Love Your Slow Sex: Love Your Body Blog Part 47

Today I digress to talk more about sex. Sex and loving your body go hand-in-hand, and I didn’t get any complaints from my last venture onto this limb, quite the opposite, in fact! You might remember that several weeks ago I gave away a free One Taste women’s sexuality retreat to a blog-reader. This week I’m sharing with you a new book written by the facilitator of the retreat, Nicole Daedone, called Slow Sex: the Art and Craft of the Female Orgasm.

Has it ever happened that you never noticed something in the world, let’s say delivery trucks with attached lift equipment, until one backs into your car, squashing your hood, and then suddenly you start seeing them everywhere?

Not to say this has ever happened to me, except for last Thursday afternoon. Since then, it’s as if delivery trucks were invented and populated the planet overnight. They are everywhere.

When the folks at One Taste first contacted me, I had never heard of them in the 17 years I’ve lived in the Bay Area. Then overnight, friends and acquaintances at parties start telling me, “Oh yeah, I’ve heard of them, they have a center in SF, don’t they… [fill in the blank],” and later they email me articles from the New York Times and Salon. Suddenly I’m feeling like the kid who was in the bathroom while the teacher did a headstand on her desk. Where have I been? And what is this whole celebration of the female orgasm about?

In the book’s intro, Daedone compares slow sex to the taste of a ripe, juicy heirloom tomato.

That certainly grabbed my attention. As the granddaughter of a man who considered a plate of his home-grown sliced tomatoes a dessert equal to my grandmother’s blackberry cobbler, when you start talking tomatoes, I know you’re serious. What else really needs to be said?

A lot apparently.

Apparently we’re pretty repressed (no surprise there), don’t know what to ask for, or how to ask for it (somewhat surprising), and don’t feel entitled to acknowledge our desires (disturbing and definitely worth looking into). Slow Sex offers men a way to listen and tap into female desire, and shows women how to unearth their desire and release it in a way that reinvigorates their whole lives.

From the gossip I’d heard about One Taste, I expected Slow Sex to be an indictment of monogamy and a clarion call for a return to the glories of 70’s style swinging.

If that’s the book you’re looking for, save your money. Daedone describes her orgasmic meditation and slow sex techniques mostly as they apply to primary heterosexual relationships, with the exception of a few nods to singles and lesbian and gay couples. Conventional and yet not.

Though I’m at the disadvantage of not having read widely in the field of sex manuals (with the notable exception of The Joy of Sex shared up and down the dorm hallway in college), the upshot of Slow Sex is this: women’s orgasms matter, and they are not what you think. They are not fancy, not high-volume, not fever-pitched. They don’t require an advanced degree in biomechanical engineering.

A woman can orgasm for 15 minutes or for the rest of her life.

Any woman. You. The secret is what Daedone calls Orgasmic Meditation or OMing (cute, huh?). You may never again Om at the beginning of yoga class without an inner smile. OMing and Om-ing are essentially unrelated, except that they both invoke a meditative state of concentration. In the chapter “How to Om”, Daedone takes you and your partner through all the steps to OM, building communication, trust, and access to an inexhaustible source of energy along the way. Honestly, it sounds pretty fun.

To tell you the truth, I haven’t tried OM yet, but I’m intrigued.

A technique that combines meditation, orgasm, relationship, and increased joy for life? I’m listening.

What especially delights me about Slow Sex is its emphasis on how to listen to your body, feel the sensations, and grow in your sensitivity and awareness. As in yoga, desire is not a problem, but a path to explore honestly, with love and devotion. In these ways, Slow Sex is simply an extension of yoga practice into intimate relationships and reveals an ocean worth diving into.

As I turned the last page last night, I wondered who should read this book.

Which of my friends and students would find this book helpful, even life-changing? Here are some questions you can ask yourself: Do you want to experience orgasm, possibly for the first time, or in a different way than you ever imagined? Do you want to improve your communication during sex with your partner, and possibly in the rest of your relationship as well? Do you want to access your desire more deeply, and learn to channel it into your life? Do you sense that OM might take you further on your journey of learning to love your body? Maybe OM is for you.

I’d love to hear your thoughts.

To find out more about One Taste go to http://www.onetaste.us/ . To view Slow Sex on Amazon, click here. (And no, silly, of course I don’t get kickbacks.)

The Second Arrow: Love Your Body Blog Part 46

What do you see when you look in the mirror? What story do you tell yourself about your body?

If you’re like many people, when you see your reflection in the mirror, you think, “Ugh. When will I get rid of these fat rolls/cellulite mountains/burgeoning stretch marks?!” Then you silently (or not so silently) vow that tomorrow you are starting a new diet/new exercise program/new strategy for excising that part of your body forever. Then later, when you’re driving, or washing the dishes, or talking to a friend on the phone, you’re still giving yourself a hard time about it-- sometimes for hours or weeks.

“There are two arrows,” Buddha told his students. “The first arrow is pain, injury, loss. You can’t avoid it. What you can avoid is the second arrow; the one you shoot at yourself about why you got shot by the first arrow to begin with.”

When I share this story with my yoga students, they often look at me with surprise. “I don’t have to shoot the second arrow? I don’t have to tell and re-tell the story about how there is something wrong with me? Or him? Or the world?” Nope. That’s the suffering we create for ourselves. You don’t have to tell the story that makes you or the world bad.

Here’s an example: my partner comes home late from work. I’m mad, because I had dinner ready 45 minutes ago, and she didn’t even call to tell me she was running late. Her being late is the first arrow. The second arrow is the story I tell myself:

What a complete, inconsiderate, insensitive, self-centered jerk! I can’t believe I married her. What’s wrong with me that I always end up with people who walk all over me?

