness.

Curiosity is key. I want to investigate what might live under the surface of things. I want to scratch away the black until I see that the black has a purpose, too.

I Could Write about Anything

Recovery is NOW. Happiness is NOW. These are the words I’m thinking…now. I can choose to behave in a totally new way at any moment. Life is open and free. Why do I often deny it?

I feel called to live a non-traditional life. Frankly, a life that would be “traditional” in my eyes is too difficult—impossible really. Even though I do believe that anything is possible, I don’t particularly care if the traditional life is achievable. I don’t want it. In fact, it would do me good just to take the prospect off my plate.

Let’s face it, I like to stand out a bit. Why would I wear scarves of every color and necklaces bigger than my face if I didn’t want some recognition!? Something in me is screaming, “This is not how it has to be!” And it isn’t. Life can be whatever we make it.

Of course, the kind of options that reality implies are not so inviting to a decision-phobe. “You mean, I can do ANYTHING I want?” I question. “Really?”

Yes! Anything. I can believe anything I want, do anything I want, think anything I want. Sure, there may be financial or geographical limitations, but the insurmountable boundary is rare (if not nonexistent). With a little ingenuity and the universe on our side, all truly is possible.

This means that when I feel bored with my life (as I have felt lately), I can choose to do something new. I can get out of the rut. It is possible. Working so hard to maintain a “regular” job or an “acceptable” body or a “reasonable” schedule wears me out! I cannot bear the pressure of having to portray a “normal” sort of lifestyle, sexuality, spirituality, fashion sense, ethics, or ideology. Of course, the “normal” I strive after is simply a construction I’ve made to drive me and only me insane. I wouldn’t hold anyone else to these ideals, but somewhere along the way, they were planted in my psyche.

I feel comfortable that what I am doing now will result in the fulfillment of those ideals, but I don’t want those ideals anymore! However, at this point, I’ve grown so attached to my safe routines that I fear releasing them. Nonetheless, I know that getting out of these unfulfilling routines simply requires that I try a few new things and break those routines a little bit. Now, if my feelings about my boredom and the solution are so obvious, why don’t I get out of the rut?

Ah, the eternal conundrum. Even though I have a pretty fierce love/hate relationship with most of the biblical Paul's writings, he was just another human being (despite sainthood), and I completely commiserate with his line in Romans 7:15, “I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.” Can anyone else with various addictions relate? I think some of you might, and probably practically every “normal” person out there, too.

How many times have each of us participated in behaviors that we do not want? Through therapy (or plain common sense), most of us learn that we practice those behaviors because part of us DOES want to do them. I engage in self-destructive patterns because part of me believes that they are helping me, because they enable me to somewhat express something I do not know how to express another way.

What is the key to breaking the cycle? Saying, “I’ll stop doing that”? No. What DOES work is finding something that provides what we’re looking for with less effort or hurt. The effort is in the FINDING of the thing that can replace the unsatisfactory behavior. And how do we get to the point of actively looking for the replacement? Ha! Your guess is as good as mine.

My experience has been that in order to break patterns that aren’t working for me, I have to develop new patterns that I love more than the old. In order to stop bingeing, I have to want something else far more than that immense amount of food. (It ultimately comes down to love, for love is really the greatest desire any of us can have.)

At first, there seems to be nothing I want more than that binge. What could possibly fulfill me more? Therefore, in the beginning, I have to do a little forcing of myself into new areas. I have to try different things, even if I don’t want to. I can come home and binge later, but I need to try something new first. Eventually, I might find something I truly enjoy. Then, I have to do the new thing more often and make it a pattern. The more I do the things that I love, the easier it is for my mind and body to remember how preferable those behaviors are to the binge.

It takes time and some effort. It isn’t always easy. But the solution is pretty simple, almost like a math equation. If I have more positive memories of one behavior, I’m more likely to do that than something else. I can change my “muscle memory,” in a way. Unfortunately, I repeat, it takes time and some effort.

Sometimes, I find it valuable to look into the “negative” behavior and honestly see what it is doing for me. I want to understand why I like it so much, why I am afraid to change it. I ultimately want to see what good lies within it, because nothing is all bad. (Once again, I dislike the words good and bad, but I’m using them. Damn the English language and linear thought! – although both are valuable ;) ) Sometimes, I can actually embrace a behavior I want to get rid of and see that it can work for me if taken down to its core.

Perhaps the desire to binge is really a desire for a healthy amount of food or simply a desire to feel full and taken care of. These desires can be acted on in other ways. And it’s always possible for me to eat a large meal or snack rather than zone out and enter into binge mode. I believe that it’s completely okay to indulge myself regularly. If I am truly listening to my emotional, spiritual, and physical needs, things balance out.

I am constantly seeking balance. I crave it. I need it. That’s why I often swing from one extreme to the other—not because I am averse to balance, but because I am trying to find it. If I restrict in one area of my life, I will do something else in excess. It’s hard to see that these extremes are really ways in which I balance myself.

