Do you love your body?

My body at last, I claim you!

I live here!

I am not some discarnate spirit using just any vehicle to get around….

for so many years I rejected my body because it isn’t perfect

according to the standards of my culture.

I have been unfaithful to it, letting other’s opinions turn me against it,

allowing others to use it without love, without tenderness…

Because I myself rejected my body I didn’t protect it,

didn’t demand that it be treated like the precious gift that it is…                                

My body, the temple of my soul deserves better from me.

I reclaim this body…

This body is a miracle; it is the first gift of the Creator to me – my birthday present.

I take this body to have and to hold, in sickness and in health,

to honour, love and cherish until death do us part.

I am a woman reclaiming my body”

 - Janet F- Quinn

To fully reclaim our body and free us up to make more conscious and healthy choices in relation to how we treat it, we need to understand our thoughts and how they relate to our relationship with food.

What I’m talking about here is not just what we put into are bodies but why?
What is the thought or belief that leads us to treat our bodies the way we do or don’t do?
And what feelings and behaviours are triggered by these thoughts?

Awareness of this will not only support your choices but also aid motivation and persistence to achieve your goals.

So here's a journal question - What do you need to change, do differently, give up, or introduce to 'reclaim your body'?

To discuss this more and find out how the Conscious Eating Coach can support you further e-mail jacqui@artoflivingcoaching.co.uk

Weight Loss Plateau - Is it emotional?

As some of might know I'm always looking for the underlying psychological causes to our health issues and I think a weight loss plateau might also come into this category.

If you are someone who has reached a plateau for a while then maybe there is an emotional block to moving forward.

When I did some work on this for myself some years ago, my explorations revealed that holding on to weight was a form of psychological 'protection' for me. Fat meant being safe, that 'I couldn't be 'got'.', and only by recognizing and acknowledging this was I able to let it go and move on.

So if you think this might apply to you then ask yourself the following questions...

• Why did I put the weight on in the first place?
• How did it serve me? (e.g. helped me cope with a breakup, de-stress etc.)
• If I was to reach my ideal weight, how would my life change?
• What or who might I have to let go of that maybe I'm not ready to?
• Who do I think I'll become when I lose the weight?

If you want to explore these more then e-mail me for your complimentary Conscious Eating coaching session.

5 Tips for moving past the Plateau

1. Persist - just hang on in there! If you're sticking to your regime then it is coming off, just maybe not enough for the scale to see right now.
2. Check for hidden calories, it is surprising how many calories can be hidden in a teaspoon of this or a pinch of that - be honest with yourself.
3. Increase muscle building exercises - Muscle burns fat!
4. Revisit your goals and motivation for losing weight in the first place and ask yourself if maybe you have reached a plateau because that is where you body feels most comfortable.
5. ACCEPT that you are where you are, ACCEPT that your body is resting from weight loss right now, ACCEPT that you are eating for health whether or not you are losing weight, ACCEPT YOURSELF FULLY. Refusal to accept the reality of where you are right now will build into stress and likely be the cause of 'why do I bother' binges.

How to move forward when you reach the Weight Loss Plateau

I've been thinking lately of plateau's - specifically when after a few weeks dieting you hit what appears to be a wall and no matter how much excercise you do or how many calories you cut down to, the weight just doesn't budge.

Everyone on a weight loss diet will at some stage reach a plateau - maybe for a week or two, maybe even longer. Rather than becoming despondent over this - that your 'hard work' seems to not be paying off anymore I would like to invite you to take this opportunity to review and revisit your plan.

Firstly, accept that for the moment your body is resting where it is. Getting annoyed will only increase resistance, make you unhappy and probably contribute to you giving up.
Secondly take a moment to acknowledge what you've achieved to date, not just the pounds lost but the way your clothes feel, the way your body feels - relish in your success to date!

When you've done that you will be in a far more positive place to then take a look at your plan.
So when you do ask yourself the following questions...

• Are your original goals still valid or do you now have different ones?
• Does your original strategy for achieving these goals need to be changed or varied?

Although our bodies work somewhat like machines, unlike machines we cannot guarantee the output and our bodies will work at the pace they want to work, maybe you need to vary your routine, maybe up the exercise, maybe leave off the exercise for a day or two.

If you are considering reducing your calories more, just remember that your bodies need a minimal amount of calories to function and cutting down too much is unhealthy and cause your body to hold on to fat if it thinks it is going to starve.

Who really knows what foods agree with YOUR body?

I've been thinking some more about the blood group diet and I'm still curious how such a generalisation can be good for everyone. Whilst our blood group might be the same, our life and health experiences are not so how do those get taken into account?
I was speaking to a women a couple of days ago who was praising this diet as it suggested to her not to eat white bread and cows milk. These are actually, products that are commonly known not to be the best for us - white bread because the flour has been processed so much there is no goodness left in it and...well...surely any animal milk is designed to be drunk by the baby of that species and so cows milk surely is designed for drinking by baby cows? what do you think?

The other thing I've been pondering on is the diagnosis by a machine of what one should or shouldn't eat. Some vegetarian friends of mine went to see a local homeopath/naturapath and he used some machine on them which said they need to eat meat and fish. There was no testing of blood or other internal physical condition and so I'm wondering how too this works. How can a machine 'listen' to a body's needs better than the owner of the body?

Claiming Your Body! - Janet F Quinn

My body at last, I claim you!

I live here!

I am not some discarnate spirit

using just any vehicle to get around….

for so many years I rejected my body because

it isn’t perfect according to the standards of my culture.

I have been unfaithful to it,

letting other’s opinions turn me against it,

allowing others to use it without love,

without tenderness…

Because I myself rejected my body I didn’t protect it, didn’t demand that it be treated

like the precious gift that it is…

My body, the temple of my soul deserves better from me.

I reclaim this body…

This body is a miracle;

it is the first gift of the Creator to me – my birthday present.

I take this body to have and to hold, in sickness and in health, to honour, love and cherish until death do us part.

I am a woman reclaiming my body”

- Janet F- Quinn