14 Jan 12, 2:30 PM
totallycoverme
UK(M), 4 yrs
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skyfox wrote:
The women in my family have always struggled with weight problems. You can't really tell it by looking at me, but I take after my father's side of the family more than my mother's side in that respect. But I feel a decent comparison is with depression.
When I was pretty depressed in college, I had a boyfriend who said "well, just cheer up!" To a depressive, that's about as helpful as telling an overweight person to eat less and exercise more. If it were that simple, we'd all be happy thin people with beautiful lives in a fairy tale land full of rainbows and butterflies.
I've come to learn about my body and my mind. I know that my body reacts well to exercise. I have what I like to think of a peasant's body, easy to train to do hard work and heavy lifting, but when lax grows horizontally in a disturbing fashion. I know that my mind is prone to obsessive thoughts about my lack of self-worth and amplifies past mistakes. I also know that there is a connection between my body and mind and helping one helps the other. Yoga and meditation has done wonders for both, and I can really feel it both physically and mentally when I'm stationary for too long.
Where I am, I feel more in control of my body and my mind. I know I am still likely to gain weight if I do nothing, and I know I am still likely to very dark thoughts if I don't maintain my emotional and mental well-being. But I also know a bit more of what triggers these negative reactions, and what helps combat them, and am able to utilise various techniques to force myself out of bad places.
I was not taught how to manage myself this way. This is simply trial and error and finding different coping mechanisms. Life is a coping mechanism. I am not advocating therapy or something unless you feel it would help you. I am advocating knowing yourself. Know your mind and know your body. That knowledge gives you the tools to be able to control your mind and body. When you can control your mind and body, you can get it to do anything you want it to.
It's a battle, it always is, and once you've lost control it's really hard not to slip back into that same pattern again, but it is possible. Difficult and sometimes painful, but possible. It may not be like anything else that anyone else is doing; it may be exactly what someone else is doing. Maybe you need support, maybe you need constant change, maybe you need to feel challenged, maybe you need to feel rewarded, maybe it's something else entirely different. Everyone is different. But if you don't know yourself, you're just wandering around in the dark.
There are admittedly downsides to this. I know it sounds rather cold or a little hippy-ish depending upon your perspective, and can lead to either cold "I refuse to deal with this topic/person/thing because it would have a negative effect on me" behaviour or "I must do this because without it I gain weight/lose my sanity" insistence, but sometimes you have to protect yourself first and deal with other people later.
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amen to the bold 
I like what you say here. It sounds like a very holistic way of thinking what with recognising the body and mind as things that work together and that if one's out of groove the other will follow.
It's nice to be important, but it's more important to be nice xx
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14 Jan 12, 7:35 PM
MissKimberley
NL, 8 yrs
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lushvelvet wrote:
I despair of the unkindness and utter lack of compassion extended, here on IC and elsewhere, to people who are overweight. Few people are fat because they don't know or understand the simple equation of calorie intake v calorie expenditure for heaven's sake.
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Thank you for validating my intelligence  Amazing how I manage to be a professional in a well paid job, got a university degree and have normal loving relationships with human beings but supposedly as a fatty can't work out what makes me fat.
lushvelvet wrote:
I don't have a solution to the obesity problem. I just know that we as a society, and those who govern over us, need to accept and address the fact that overeating often has very little to do with physical hunger or ignorance of basic physiology. Until that happens, campaigns to tackle obesity are destined to fail as they're ludicrously simplistic and attempt to tackle the symptoms rather than the cause.
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Amen.
“During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act” - George Orwell
"In order to be irreplaceable, one must always be different" - Coco Chanel
Please check out @FemDom_Forum too!
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15 Jan 12, 7:04 AM
Cinnamon_Tart
UK(S), 8 yrs
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All credit to the OP for not censoring what I'm sure in many cases must have been frustrating replies.
I don't know anyone who is heavier than they wish to be, and happy about it. It seems very simple to me: it is within your control. The choices you make, whether to eat less, exercise more, take pills, have surgery, go to a diet club etc....
Your choice. Your life.
Just don't spout crap about unproven or dangerous or stupid solutions. You look like a fool if you do, but more to the point, you're only kidding yourself.
Same with other eating disorders. It remains your choice to accept you have a problem, and seek help, or not. Pleasure: quantified by plunge pools, and waterfalls.
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15 Jan 12, 8:50 AM
wonderer
UK, 5 yrs
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Cinnamon_Tart wrote:
All credit to the OP for not censoring what I'm sure in many cases must have been frustrating replies.
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I thought that as well, but then noticed she hasn't been on IC for 42 hours, so Bohnanza's comment on the first page is the latest she could have seen (unless she's lurked on to IC as a guest).
