by Heidi Bylsma | Aug 19, 2010 | Blog
WHOOO HOOO! I am celebrating!
After the mishaps with my doctor (actually a nurse practitioner) during the past month (of which I wrote briefly in the previous blog entry) and since I have never been very happy with my doctor there, I asked for recommendations from local friends and got one for a doctor who also happens to be a Christian man. Yay! I met him today for the first time.
I must confess that I called my previous doctor “Dragon Lady.” I have written about her here, here, and here.
There can be no doubt that I needed to get a new doctor a LONG time ago. But it took the medicine mishaps of the past month to get me to finally do it! It was scary what they were doing to me with prescriptions!
So, today, I had the joy of meeting Dr. Vince Licata. He smiles. A LOT. Nothing like Dr. Dragon Lady! In the course of conversation, do you know what he said to me? He actually referred to me as being about at my ideal size…he didn’t even LOOK at the number from being weighed today! (Neither did I, given my current insanity.)
I LOVE THIS MAN! He just looked at ME. He mentioned that I was clearly “athletic.” Can I KISS him, now?
Why was Dr. Dragon Lady so mean?
I certainly don’t see myself the way the new doctor does, but (pinch me, please!) this man is now my DOCTOR! I can die happy! LOL! I mean, if *anyone* could give me a non-biased, but professional, objective opinion, I think it would be him. It isn’t like I went shopping for a doctor who would say these kind of nice things to me. 🙂
How about you? What non-biased, objective statement might someone use to describe you? Is it possible that others see you very differently than you see yourself? As with my former physician, are there “unsafe” people in your life that God might want you to get distance from to act on godly boundaries?
by Heidi Bylsma | Aug 18, 2010 | Blog
Wow–blindsided! I didn’t see this one coming.
I don’t have a scale at home. Now I really know why all over again.
Long story short: I went to the doctor with a mild health concern. After two prescriptions that made things worse, instead of better, I was able to tell there was a change in my weight because of the way my clothes fit. The scale at the doctor’s office confirmed that I lost 8 pounds in about 2 weeks. The weight change was from not digesting things well due to bad reactions to the medicines prescribed. This is NOT a good thing!
The health problem is (I think) gone.
Now I have this “scale thing” present in my head.
It is amazing to me, in fact, that I am such a mess mentally from having been weighed and having this change! Suddenly everything I do or eat is being evaluated in terms of “I want the number on the scale to be lower the next time I go in, whenever that may be…” It concerns me, of course, that I lost 8 pounds lost in 2 weeks from being ill in response to medicines, but, in my twisted way of thinking–the old dieting mentality has kicked in–I have thoughts like: “Oh, well, let’s make the most of it and keep losing.” This is the way my mind used to work when I got the flue in the “old days.” It is like I feel compelled (truly…compelled) to act like the weight loss is something I must preserve and build on…Good grief.
This wouldn’t be so bad except it is with me constantly. I feel the presence of a number to define me, constantly. I have been free of this for over a year now. It is like a monkey on my back again. It is odd to me that I am so weak. That I can’t seem to use a scale as a tool even once a year…
God is using this to show me just how much I need him to experience freedom.
How about you? Do you battle with mental “junk” that happens when you step on the scale? Do you allow the number to define you? We are more than our weight! The number does not have the right to define us–only our Lord has that privilege!
by Heidi Bylsma | Aug 17, 2010 | Blog
Hi, everyone. I am planning for fall!
I have decided to lead a LIVE group going through the Thin Within workbook–Rebuilding God’s Temple Workbook #1.
I am hoping some of you will go through it with me here at the blog and, more, that some of you will even choose to have LIVE groups as well!
I hope to be at least a week ahead of those of you leading live groups so that I can offer you resources and thoughts that the group I lead found valuable/helpful. I will be offering two orientations for people to find out about Thin Within in my town, one on August 29th and the other on September 1st. I will have my first class on September 8 when I will assign the first week’s lesson to my class. We will go over the first lesson on September 15. I will post resources for you following my meeting with my group, so, for instance, resources for leading/studying Lesson 1 in the workbook will be posted probably on Saturday, September 18th.
So, what I need from you is by August 30th, use THIS post to let me know that you will participate and if you will have a group with you or not. This can be an informal group of 2 friends…or 1 friend! OR, it can be a group of 100 ambitious ladies! 🙂 Whatever God leads YOU to do. Let me know here what your plans are for this study. It is my desire that as many of us as possible will be connected LIVE in face-to-face opportunities with people. It doesn’t mean you have to be, but I do want to encourage it!
If you haven’t seen it before, click on this link to read about what is included in the workbook kit.
If you are a visual person and haven’t seen my “infomercial” about the workbook kit, yet, you can click on this link to see the post that includes the video.