Then I shoot a few kerosene-soaked second arrows at her, too. Add a little PMS to this flammable mix of arrows, and we can end up in an epic, hours-long fight involving slamming doors, threats of divorce, and multiple emptied tissue boxes.

Instead, what if I didn’t shoot the second arrow?

People are late sometimes and forget to call, despite their best efforts. What if I thought to myself, “I’m bummed she got home late. Maybe she’s bummed too. I know she loves me and would never do this on purpose.”? First arrow but no second arrow. Pain but no suffering. Disappointment but no argument.

When you look into the mirror what’s the first arrow? Your body. Your aging, changing, un-airbrushed body. Your body is what it is. It’s not bad, it’s not necessarily even painful. It’s just a body.

But looking in the mirror, I might instantly compare my lips to Angelina Jolie or my thighs to some 20 year old model’s that I saw on a radio station billboard. Squinting at the reflection I remind myself that my lips are nothing like Angelina’s and even when I was 20, my body did not look like an airbrushed model’s. The longer I look, the crappier I feel. Comparing myself negatively to someone else is a second arrow inandof itself. Then I get out the big artillery: the story I tell myself about why I don’t look “better.” It starts with, “What’s wrong with me that I don’t look younger/thinner/more gorgeous?” And moves to, “I need to work out more and do a master cleanse, that will get me started.” Soon my inner anorexic feels her powers return and she helpfully suggests, “Stop eating.” Uh-oh.

How do we stop shooting the second arrow?

First, notice when you start comparing. Your body stands alone. Your body is good and worthy. Heck, it’s carried you around your whole life, and for its thanks you compare it to Hollywood actresses, or your friend, or yourself ten years ago? Get real and give it a break. Second, notice when an encounter with the mirror (or scale---a different sort of mirror) sets your inner critic on a raucous meth-binge of self-hatred. Or sends you over a speed bump of dieting wistfulness.

Notice your usual second arrows.

Get to know them, let them become like old friends. When the one with the story about how you should eat and look like Kate Moss/your svelte aunt/your tiny friend comes up, just say, “Hey, it’s you again. Thanks for stopping by and sharing your opinion. You’ll have to forgive me if I don’t serve you refreshments and ask you to stay awhile, but I’ve really got better things to do.”

When you notice yourself repeating a really sticky story (like shooting yourself over and over with the same second arrow), observe how it feels in your body and in your heart. Offer it your breath, and a sense of spaciousness and tenderness. These stories can be powerful and persistent. But really, they’re just stories.

You have the ability to tell different stories.

Nowadays, instead of shooting second arrows at myself, when I see my reflection in the mirror, I tell myself:

This is a good body. Thanks for everything you do, body. I’m working hard to learn to love you and to keep loving you no matter what. We’re in this together.

Instead of being mad at my body, I feel a sense of friendliness and trust. Where I once had to duck to avoid the second arrows, now my body soaks up gratitude and affection.

The next time you find yourself in the mirror, notice your second arrows, get to know them, and offer your reflection healing, instead of hurt.

(Thanks to yoga instructor and author Judith Lasater, who first told me a version of the second arrow story.)

Body Snark: Love Your Body Blog Part 45

Are you snarky about bodies?

You know what I mean: Have you ever elbowed a friend who’s gained some weight and thought (or said!), “Hey, leave some for me!” Do you look at super-skinny models and comment under your breath, “Ouch. Someone give that girl a sandwich.” Honestly, even saying to someone, “You look great, have you lost weight?” is unintentionally snarky. Think about it: you’re implying you thought all along they should lose a few pounds… and well, they didn’t look so hot before. Plus, I’ve had enough friends go through cancer that I make a point of not mentioning someone’s missing pounds. Seriously, once you overhear someone’s reply, “Oh yeah, I got my diagnosis last month and the chemo’s really killed my appetite,” you’ll never mention weight loss again.

In fact, I still get triggered if someone asks me I’ve lost weight.

My mind spins off, “Did I look fat before? Why are they keeping track of my weight? Everybody’s looking at me. Maybe everybody thinks I’m fat. Why do I look skinnier? Maybe I’m not eating enough. Maybe I’m becoming anorexic again. Now I’m hungry.” My thoughts zoom away on their own wild roller coaster. Most days I have the peace of mind to step off before the ride gets too scary, but not always.

Yet I’m guilty of overt snark myself.

Just the other day while walking in San Francisco, I saw a gym ad on the side of the bus with the skinniest woman I’d seen in a long time. My first thought was, “Ew. When did they start using famine victims to advertise gym memberships?”

This is a complicated sentiment for me.

At first, I was pleased with myself. Not so long ago, this recovering anorexic still wanted to be that super-skinny model. I take my mean comment as proof that my inner anorexic is off-duty, and that I no longer equate skinniness with health and desirability. I also feel justified in acknowledging that holding up super-skinny women as what all women should (want to) look like is a mean-spirited practical joke for most of us.

However, labeling all super-skinny women as famine victims is just as unfair as labeling all fat people gluttons. Several of my thin friends have trouble keeping weight on, not because they are starving themselves, but because of their metabolism and body type. They don’t need my labels or my snarkiness. Or anyone else’s. Thin, fat, or anything in between, no body enjoys insensitive criticism.