I think it has been a useful discussion, even though it's taken a course the OP probably didn't envisage. Thank you tallulahme for sparking it off and for hosting it on your weblog (so far at least!)
... and to various others who have posted on the thread.
Often things seem simple from the outside but far less so from an insider's perspective. I find hardly anything simple nowadays; there seem to be at least two sides to most arguments. So little is black and white; shades of grey and multiple vibrant hues seem to abound everywhere .
Making a major change to one's lifestyle can require huge determination and self-discipline; it may seem simpler to those who have these qualities in abundance.
I do agree that there are lots of "quack" remedies and diets out there which deserve little scientific credibility and are making money for unqualified purveyors. I think people should be especially wary of remedies which are unproven and dangerous, especially when exaggerated claims are made for their effectiveness.
Some of the odder diets seem to be relatively harmless, more like fashion accessories, and might have a placebo effect and actually help people to lose weight through non-biological (perhaps social or psychological) mechanisms. If so, there's an interesting discourse to be conducted on the ethics involved.
(Sorry my second snip is without context; selected as a concise representation of a point made by others; not intended personally).
"Wisdom begins in wonder” (Socrates)
"Imagination is more important than knowledge" (Albert Einstein)
Ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est. http://www.informedconsent.co.uk/posts/226772/
Edited 15 Jan 12, 9:18 AM by wonderer
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15 Jan 12, 9:57 AM
Cinnamon_Tart
UK(S), 8 yrs
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wonderer wrote:
Cinnamon_Tart wrote:
All credit to the OP for not censoring what I'm sure in many cases must have been frustrating replies.
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I thought that as well, but then noticed she hasn't been on IC for 42 hours, so Bohnanza's comment on the first page is the latest she could have seen (unless she's lurked on to IC as a guest).
I think it has been a useful discussion, even though it's taken a course the OP probably didn't envisage. Thank you tallulahme for sparking it off and for hosting it on your weblog (so far at least!)
... and to various others who have posted on the thread.
Often things seem simple from the outside but far less so from an insider's perspective. I find hardly anything simple nowadays; there seem to be at least two sides to most arguments. So little is black and white; shades of grey and multiple vibrant hues seem to abound everywhere .
Making a major change to one's lifestyle can require huge determination and self-discipline; it may seem simpler to those who have these qualities in abundance.
I do agree that there are lots of "quack" remedies and diets out there which deserve little scientific credibility and are making money for unqualified purveyors. I think people should be especially wary of remedies which are unproven and dangerous, especially when exaggerated claims are made for their effectiveness.
Some of the odder diets seem to be relatively harmless, more like fashion accessories, and might have a placebo effect and actually help people to lose weight through non-biological (perhaps social or psychological) mechanisms. If so, there's an interesting discourse to be conducted on the ethics involved.
(Sorry my second snip is without context; selected as a concise representation of a point made by others; not intended personally).
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It is still utterly simple, wonderer, about as simple as it gets.
You have a choice. It is your responsibility, and yours alone, what choices you choose to make.
Just be sure you're happy to live with the consequences of the choices you make.
And, if you are not, guess what, you're free to make another choice.
Pleasure: quantified by plunge pools, and waterfalls.
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15 Jan 12, 10:10 AM
TheSilverFox
UK(GU), 2 yrs
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Cinnamon_Tart wrote:
It is still utterly simple, wonderer, about as simple as it gets.
You have a choice. It is your responsibility, and yours alone, what choices you choose to make.
Just be sure you're happy to live with the consequences of the choices you make.
And, if you are not, guess what, you're free to make another choice.
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This ^^^^^^^^
The challenge is that a lot of us might know we want to change but what we are "familiar" with is easier for us to deal with than the risk of something we dont know or understand. This is the idea of a familiarity trap as opposed to the comfort zone. In the familiarity zone you can be really uncomfortable but know how to deal with it. What is unfamiliar is really scary... For more on this read Richard Bandler: Make your life great.
Making that choice and following through on it can be the toughest thing you ever do... Especially if you are changing a lifetime of behaviour... "I can and I will.... I just choose not to..... Yet!"
"The art of being a gentleman is knowing when not to be..."
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15 Jan 12, 10:26 AM
River_Deep
UK, 6 yrs
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You do not need cigarettes to live so you can choose to give them up
You do not need drugs to live so you can choose to give them up
You do not need alcohol to live so you can choose to give it up
You need food to live, you cannot choose give it up.
The first 3 are seen as addictions because they are not part of the life you are born with. You do not get them waved in from of your face every hour of the day.