$45 is a lot of money to most of us these days, so, prayerfully ask the Lord what HE wants for you. If you lead a group, I believe Thin Within gives you your workbook kit for $25. 🙂
Don’t forget to respond to this post by August 30th to tell me if you will be participating and if you have people who will do it with you! 🙂 I can’t wait to hear! 🙂
(Doing it solo, is certainly fine! :-))
by Heidi Bylsma | Aug 16, 2010 | Blog
I wonder if you can relate to these thoughts:
“I just decided to quit Thin Within for a while. I just couldn’t do it right.”
“There is something I am not getting about eating 0 to 5. I am not losing any weight.”
“There is too much freedom with this approach to eating. I do better with counting calories/points/blocks/fat grams” (etc., etc!).
“I haven’t lost any weight yet. I don’t know what is wrong with me!”
“I gained back all the weight I lost when I did Thin Within before. What is wrong with me?”
Many of us who apply ourselves to living the principles taught in Thin Within often struggle with thoughts like these. Sometimes, we stop and start the book or workbook numerous times. We visit the forums, this blog :-), the Thin Within Facebook page, maybe even the Thin Within SparkTeam, or a Thin Within Yahoo group–earnestly for a few days, a few weeks, maybe even a few months, before we again become discouraged and thoughts like those above fly through our heads.
Let’s recognize what is going on here! This is perfectionism rearing its head. Are you, like me…not having ever considered yourself a perfectionist really? Thoughts like these are tell-tale indicators that perhaps we are!
Not only that, but I want to suggest that these thoughts reveal that our focus needs to shift. Is the physical–our bodies, weight, size, shape–really what God wants us to spend such energy on? Even if we were at our “ideal body weight” (whatever that is!) would this be freedom, to constantly be clinging to the size and struggling not to gain an ounce? God calls us to freedom and He defines that that is!
For our light and momentary troubles
are achieving for us an eternal glory
that far outweighs them all.
So we fix our eyes not on what is seen,
but on what is unseen.
For what is seen is temporary,
but what is unseen is eternal.
– 2 Corinthians 4:17-18
Truthfully, in Christ, I believe we all have a longing for our eternal heavenly home–for perfection. It is a godly longing for perfection. But this godly longing becomes a roadblock when we stop and allow it to determine what we will do next. Or when we focus on the things in this world that are temporary (such as our body shape and size). In fact, it isn’t just a roadblock–it is an idol of our heart. Let me explain.
God is in the business of sanctifying his people. He justifies us. He declares us holy and righteous in Christ, but our Christian life does not stop there. God is in the business of progressively leading us to a holy life. One moment at a time, one choice at a time. We are being cleansed, sanctified, practically washed up, if you will.
BUT we won’t arrive at “perfect” this side of heaven.
That is just the reality!
Something we have to realize is that when we insist on perfection–“Doing it right”–or else we will quit, we are not allowing God to direct our paths. We are leaning on our own understanding. We are not acknowledging him or the eternal work he is doing within. We are elevating our pride in our performance above his personal leading in our lives.
The truth is even when we aren’t reading or “doing” Thin Within, God is at work in our lives. Perhaps he is doing something deeper–a work that must be done in order for me to get to the next level of freedom.
God values faithfulness so highly. When I know that God has called me to respond to my hunger and satisfied signals and to invite him into my eating experience, when I am convicted that I need to be rid of my bathroom scale because it is an idol in my life, when I am called not to give in to the pressures to have a Barbie body even at 48 years of age and 2 kids later…even when I don’t do any of these things well, FAITHFULNESS is what really matters! Hanging in there. Please, this is not “doing it perfect.”
Faithfulness means, every time I wander, every time I fall down, I allow GOD to lift me up again. It means that I rejoice in my weaknesses, because in my weaknesses, HIS strength is clearly seen. It means that I know that even when my weight isn’t where I want it to be, GOD IS FAITHFUL AND IS AT WORK DOING WHAT MATTERS INSIDE OF ME.
The following passage, one I quote here frequently, is the antithesis of perfectionism. Yet here it is! God’s thought on this matter!
But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you,
for my power is made perfect in weakness.”
Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses,
so that Christ’s power may rest on me.
That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses,
in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties.
For when I am weak, then I am strong.
– 2 Corinthians 12:9-10
Let’s reject the mentality that we must bail if we aren’t “doing it” perfectly!
Let’s be faithful and trust the Lord that He is at work in us doing a new thing!
How about you? Do you struggle with wanting to quit when you aren’t “doing” this thing perfectly? Will you take a moment and affirm what is true about the work God is even now doing in you? Will you allow your weakness to be a showcase for His marvelous strength?
