Healthy or Not

On being willing and able to look at yourself with your eyes open.

How many times must we see the ways we trap ourselves before we learn that we don’t have to fall in, and we don’t even have to set a trap?

I cut out gluten at the beginning of the year, an arbitrary rule I decided I should follow for the sake of my so-called healthier self. I go through phases of becoming obsessed with cleansing and “purifying” my body, usually by restriction, and will seek experts people who tell me that yes, this detoxifying salt-oil-sugar free / celery juice / raw lifestyle will make you feel amazing and it’s totally safe and healthy. You will ascend to new spiritual realms. Pay me to tell you this for thirty days; you’ll never go back.

I added some more arbitrary rules early in the summer, and then I passed out because of overexertion, and now I’m here again, rule-free, eating frozen buttermilk waffles and falling in love.

How many times will I be tricked into believing that I can be a person who does “cleanses” and remains healthy? Does a childhood eating disorder mean doomed to a life of problems with food? Is my brain permanently scarred with the memory of deprivation?

To the collective—why are so many of us so fixated on purification and detoxifying? Is it simply part of being a human, this tendency to obsess over that which we think we have control?

Sometimes it’s hard for me to determine what’s healthy, when I’m caught in the drama of the disordered mind. This feels very true, and I also know it’s a lie I tell myself when I don’t want to face the truth. It’s not actually hard to determine what the “healthier” or loving choice is; what’s hard is to acknowledge and act on it. When I know I’m avoiding knowing something, I pretend it’s hard to know that I’m avoiding it.

I think this is pretty common, right: we don’t want to face the truth of what we don’t want to be true, so we don’t. Besides, we can only be as honest as we can be right now, with the information we have thus far, and if our awareness or life hasn’t let us in on more truth, we’re off the hook for doing anything about it. Here though, we must remember, we have agency—periodically inquiring “how am I lying to myself right now?” may do some good work on expanding our awareness at any given moment.

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It feels so boring, to get trapped in the same old pattern over and over again. Restriction, again, obsessing over my body, again, living in my neurotic mind, again, feeling awful about it all. Boring.

But, as anyone who has gone to a recovery group will remind you, life and recovery are not linear, and when we go forward—as we can only do—we bring along what the past has taught us. We are not the same people as we were the last time that happened. There’s been growth. And, there’s something new and beautiful waiting for us on the other side.

When we talk about self-development, or making life changes of any kind, the actions you take are secondary: for me, it’s only a little bit about the gluten. Mostly, it comes down to relentlessly confronting the truth of the moment as it has landed within you. Self-awareness is the real name of the game: if you’re willing and able to look at yourself with your eyes open, you unlock the agency to change in ways that empower you.

As I keep learning, over and over, whenever I choose to move out of a period of restriction and rigidity, life opens up to me. When I choose a gentler way, life fills the blanks in with love.

Seems like confirmation to me.

Happy fall! May it be bountiful.

Maggie