Many of my fat friends don’t mind being called “fat”: in fact, in some circles, identifying as fat is empowering, like reclaiming the word queer (although you should ask people what term they prefer). But they don’t appreciate ignorant comments from random strangers like, “Why don’t you join a gym?” (They probably already do), or “Lay off the burgers and fries,” or “Keep eating those salads and you’ll lose those pounds” (Maybe this burger is the only thing I’ve eaten today, or maybe I just like salad, I’m not trying to lose weight). One blogger, Dances With Fat, calls going out a “Public Display of Fatness,” during which a fat person can be subjected to all kinds of unhelpful and insulting advice from folks who can’t just mind their own beeswax.

When will we finally admit that you can’t tell anything about someone just by looking at their body?

You don’t know if they are happy or sad, active or lazy, if they love their body or hate it, if they wish they had a different body or enjoy their body and their life just the way they are. Actually, it’s none of our business.

At the first Love Your Body workshop last spring, one of the students suggested a new rule about bodies: “No commenting on bodies without joy, love, and praise for life.” In other words, no snark.

Can you see what’s genuinely beautiful in your friend who’s gained weight? Can you praise your fat friend’s radiance and glow? Can you be joyful about your skinny friend’s body, and the bodies of all shapes and sizes of those you love? Every body you see houses a person’s dreams, hopes, wisdom, joy, and sorrow. Look for what’s good in them, what’s right and lovely. No one needs our snarkiness… is that really what we want to put out there into the world? But lots of people need our love and acceptance. Including ourselves.

What the Heck is Intuitive Eating, Anyway?

Today I’m excited to share with you an interview with the amazing Golda Poretsky. Golda is a certified holistic health counselor and founder of Body Love Wellness, a wellness company that provides individual and group counseling from a Health At Every Size perspective. Via her blog, podcast, and counseling programs, she helps women and men throughout the country get off the dieting roller coaster, give their bodies what they really crave, and love their bodies and themselves. Golda's programs and activism work have been featured on CBS's The Early Show, ABC's Nightline, NBC's LX New York and Time Out New York. She is also author of Stop Dieting Now: 25 Reasons To Stop, 25 Ways To Heal, available in softcover, Kindle, and Nook.

SPECIAL OFFER: As a special gift for lucky readers, Golda is gifting a free Food Mood Transformation Session to the first 5 Finding Fullness readers who sign up. This is your chance to talk to Golda about any struggles you’re having with food and body image, and get some real solutions for moving forward. To sign up for your free session, go to http://www.bodylovewellness.com/findingfullness/.

1. Briefly, Golda, what is intuitive eating?

Intuitive eating is a practice of listening to your body's food desires and feelings of hunger and fullness, and making food choices based on those indicators.

2. How has eating intuitively affected your own life?

Oh, gosh. It's affected my life in so many ways. But I think the hugest impact of intuitive eating is emotional. I was a lifelong dieter until I found intuitive eating. I was always on a diet, and when I wasn't, I was stressing about whether I should or not. But now, I don't spend my days stressing about food, what I'm going to eat, what I can eat, what I can't eat. I don't count points or calories or carbs or fat grams. I just eat good food that I like, and I pay attention to my hunger and fullness. It's a really peaceful place to be.

3. What are the first steps someone who wants to learn to eat intuitively can take?

Truthfully, the best place to start is uncovering your "food rules." Most of us have rules that we've carried with us from past diets, and often they conflict. We see ourselves as "being good" when we stick to our rules and "being bad" when we don't. So it's important to get a lot of clarity on what our beliefs are around food and begin to let go of them, so that we can hear our inner wisdom.

4. How can intuitive eating help someone who sometimes over- or under-eats?

Because bingeing and restricting really aren't about the food, using intuitive eating tools can allow someone who binges or restricts to begin to get clarity on her/his emotional reality. That's really a key component of intuitive eating -- it gives you the space to acknowledge your emotional hunger as well as your physical hunger.

5. Why is intuitive eating better than dieting?

Dieting is incredibly detrimental. We're sold a lie that diets and weight loss are healthy and good for us, and that lie couldn't be further from the truth. In my book, Stop Dieting Now, I give 25 reasons to stop dieting, so it's hard to pick just one. But the main reason why intuitive eating is better than dieting is that diets impose a set of rules on the dieter that has nothing to do with that dieter. Your diet doesn't care if you're having a long, stressful day or an easy day at home. Your diet doesn't care if it's the summer in Southern Florida or the winter in Alaska. No matter what, you have to make choices based on that diet, not on what you want or need. Intuitive eating allows you to learn to listen to your body and trust that your body will direct you toward the nutrition you need.

6. What further resources would you recommend for someone who would like to step onto the path of intuitive eating?

I would highly recommend Linda Bacon's book: Health At Every Size, The Surprising Truth About Your Weight. It's a great way to learn the principles of intuitive eating while also learning why it's a good idea. There are lots of books on intuitive eating that may be more familiar to your readers, but I wouldn't recommend them because they talk about intuitive eating as a weight loss tool, which it isn't. Some people lose weight from intuitive eating and some don't, and I find that those who don't lose weight think they're doing it wrong. In other words, it becomes another diet that they feel they've failed at, which defeats the whole purpose!

I think it's also important to get help with this process. When you've suffered from disordered eating for years, usually reading a few books and blogs isn't going to do the trick. There are real issues to be worked through, and it's important to get support.

7. Thank you so much for sharing your wisdom with us, Golda! I hope lots of readers take advantage of your resources and experience. Blessings!

Love Your Body Blog Part 44

Diet is “Die” with a “T”: Love Your Body Blog Part 43

You know what my body really hates? Diets. My best friend/body thinks diets stink, and doesn’t understand why I would ever force myself to suddenly and drastically change what I eat. Plus, she reminds me, I’ve tried diets before and they never, ever work, so there.

