OK – Anna Nichol Smith is driving me nuts. Really. It’s the green-eyed monster in me. I ‘m jealous. She got thin REALLY quickly. I know that she’s taking “trimspa, baby” and I wanna take it, too! In case I haven’t put it up here before, I’m an ephedra addict. “Recovering ephedra addict” is I guess the correct title. I haven’t taken any in about 2 years, but, darn, I miss it. I love the feeling of zooming around all of the time AND I love the fact that it gets me thin – really thin – quickly. Unfortunately there are those darned side effects of having to take more and more, of feeling like crud most of the time, and, oh yea, gaining all of the weight back plus more when you’re body finally tells you that you have to stop taking it for a while.

I’m not going back to that life. In some ways, I ‘m just too damn old. I don’t need or want the drama in my life, but I really want to get back to my fighting weight like Anna. I guess that I identify with her because she and I have a really similar physique. I don’t have the “junk in the trunk” that she has, but the rest is the same….have you ever taken a good gander at the size of her hands!

Also, like her, I don’t like to limit myself. I’m not very good at telling myself “no”. Unlike her I have an excellent education and can carry on a conversation, but, hey, one of us is a millionaire and it ain’t the one that went to Cornell! I know, I know, I’ll get there when I get there. There’s sweetness in the process. I know all of that stuff. I’m not religious, but I do love that old saying: God grant me patience and GRANT IT TO ME NOW!

I feel a lot better today. I still have a pretty nasty sore throat, but it isn’t miserable like it has been. I’m going to make it to the health club today and I’m looking forward to it. Whenever I don’t work out for a few days, I feel like my blood gets thick, sluggish and contaminated. It will feel good to get things moving again.

I have had a lot of things going through my head about food, life, patience, and life experiences. I am a big fan of the “Conversations With God” series. It has really helped me to keep calm about the events of my life and of the world. I highly recommend that anyone who is interested in spirituality and a different way of looking at life pick up one of the books. One of the things that it has helped me to understand is my belief in the perfection in the continual moment of “now”. Our lives tick by, and we spent so much of it “wanting”. The act of wanting something takes it away from us and it robs us of the perfect of the moment. That is only my opinion, of course. I am a very forward thinking person. I tend to look ahead of where I am and start running to that place, rather than to enjoy the thing that I am experiencing at this moment of now. This has me sort of running through my life, and I don’t like it.

For example, seeing Anna Nichol makes me want to get “thin” as soon as possible. It makes me start hating where I am right now – which is sort of a “normal” size for me. I’m not particularly heavy; I’m just not skinny. I love being skinny. The problem is that I have always “cheated” to get there. I have taken pills, over exercised, under eaten and over dieted my way there. Of course, after running to get there, it doesn’t last very long because I have never done it in a way that was long lasting. I have cheated and cut corners. In the process of doing this, I have cheated myself the experience that I am experiencing right now. I have missed the ability to be calm, and I have missed the ability to trust my own body. I have an amazing body, but I haven’t ever trusted it. I have always believed that it would, eventually, betray me.

What I am finding, while sticking to the BTD, is that my body, if given the right stuff, is an amazing force. It can, as clearly as any spoken or written word, tell me what works and what doesn’t. It can clean itself out and clear itself up and in the process become what it was meant to be. I’ve really put my body through a lot of misery in the 40+ years that it has been mine. I amazed that it’s not ruined, but it isn’t. It’s perfect. Right now. Right here.

That’s the thing that I have to keep in my head – the perfection in the process and in every moment of “now”. I have brought forth this experience to myself, so why am I rushing through it? I have created every single moment that I live, so why do I treat these moments with distain and disrespect?

The question, “why?” tends to be an irrelevant one in my life, and a waste of time and mental energy. I know this, yet it still comes out of my mouth and rolls around my brain. I am working on moving past the “why?”s and moving into a place of embracing the things that puzzle me. That’s faith….not the easiest concept for a former agnostic such as myself.

A few diet notes: I have found that a small amount of really good dark chocolate, along with the bennie and neutral starches is keeping the binges and the diet pitfalls at bay. That being said, spending 4 days with a bunch of 5 year olds did take it toll on keeping on the program. I was REALLY relieved to be at home without child today so that I could stick to a really good eating program. My body starts to crave the simplicity and predictability of the ER4YT foods and beverages.

Speaking of craving ER4YT foods, my body – specifically my stomach – just growled at me to remind me that it’s time for lunch. I’ll write more soon…