I can trust myself to find the balance. When I trust myself to know what’s right, I’m more likely to sit down and listen intently to my real needs and desires. I absolutely CAN trust the light within. I do want the best for myself, and with a little creativity, I can get it in ways that lead to a life greater than I could ever imagine!

I hope that you all learn to trust yourselves and will take a little time (even ten minutes) this week to sit with yourself quietly and see what comes up. Be kind enough to ask yourself what you are feeling and what is going on.

Much love ~~

P.S. For the sake of being “real,” I must confess that I am currently struggling to show my imperfections to ANYONE, even my most trusted advisors and friends. Sure, I know all of this great, affirmative stuff, but am I applying it? Not so much these days. There are many things I am scared as all-fire to let go of. However, tonight I know recovery is NOW. Happiness is NOW. I am making different choices this evening, even if only a couple. And it will lead to success. The only way to break the fear of change is to change something and see what happens… Running the gauntlet, y’all.

Help? How Dare You!?

I get angry when people offer me help. I can cry all day long for someone to come help me, but that doesn’t stop me from instinctively shoving the help away when it finally comes. This pattern has truly been a conundrum for me throughout the past few years. I’ll take a look at it, work on it a bit, get distracted, and then be reminded of it much later. Well, a few recent instances have alerted me to how my natural tendency to push help away has inhibited me in many aspects of life.

To fully uproot this issue, I will need to look into family of origin issues and many things from my past, but here, I would like to discuss a few possible reasons for my seemingly insane reaction to the kindness of others.

Number one, I perceive an offering of help as an implication of my own inadequacy. The questions that flood my mind go something like this: “Why would I need help with this? Why do you think I need help? Do you think I’m not capable or responsible?”

Most of the time, I do actually need help. Yes, many tasks would be easier if I would allow someone to assist me. However, something in me never wants to be weak. I want to prove to the world that I can make it on my own when, in reality, no one makes it alone.

Secondly, if someone offers help, I think, “Does he believe he is better than me? Does she think I’m stupid? I need to prove everyone wrong. I can do this! How dare you insinuate otherwise?”

Obviously, some people know more about certain things than others. Many tasks simply require more than one person to accomplish them, and observant people recognize this and are willing to help. It’s pretty arrogant of me to assert that I can accomplish the impossible alone.

Other times, when people come and offer help, I wonder if I have accidentally revealed my vulnerability. I panic and try to figure out how a person was able to see that I was struggling or needed help. I like to think I’m good at putting on masks and pretending everything is fine. When I am proven that my façade is not quite as opaque as I’d hoped, I feel I’ve failed and immediately try to assert that I don't need a thing. I desperately want whoever has seen through me to go away. "Don't remind me of my weakness!" I cry.

I would like to change my thinking. It’s okay to fail at pretending to be strong. It’s okay for people to see through my veneer. The true me is strong but also needs help.

A final issue I have with the helpers of the world: I don’t want to be told that something is wrong with me. Something in me believes that if I need help, there must be something off, something that needs fixing, about me. I want to be accepted and loved just as I am, and if someone offers help, I construe that to mean that they don’t love me as I am. And all I really want is to be loved exactly as I am. If I think that someone does not accept me, I determine to drive them away.

In recent years, I have discovered that peace is not a static place; it’s an ever-shifting journey. Extremes naturally pull at each other and create tension inside. This is the universal process of homeostasis. I am always SEEKING it. The work is never done; I will never reach a completely blank place. Peace is feeling the tension and knowing that it is okay. Therefore, I am learning to accept all sides of me – light and dark, confused and focused, kind and malicious, trusting and skeptical, happy and sad.

Not everyone understands that both parts can exist simultaneously. When those people offer advice, they are trying to fix something that does not need to be fixed. I loathe it when I admit to feeling sad, and listeners insist on providing dozens of ways to be happy (as if I haven't already thought of them) rather than just allowing me to be sad and feeling that sadness with me.

Regardless of the less emotionally intelligent among us, some people are honestly trying to help, not fix me. Those individuals love me and just want to make life a little easier. What’s so bad about that? I regret that I have rejected such offerings. Does every moment have to be hard to have meaning? No. Life is meant to be lived in community, however much or little of it I need at any given time. I enjoy helping others. Why balk when the same outpouring of love is offered to me?

In any case, these notions have yet to be fully explored. A lot of ideas live within this single issue. For now, though, I’m recognizing that I don’t want to be told that I’m “messed up” and need fixing. Because of that deeply entrenched desire, I need to take a little time to pause when people offer assistance so that I can appreciate moments when I do need help and fully love those souls who want to give it.

Despite my continual prayers for superpowers, I am not Superwoman. I’m still holding out hope for the power of flight, though…