Why does my body hate dieting? Let’s ask her:

Hey Body, what’s the big deal? Why does the word “diet” get your panties all tied up in a knot?

1. Oh hon, where do I start? First off, when you listen to a diet, you’re not listening to ME. You’re ignoring my needs in favor of listening to somebody you’ve never met, who doesn’t care about your body, and who is probably just trying to get you to buy their book or pay an arm and a leg for their “guaranteed” system. The only thing that’s guaranteed is you’ll feel too humiliated to ask for a refund!

2. When you go on a diet, you’re treating me like I’m a dress size or a number on the scale. I am so much more than that, and you know it.

3. You only feel good if I’ve lost weight, and you’re pissed at me if you don’t.

4. When you go on a diet, you throw down the gauntlet. You declare war on me. I have no choice but to protect myself with cravings, hunger, and fatigue. I hate feeling like we’re not on the same side. I need you to love me and take care of me, respect me and adore me, not call me names and starve me. I want to support you too. Can’t we just all get along?

5. I like the size I’m at right now. I feel comfortable and healthy here. When you go on a diet, you’re trying to turn me into something I’m not; a tiny size zero. Can we just be realistic here? I am not meant to be a size zero. Not now, not ever. Not for diet pills, or liposuction, or gastric bypass surgery. I will never voluntarily be a size zero or anything close to it, and if you insist otherwise, we will have a problem.

My best friend/body sounds like she means business, doesn’t she? Trust me, you do not want to mess with her. When she’s taken care of, she’s all sweet pussycat, cuddle and purr, but if you threaten her, the claws come out!

Okay, Body, so how is dieting different from what we’re doing now, which is not eating sugar? (…I’ve given up most forms of sugar for almost two years now.) Couldn’t you say we’re on a sugar-free diet?

Eww! No way. I feel like we’re on a sugar-free fi-es-ta! But seriously, first of all, there’s no calorie restriction. You don’t leave me feeling hungry all the time.

Secondly, we agreed together that not eating sugar was a good idea. You were feeling tired a lot and started to notice that sugar made you crabby and crash out. We both feel way better without it, with lots more energy to have fun and get stuff done.

Thirdly, it’s NO BIG DEAL. If you feed me a little bit of sugar, there’s no failure, we just deal with it and move on. There’s no punishment and no anger.

Fourth, it’s not tied to my appearance or weight. The decision to eat less sugar was based on how you feel, not on what I look like. That’s the kind of change I can get behind.

Finally, you gave up sugar out of love for me, not out of unhappiness or disgust. Giving up sugar feels like devotion instead of deprivation. We’re increasing our level of love, trust, and understanding instead of undermining it. It’s as different as cats and… peanut butter.

Well, Body, say someone wants to change their eating habits to feel healthier, how would you recommend they go about it?

1. Change one small thing at a time, like eating more vegetables or less processed food, incorporating it over the course of a month or longer, until it becomes a habit. Only add another change once you and your body feel confident with the first.

2. Get your body’s buy in. Ask your body if it feels good about this change, and listen to your body’s answer. Give it veto power. If your body says it won’t work, it won’t, believe me!

3. Do it out of love for your body, not out of wanting to change your body or thinking there’s something wrong with your body. I speak for all bodies when I say, love the one you’re with!

What wisdom (or humor) does your body have to share about dieting? Let your body do the talking!

Love Your Body Blog Part 42: Eat Like a Goddess

Years ago I asked my yoga students, “How would you treat yourself differently if you believed you were divine?” After class one student told me with a laugh, “If I believed I was divine, I wouldn’t eat standing up over the counter.” I agreed; if I believed I was divine, I wouldn’t eat behind the wheel of my car.

Can you imagine Aphrodite slurping down a veggie sandwich leaning over the kitchen counter (it would totally mess up her hair, and her toga… do you know how much the dry cleaning bills are for those things?), or Athena chowing down on a carnitas asada burrito behind the wheel of her convertible PT Cruiser? Seriously, the burrito is less believable than the car.

How would a goddess eat? Definitely sitting down. Preferably with servants waving palm fronds, serving peeled grapes… sorry, got a little carried away. How about with a single flower in the center of the table, a lovely glass of water with lemon, a freshly prepared dish in front of her with a seasonal variety of colors, textures, and flavors? As she settles into her chair she takes a moment to enjoy the beauty of the food in front of her. As her eyes take in the rich hues, she imagines the farms the vegetables came from, the sun shining on them, the rain moistening their roots, the nimble bees who pollinated each flower, and the hands that tended and picked them. She opens her hands around the plate and offers a blessing, “May all those who offer me this meal be blessed. May this food nourish me. May my energy and life honor all beings.”

Then each bite she takes in she sighs and lingers over, enjoying every aspect and sensation of eating. Yum.

At the end of her meal, perhaps in the company of other smiling goddesses (and gods), she leans back in her seat, feeling full and sated.

Why don’t we eat like goddesses? We’re busy. We’re tired. We have little ones to feed and laundry to do. We don’t feel entitled to really sit down and enjoy a meal.

But really, could you eat like a goddess once a day? How about once a week? Plan a goddess lunch with a friend, or make yourself a goddess meal. When you’re planning a meal or going out to eat, ask yourself, “What does my inner goddess want to eat?”

My inner goddess loves:

Eating outside, at a café patio, or in my own garden

A carafe of water at the table

Sweet red peppers (probably because they’re seasonal and pricey!)

Figs and berries

Leafy salads with Goddess dressing (c’mon, what did you expect?)

