Thursday, June 30, 2011

Participate in your Miracle


For years I have prayed to God and asked him to help me lose weight. I can truthfully say this prayer has been going on for over 25 years. I have believed in God most of my life and have felt his presence but until this year I have not really tapped into his power, his love, and his way of life for me. My prayers were selfishly motivated with minimal “thank you God’s” followed by long lists of wants driven by selfishness, what I thought and what I felt emotionally.

Often as I reflect on these prayers I see they were not at all seeking guidance and direction but more fantasy driven. I wanted God to pop out of his heavenly place and grant me my 3, or most times more, wishes or miracles so I would then be happy. I didn’t want to have to do anything for them either. You know the scripture, “Ask and it shall be given!” Seemed like the perfect plan to me! NOT!! Because I was still not only fat, I was heading toward morbidly obesedom. ( Yes, it is a word in FatDiva’s dictionary!)

After spending some quality, not the 5 min prayer morning and night, but quality time with God and his Word, and writing daily in my journey of reflection, I have some understandings about my life that I just want to share...

Revelation #1 : God is not my genie! I can’t just come to him in time of need and bark our requests and expect them to happen and most important remain a constant in my life without any work on my part.

Revelation #2: I have to be an active participant in the miracle. I can’t want to be a smaller size and still eat my 3 C’s (cakes, cookies, and chips). I can’t want to be able to sit in an airplane seat comfortably and not work out and live an active life. I can’t want to be able to shop in a regular, non -plus size, store and still be able to eat what I want, when I want, and how much I want! That is not my reality! That is actually my insanity. I have to be a willing participant in this and not depend on my own power to be able to do it. I would never be able to give up my 3 C’s by my own power. It is just not happening.

Revelation #3: I had to seek a higher power, God: Jesus: Holy Spirit, to help me give up my own way of life in order to live in the abundance of joy he has prepared for me! (That is my miracle, being able to submit to a new way of life).
Because of these revelations, my daily prayers have changed over the last couple of months. They no longer consist of my selfishly motivated requests but sound similar to this prayer:

God, I offer myself to thee to build with me and to do with me as thy will. Relieve me of the bondage of self that I may better do thy will. Take away my difficulties, that victory over them may bear witness to those I would help of thy power, thy love, and thy way of life. May I do thy will always. (12 Steps of Recovery: 3rd Step Prayer)

So my question to you is ... What is your miracle that you have NOT been an active participant? Have we asked to be financially stable and debt free but don’t want to give up our abundant purchases of shoes and accessories (Ouch! I stepped on my own toe). Have we asked to find or be found by our perfect mate but don’t want to surrender our unrealistic list of qualities over to God? Have we asked for a career change and don’t want to give up our own aspirations of financial or status based success to fulfill our purpose through God’s eyes? Or have we asked for a complete makeover of our life and just want to sit on the sidelines and wait for our miracle to come from our “genie in a bottle?” No judgments just food for your thoughts?

Fat Diva Rule # 28: Be an active participant in your Miracle.

Lesson Learned: Most things you strive for in life will not come without you being an active and willing participant in the process!

Wednesday, June 29, 2011

Fat Diva says... TAG HIM IN!


It’s been a while and I have lots to say! First of all this battle of the bulge is more complex than I had originally thought. I use to think that this was a one on one fight! There was me, FATDIVA, in one corner and the physical WEIGHT in the other. If I ate right and exercised then my troubles would be over. If this was true then I would be a size 0 by now! I am the queen of losing weight but what I couldn’t figure out was how to keep it off.

This is when it gets a little deep so I am using a metaphor of wrestling! See I thought I was in this one on one fight but little did I know this was a tag team battle. I wasn’t winning because I didn’t even know I had more opponents who wanted to fight me at the same time? This would maybe work if I had a partner. But where was my partner? Can you say UNFAIR FIGHT! My battle was no longer just a fight against my physical weight but I realized I was fighting my emotional instability as well. And there I was without any help (so I thought)!

I never could understand why I couldn’t keep the weight off and could never win the battle. Now I know! Every time I would lose weight and would seem to have the weight issue on the ropes, my emotional instability would come and hit me from behind. And I would run into the arms of my first love (food)! Up against the ropes once again being double teamed. I would just lose once again (for the slow folk,... that means I would gain the weight back).

What I didn’t realize is I have a tag team partner, my spirituality, better known as my relationship with God, which I could use to help me with my battle. He is standing ringside waiting for me to tag him in. In the past, I would only cry out in hurt and anguish over me losing the battle but never really asked him to join the fight with me. I never tagged him into the battle and therefore I was losing every round no matter how hard I was fighting. The physical and the emotional issues were kicking my butt daily and not until I started tagging him in, seeking God for guidance and understanding and just basically building our relationship, did I fully understand this fight and began to win.

As a result, I had a “behind the scenes” view of my life...and my struggle with food. It, my weight issue, was like a cancer (Side NOTE: I know another metaphor!! Yeah Jesus spoke in parables so everyone could understand where he was coming from, so there you go!! )

Where was I, oh yeah, CANCER... my weight started in my physical body but started to affect my emotional stability and my spiritual growth. And actually I am not even sure if it started with my physical body but in reality it was my emotional instability that started it all. So what do we do with cancer, we fight it! So that is what I am doing! I am fighting against this problem. But the key is not to just fight where the cancer started but in all the places it has spread because if I don’t it will keep coming back! I mean that literally because I have lost and gained the same hundreds of pounds over and over again in my life. I wasn’t fixing all of the things that were making me fat and fatter!

In order for me to have this excessive weight gone I would have to have a plan that not only helps me address my physical issues but deals with my emotional issues as well. And I can only do it by tagging in my partner, God! He will be able to fight when I am down on the ropes, he will be able to give me strength when I am physically exhausted and emotionally drained. He will be the source of my strength and power. All I have to do is TAG HIM IN!

Fat Diva Rule # 36: When you are being double teamed by your physical desires and your emotional distress don’t forget you have a partner and all you have to do is TAG HIM IN.

Lesson Learned: In the battle of the bulge, things are always not as they appear on first glance.