If someone is smoking beside you, you can move. If someone is doing drugs, you can move. You do not have to go to the party/pub if you feel you may break your sobriety. Friends can usually comment on the first 3. You ever heard someone say "don't eat that cake as you will get fatter"
YOU HAVE TO EAT. You cannot escape it...
I think you get where I am coming from!
It is not what you say or do but the way you say or do it
Edited 15 Jan 12, 11:06 AM by River_Deep
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15 Jan 12, 11:00 AM
skyfox
UK(EH), 5 yrs
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TheSilverFox wrote:
Cinnamon_Tart wrote:
It is still utterly simple, wonderer, about as simple as it gets.
You have a choice. It is your responsibility, and yours alone, what choices you choose to make.
Just be sure you're happy to live with the consequences of the choices you make.
And, if you are not, guess what, you're free to make another choice.
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This ^^^^^^^^
The challenge is that a lot of us might know we want to change but what we are "familiar" with is easier for us to deal with than the risk of something we dont know or understand. This is the idea of a familiarity trap as opposed to the comfort zone. In the familiarity zone you can be really uncomfortable but know how to deal with it. What is unfamiliar is really scary... For more on this read Richard Bandler: Make your life great.
Making that choice and following through on it can be the toughest thing you ever do... Especially if you are changing a lifetime of behaviour...
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I reiterate myself:
In addition to TheSilverFoxes's point about the comfort of familiarity, there are a multitude of other hurdles to get over.
How can you change what is an effect (your weight) if you do not understand the causes?
The quack remedies and diets that Wonderer complained about are one of those distractions from the truth that divert and confuse. And what might work for one person might not work for another.
If you do not think that you have a choice, are you really making a choice?
If you think that your only options are A and B, are you really making a choice when there are so many other letters out there?
It's all well and fine, CinnamonTart, to say that people have a choice. But if you do not expose the other false options and show light on those that might be options, all they hear is "You have a choice between black and black. Now why didn't you choose white?"
Self-knowledge, acceptance (meaning acknowledging that something exists, but you don't have to like it!), and a certain amount of creativity in thinking can help people control a variety of behaviours. But each person is different, so you can't make hard and fast rules.
The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.
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15 Jan 12, 11:14 AM
TheSilverFox
UK(GU), 2 yrs
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skyfox wrote:
TheSilverFox wrote:
Cinnamon_Tart wrote:
It is still utterly simple, wonderer, about as simple as it gets.
You have a choice. It is your responsibility, and yours alone, what choices you choose to make.
Just be sure you're happy to live with the consequences of the choices you make.
And, if you are not, guess what, you're free to make another choice.
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This ^^^^^^^^
The challenge is that a lot of us might know we want to change but what we are "familiar" with is easier for us to deal with than the risk of something we dont know or understand. This is the idea of a familiarity trap as opposed to the comfort zone. In the familiarity zone you can be really uncomfortable but know how to deal with it. What is unfamiliar is really scary... For more on this read Richard Bandler: Make your life great.
Making that choice and following through on it can be the toughest thing you ever do... Especially if you are changing a lifetime of behaviour...
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I reiterate myself:
In addition to TheSilverFoxes's point about the comfort of familiarity, there are a multitude of other hurdles to get over.
How can you change what is an effect (your weight) if you do not understand the causes?
The quack remedies and diets that Wonderer complained about are one of those distractions from the truth that divert and confuse. And what might work for one person might not work for another.
If you do not think that you have a choice, are you really making a choice?
If you think that your only options are A and B, are you really making a choice when there are so many other letters out there?
It's all well and fine, CinnamonTart, to say that people have a choice. But if you do not expose the other false options and show light on those that might be options, all they hear is "You have a choice between black and black. Now why didn't you choose white?"
Self-knowledge, acceptance (meaning acknowledging that something exists, but you don't have to like it!), and a certain amount of creativity in thinking can help people control a variety of behaviours. But each person is different, so you can't make hard and fast rules.
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Agreed... The investigation will count for nought if you don't really want the change though... Or of course if you don't believe you can change... Personal "beliefs" about oneself are incredibly powerful at derailing the best of intentions... "I can and I will.... I just choose not to..... Yet!"
"The art of being a gentleman is knowing when not to be..."
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15 Jan 12, 12:30 PM
valleyrose17
UK(BS), 2 yrs
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I really don't understand why there is so much intolerance and mis-understanding about this issue and on this thread.
It clearly IS simple for some people and for others NOT so simple. Like everything else in life we are all different with different strengths and weaknesses and I don't understand, given the sopposed tolerant nature of people of nature on here, why the "it's so simple" brigade cannot see that.
And no - I am not obese either.. "Fear is that little darkroom where negatives are developed" Michael Pritchard
"Once in his life, every man is entitled to fall in love with a gorgeous redhead" - Lucille Ball
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