Finger foods like spring rolls

Curried vegetables, daal and rice

Asparagus, avocado, and artichokes

Sauteed greens

Flowers, yes even in the food

A sweet blessing

Anything prepared with love and creativity

My inner goddess also likes to eat slowly and in the company of good friends (even if they’re flowers). Listen to your inner goddess and let her teach you how to eat with great mindfulness and enjoyment. To nourish her, ask her what she needs, what she loves, and feed it to her. Slowly and with great love.

What does your inner goddess love?

Love Your Body Blog Part 41: Food Rules!

I love Michael Pollan. His book, The Botany of Desire, forever changed the way I think about apples (Johnny Appleseed as a hard-cider swilling Dionysus), and marijuana (did you know your body naturally produces some of the same active chemicals found in weed?). His latest Food Rules rocked my world, too: “Eat food, not too much, mostly plants.” Simple, elegant, pithy. As a former anorexic with a disturbing past tendency to punish myself around food, I would add the following corollary: “Not too little food, either!” Not too much and not too little is the secret to balance in everything. (I’ll discuss this more in terms of intuitive eating in a later post.)

Twinkies and Slim Jims do not count as “food”, according to Pollan; too many ingredients (he recommends eating things with less than five ingredients), half of which your great-grandmother wouldn’t recognize as food… polysorbate 60, sodium nitrate, hydrolyzed soy protein.

I love the idea of my great-grandmother picking up items at the local Safeway and reading the ingredients with one eyebrow cocked up, lips pursed.

Maltodextrin? Emulsifier: E-471? In her flour-dusted apron, she'd politely place the Pringles can back on the shelf and wonder to herself when she’d stopped understanding English. Wandering down the baking aisle, after a brief mystified glance at the Betty Crocker section (What?! Cake in a box? She’d shake the box and think aloud, “Strange. It doesn’t sound like cake.”), she’d load up her cart with two 20 lb bags of flour ($2 off two with your Safeway club card!), a can of baking powder, and be on her way. Biscuits, pie, and the farm. What else does a family need?

Whole foods provide a nutritional punch processed foods lose—ahem—in the process. Vegetables and fruits normally require you to interact with them: peel them, often cook them, and sit down to eat and enjoy them. Processed foods are designed to be eaten anywhere, on the run, in the car, while pumping your gas. Of course, yesterday while waiting for a red light, I saw a twenty-something hipster stride by in the crosswalk eating a salad out of a plastic container with a fork. Maybe we’ll figure out how to cook and walk too. Sigh.

What does all of this have to do with loving your body? Your body evolved over millions of years eating whole foods. Modern processed foods have only been around for several decades. Whole foods are your body’s home base, its basic fuel source. Many of us have trained ourselves to survive on processed foods, and our minds and bodies may come to crave these foods almost exclusively. This is why the farmers market is a great way to bring more whole foods into your diet. In the outside air, away from the aisles of canned meat and sugar cereals, your body can experience what humans have experienced for thousands of years, since the first farmers grew a surplus to sell to their neighbors: a community brought together to feed their bodies from the abundance of the earth. Amid the stands of brightly colored seasonal produce, notice what the predominant color is: in almost every season, it’s green. Invite your eyes to take in the saturated green of the chard leaves, the silvery green of the dinosaur kale, and the feathery green of freshly pulled carrot tops.

If you’re a regular at the farmers market, just listen to what your body wants, let it choose what’s for dinner. If you’re new to the market, go and buy just one thing your body feels drawn to. Ask the person standing next to you how to best prepare it. Who knows, in Berkeley you might be standing next to Alice Waters or Jessica Prentice! Or Michael Pollan himself.

Love Your Body Blog Part 40: My body loves SPAM with a side of Twinkies. Not!

What does your body love to eat? Your first reaction might be similar to my son’s: vanilla ice cream whipped cream sundaes and bacon sandwiches. (Not in the same bowl… separately.) Does your body love to eat like a middle-schooler? Really?

Have you ever asked your body what it likes to eat? When I ask my body, images of fresh veggies float through my imagination: warm curries, sautéed greens, asparagus roasted in olive oil, diced avocados. Then big mangoes wander by, followed by juicy peaches, tangy raspberries, and sweet blood oranges.

One of my body’s favorite treats, that it only gets to enjoy a couple times a year, is eating sun-warmed strawberries out of the field.

Nothing compares to the sweet juiciness of a perfectly ripe strawberry plucked right from its squat foliage, and popped into your mouth on the spot. At least nothing I’ve ever encountered.

Sometimes it’s hard to hear what your body wants because your mind gets into Cookie Monster mode: “I want chocolate now. Donuts now. Chocolate donuts. Now.”

Then the mind spends a lot of time strategizing about how to get its emotional fix, the oh-so-brief stress relief that a heavy dose of sugar and fat provides to the brain. But when I ask my body---my best friend---what it wants, it almost never says chocolate donuts.

In fact, it took me years to realize that my body hated donuts, and sugar in almost all its forms.

Every time I ate sugar, I would turn irritable and crabby, and need to go home to take a nap. For years I thought I hated birthday parties… halfway through the party I would think, “Party games are stupid. Birthdays are stupid. Look at all these wasteful decorations and don’t even get me started about the paper plates. Don’t my friends have anything better to do than pollute the earth with more trash?” I turned into a raving party-pooper bitch. Finally I realized if I skipped the cake or ate only one bite, I liked birthdays just fine: I could blow my party horn and enjoy stumbling through the three-legged race along with everyone else.

Your body may not react to sugar the way mine does; I certainly hope not. But how does your body respond to different foods? Do you pay attention to its reactions?

What foods help your body feel full and sated? What foods make it irritated and upset?

Check in with your body and ask it how it likes different foods. How does a vanilla milkshake feel? How does a colorful salad feel? How does a beautifully presented, lovingly prepared meal feel? How does it feel to eat fast food behind the wheel of your car?

Psychiatrist and intuition specialist Judith Orloff recommends going to the farmers market, closing your eyes, and asking your body what it needs, what it wants, what it craves. Go around to the different stands, take in the sights and smells of fresh vegetables and fruits, and invite your body to respond with a “No, thanks,” a “Yes, please,” and the occasional, “Oh yeah, baby, I need some of that!” You’re not shopping for what you think you should eat, but learning to listen to your body’s voice. Slowly you’ll develop an ear for your body’s own preferences and wisdom.

Different foods have different effects on your body. Notice what foods make you feel:

Satisfied

Depleted

Energized

Fatigued, mentally or physically

Clear-headed

Fuzzy

Easeful, content

Bloated or uncomfortable

Happy

Irritable

Keeping a food journal in which you write briefly about how you feel before and after meals can help you tune in carefully to what your body loves and what it complains about.

Even knowing what our body enjoys most, we sometimes eat things that disagree with it. When I do this, the tendency is to give myself a hard time… “I knew better, what was I thinking? Now I’ve ruined my day with this stomachache. Again.” Unsurprisingly this tactic is as helpful and soothing as banging my head against a concrete piling. Instead of knocking myself around, I’ve learned to apologize to my body: “Oh poor body. I’m so sorry about ignoring what you needed. I’ll remember for next time that you really hate it when I don’t stop eating when I’m full. My bad. I’ll listen more carefully from now on. We’re in this together.”

Would you purposefully give your best friend a stomachache? Never. Feed your best friend body what nourishes it, feeds it, and honors it. Learn to listen to your body’s intuition and you’ll find your body returns love and radiance to you a thousand-fold.

Love Your Body Blog Part 39: Mirror, Mirror, on the Wall, Who’s the Fairest of Them All?

Growing up in the Midwest, the notion was firmly inculcated into me that saying anything nice about yourself (i.e. I’m beautiful, I’m a good person, I have a great smile) demonstrated a conceitedness that would incontrovertibly result in the sky opening up and God striking you down with his mighty lighting sword. Complimenting yourself, or even accepting a compliment, was therefore something to be avoided at all costs. You just didn’t do it. If you accidentally said something that smelled ever so slightly of hell-borne vanity, people would back away from you, shaking their heads and looking fearfully toward the heavens. It took me years to get out of this habit.

When women tell me they feel it’s self-indulgent and vain to devote time and energy to loving their bodies, I know what they mean.

In our culture it’s fine to openly criticize and make fun of yourself.

We’ll even pay to watch it; many a stand-up comedian has made their living off this goldmine of self-deprecation. And even movie stars, who are often famous because of their looks, are rarely quoted enjoying their bodies or appearance. Instead we’re treated to their latest commercial remedies for aging and their frustrations about their own bodies and self-image.

Remember the Queen in Snow White? She loved her body, right?

Well, she loved herself as long as she believed she was The Most Beautiful Woman in the World. And she was willing to poison her step-daughter, fling evil spells, and transform into a fire-spewing dragon to defend the title. Truly loving your body isn’t about seeing your body as better than anyone else’s. Or as worse. Loving your body is about seeing beauty in all bodies, as well as in your own.

By loving your own body, you help others see the good in their own bodies through the reflection of love and acceptance in your eyes.

Who do you know who loves their body? How are they in the world? Do they seem selfish and self-indulgent, or do they seem connected and loving? Loving your body isn’t about outer appearances, or falling in love with your own image in the reflecting pool like the Narcissus of ancient mythology. When you love your own body, you love it beyond its outer form of skin and face and dimples on your thighs; you love the life that moves through it, the support it gives you, and the wisdom and experience it shares with you. Loving your body means you see yourself and your body as worthy of love, and helps you see others as worthy of love as well.

You fill yourself with love and treat yourself as your best friend, and that love spills over into the rest of your life, offering more friendliness and love to all those your life touches.

Loving your body doesn’t make you selfish, in fact, it makes you more self-less. Taking good care of yourself, getting in your yoga practice or movement, eating well, sleeping enough, all of these things help you take care of the people who matter to you and even leave you with some energy left over to help them feel special and loved. When you are feeling depleted and unloved, it’s incredibly difficult to show affection and care for anyone else. Forgiveness and compassion arise easily when we’re feeling content and easeful with ourselves. When you feel loved, it’s natural to love the world.

Think about it, who would you rather hang out with: your friend who constantly makes mean jokes about her body and is unhappy and short-tempered, or your friend who seems comfortable and happy in her body and her life, and who accepts and loves you just the way you are? Which friend would you rather be?

Loving your body makes you a better friend and a better person. There’s only one way to find out if it works. Try it and see.

Love Your Body Blog Part 38: The Myth of the Unlovable Body

Do you believe that some bodies aren’t worthy of love? You know those headless photographs that the media uses to illustrate stories about the obesity scare? Maybe you have a body like that, or fear having a body like that. Maybe you wonder, if I love my body the way it is, doesn’t that mean I’m settling for bad health, unattractiveness, and low standards? If I love my body the way it is, I’ll never have the body I want.

Loving my body the way it is right now doesn’t mean it won’t change. My body has changed tremendously over the years… gotten stronger and more flexible from my yoga practice, more fluid and expressive through dancing. And I’ve gotten much better about reading its signals and figuring out what it needs to be happy. Also it’s gotten older. And although I don’t weigh myself (just yesterday at the doctor’s office as the nurse had me step on the scale, I told her “I don’t want to look and I don’t want to know”), I know my weight vacillates based on the season and whether I’ve been playing outside much.

Loving your body doesn’t mean giving up on yourself. It means giving up the war on yourself. You learn to listen to your body, and respond to its needs for food and exercise appropriately. Calling a truce with your body means slowly unraveling negative habits around food, such as overeating, undereating, eating unmindfully, and poor nourishment. Loving your body means discovering the types of exercise your body loves, and offering it those activities in doses it enjoys without overdoing. For some of us changing our relationship to our body in this way will mean we lose weight, while for others it might mean we gain weight. Either way, we can enjoy the discovery process of finding out what our body needs to feel healthy and happy, learning what food and exercise and what quantity of both help it thrive.

Loving my body the way it is has helped me want the body I love. Just like I wouldn’t feed my beloved dog garbage and poison, or let my eleven year old eat only Cheetos and Sour Patch Kids (much as he’s sure they comprise two of the four basic food groups along with pizza and ice cream), I show my body I love it by offering it delicious food and fun exercise. What’s amazing is that when you treat something carefully and give it your affectionate attention, you start to care about it, and see that it deserves your love. The more you love it, the more you want to love it, the more lovable it is.

As I’ve treated my body with love, my body has become beautiful to me. As a result I feel more beautiful and comfortable in my body, and other people see and respond to that confidence. Over the weekend I met some people at a party who looking at me couldn’t believe that I hadn’t always loved my body. As if I’d make it up! The truth is, not only did I not love my body, but I literally hated it to the extent of wishing I was dead. Ouch. It’s painful to say that now, but it shows the extreme one can start from and still make it all the way over to the other side of acceptance and love.

If I’m “obese”, is it okay for me to love my body too? (I won’t argue here with the term obese, but just know I think the whole BMI thing is a terrible plane crash no one ever found the black box for.) One thing we know, but have forgotten in the midst of our culture’s thinness obsession, is that weight is actually not a reliable indicator of health. A thin person can be terribly malnourished with arteries that would make a veteran cardiologist wince. A fat person can have beautifully clear arteries, excellent blood pressure, and healthy exercise and eating patterns. You don’t know by looking at someone’s appearance whether or not they are healthy. You have to look beyond the surface. Where have I heard that before?

The upshot is people can be healthy and be overweight. Take the 400 lb sumo wrestler who recently completed the LA marathon. I’m sorry, but for all my yoga practice and organic vegetables, that guy is in better shape than I am. He trains hard as a sumo wrestler. His exercise routine would kill me.

But Kimber, you say, what about people who are fat AND unhealthy? And I say, why focus on fat at all? Unhealthy bodies need love too, be they fat or thin. Do we tell cancer patients, “Your body is bad, unhealthy, and it’s your fault. You should punish your bad body for being sick.”? Nope. We tell them to treat their body with kindness and encourage them to take care of their body in every way possible to restore its health and vitality. Even dying and irreversibly broken bodies need love. But you don’t need me to tell you this. You know this already.

All bodies are worthy of love. No one’s body is unlovable or undeserving. No matter how fat, no matter how unhealthy. No matter how unattractive you might feel. Everyone’s body can be treated like the best friend it is. Even yours. Even mine.

Love Your Body Blog Part 37: Worship at Your Body’s Altar

Are you serious about wanting to learn to love your body? Are you committed to the process of becoming your own best friend? If the answer is “Oh yeah!” or even “Yeah, sorta, I think so,” I have a project to inspire your journey: make a Love Your Body altar.

What is an altar? It’s a sacred space in your home where you can honor and remind yourself of your inner path, and reconnect to what is truly important to you in life. When I was in Nepal last summer, we stayed in the homes of our Nepali friends. In every house we visited they had a “god room,” a separate room often designated solely for a family altar to the chosen deity, where prayers and offerings are made, and incense lit every day. Your home altar, on a window sill, a mantle, a shelf, or even in a cigar box, can be a lovely miniature version of a “god room,” honoring your ability to see the goddess (or god) in yourself.

Find a spot that won’t be disturbed too much by roommates or wandering kitties; if you have outdoor space, you could even set it up on a small table in the garden. Gather items that inspire you to love your body, or remind you of those people or things who support your growing friendship with yourself.

Making my own Love Your Body altar was a moving experience of collecting objects and inspiration from all over my house and inviting them to meet each other and be the guests of honor at a quiet party. In my yoga room, there’s a basic altar on a side table that I enjoy and play with the elements of sometimes, so all I had to do was clear it and rearrange and add items with the intention of honoring my body’s journey.

Here are the basic elements:

1. A scarf and candle holder in one of my favorite colors, indigo-violet, set the stage and create a visual center. I love indigo-violet… it’s the color I see when I close my eyes and invoke loving myself and the world. I think of it as the color I am inside.

2. Three photographs… one of my Buddhist teacher, Pema Chodron, who has taught me so much about lovingkindness, compassion, and fearlessness… one of a sculpture that reminds me of how my partner’s love has healed my relationship with my body…. And the last is me, in Baby Dancer pose, in front of the roots of a giant sequoia in Yosemite around the time I was first figuring out how to love my body.

3. Flowers from my garden, that remind me of my body’s connection to the earth and natural beauty.

4. A stone from the creek by Full Belly Farm, whose organic vegetables and marvelous farmer/friends have nourished my body and soul for many years.

5. A heart shaped mirror that was a gift from Anusara Yoga founder John Friend, and a sculpture of a woman doing yoga that was a gift from my teacher Katchie. Both remind me what an important role yoga and my teachers have had in learning to love my body.

6. A ceramic goddess incense burner with wide hips that I made years ago. She holds a “galaxy stone” in her lap… the whole universe within her embrace.

7. A Kwan Yin statue (she’s the goddess of compassion), and next to her (you can’t see it in the photo) a tiny statue of Saraswati, the goddess of wisdom. Learning to love my body has required a tremendous amount of both compassion and wisdom; they inspire me to look for these qualities both in the world and in myself to support my path.

8. A swirled purple and green hunger goddess I made from my son’s art clay. She represents the feeling of insatiable hunger that plagued me for many years. I made her at the height of my frustration over my hunger, and have been offering her gifts ever since, even as her demands gradually diminished. She holds a love charm, a goddess charm, a pendant from my mother of a Navaho mother holding her baby, and an Ohm charm and Buddha charm gifted to me by dear students. My hunger still likes to be honored.

9. Hanging against the scarf is the flying purple goddess who usually hangs in my bathroom. Her big hips and tiny breasts remind me to see my body as beautiful just the way it is.

10. Finally, two inspirational wisdom cards from Louise Hays. One says: “I fill myself with love, and I send that love out into the world. How others treat me is their path; how I react is mine.” The other: “I am in the process of becoming my own best friend—the person I am most joyous to be with.”

Take your time getting together your own objects and inspiration. You don’t have to do it all in one sitting. Let it grow and change over time. Once you have your altar set up, step back and admire it. What now?

Honor your altar by practicing yoga in front of it, meditating on it, or saying a prayer before it. You could bow to it and make offerings of fruit or chocolate. My hunger goddess loves offerings of chocolate. You could sing to it, say a mantra or dance before it, or invite friends over to share with them the significance of the objects and your journey.

Let your Love Your Body altar inspire and support you on your journey of becoming your own best friend.

Love Your Body Blog Part 36: Shopping for a new body. Are you selling?

Today I’m headed down the rabbit hole. Are you coming?

Imagine…You wake up one morning and stretch, bemoaning the little aches that seem to have taken up residence overnight.

As you brush your teeth and frown into the mirror, you think, “I’m sick of this body. I’ll stop by the store today and get a new one.”

You drive up to the Body Store, and look in the front windows. Oooh. That one’s nice. And that one might be fun. You hurry through the doors.

Once inside you think, “Well, I definitely want thinner. And maybe stronger, too.” So you go to the size zero aisle and start to peruse the bodies there. “Maybe it is possible to be too thin,” you wonder to yourself. You’re not sure some of those bodies could support your busy life. You go up a few sizes, and take a couple of bodies into the dressing room to try on. They’re okay, but not quite what you were thinking.

You look through the store, trying on some bodies you never imagined possible. You like the arms on this one, and the thighs on this other one. This one has a nice belly, but you’re not so crazy about its proportions. This other one is hot, but it says right on the label that to maintain it you have to give up your job, renounce every type of food you like, and, weirdly, sacrifice the entirety of your self-esteem. Plus it says in big black letters, “Not guaranteed beyond warranty date.” You check the warranty date. Your eyes widen. It’s today. You put it back on the rack.

By the end, you’ve got two bodies that you kind of like, that you’re thinking about taking home with you. But you can only choose one. And you realize that if you take home one of these new bodies, you’ll have to leave yours there, at the store, for someone else to take home if they want. You’ll give up the little scar on your arm from the time you and your brother tried to invent a recipe for balloon cookies. And never again will you appreciate the hands that remind you of your mom.

You’ll give up your dad’s eyes, your grandma’s feet, and the strong shoulders that Uncle Tim says were inherited from the guys who painted the roof of the Sistine Chapel.

While you’re trying to decide which body to choose, there’s a knock at the dressing room door. “Hey, are you done in there?” you hear a woman’s voice through the door.

“Yeah, just a couple more minutes.”

“’Cause if you’re going to take one of those other bodies, can you hand me yours? I’d be happy to take it if you don’t want it.”

What?! As you wandered around the store, someone who came in looking for a body was eyeing yours the whole time? She was stalking you, waiting for you to leave your body unattended. Suddenly you’re feeling very proprietary.

The disembodied voice of your admirer floats over the divider.

“I’ll be here, just let me know.”

Her voice sounds nice, you think. Maybe she’d take good care of your body. Does she know that your body cramps up in cold water, but loves warm water like a tropical fish? What about your right knee that gets achy if you miss your weekly yoga class? Does she know that it’s allergic to penicillin, but loves echinacea? What about that cool hula-hooping trick you learned last summer? She couldn’t possibly treat this body the way it deserves. She couldn’t appreciate it the way you do, love it the way….

You place the other bodies back on their hangers, and open the door. You look at the woman standing there. Her body is fine, a great body, and you wonder for a moment why she would dream of trading it in for yours.

“I’ve made my decision. I choose this body. My body. The one I was born with.”

She looks a little disappointed, and then shrugs and wanders away into the aisles. You silently wish her good luck, that she finds the body of her dreams.

You wander back out into the sunlight, happy to have chosen this body above all other bodies as your own. You’re pretty attached to it, after all.

Choose your body. So many of us live our lives as if our body is an unfair burden that’s been foisted on us by a god with a demented sense of humor.

What if instead, you said yes to your body? Yes, Body, I choose you! Choose this body with all its beauty, all its flaws, all its memories, and all its wisdom. Choose to live your life in this body. As if you’d been to the body store and walked out without buying a thing, tell yourself:

I could have chosen any body to live in, but I choose this one, this amazing, glorious body that is mine.

Why not?