by Heidi Bylsma | Feb 10, 2007 | Blog
Starting again. Dieting mentality says you wait until the next day to start. Thin Within says any moment can be a new beginning. Actually, God says that. 🙂 Last night I had more dinner than I needed. My dieting mentality said I needed to have protein to make up for the overabundance of carbohydrates that I had had. Hellooooo. Anybody home? That was silly!
Anyhow, I did my restart last night about 7pm when I brushed my teeth and announced to myself I was done eating! Good grief!
I think part of the problem is the Amish Friendship Bread we have been making. I honestly tried to tell myself that there was no moral implication to having one thing over another for breakfast…and that I could have the bread for breakfast guilt-free, but for MY body, starting a day with carbs seems to set me up for failure. I need some protein in the morning. That is just the way God has wired me I guess.
Anyhow, it isn’t about the food. Here I am focusing on the food. It is about the heart. I want my *heart* to be surrendered to the Lord…
New beginnngs…His mercy are new each morning (actually, even more frequently than that).
by Heidi Bylsma | Feb 9, 2007 | Blog
When I was reading the Thin Within book in November and December, God really impressed upon my heart the value of gratitude. When pride rears its ugly head, gratitude expressed to God puts pride in it’s place. It is very hard for pride to live and be fed, when God is esteemed as the author of all things, every good and perfect gift, success.
I think that my resolve has eroded or something (yesterday didn’t get much better even after I posted) primarily because I have focused on mySELF. I know that focusing on the Lord will lift this burden from me and bring things back into perspective. HE is my strength. HE is my satisfaction. HE is my sustainer and Deliverer.
I am grateful to God that He has put people into my life to walk with on this journey. God has used the most unlikely means to turn me back to Him back in November and I am so thankful that He is willing to do that…to go to unlikely measures to accomplish unlikely things. 🙂
My husband and kids are extremely supportive. I am grateful to God for that, as well. I know that He has moved in their hearts as well. I am so thankful to God for that. My husband and my daughter, in particular, are affirming and encouraging.
Well, I will take some of my gratitudes to my personal offline journal :-). But I know this is a key. It is tough to get on the path of my performance when my focus is on the Lord. If I stay off of the path of my performance, then I won’t be fixating on MY success, MY body, MY choices, MY food, MY clothes, MY weight…yada yada. I will be all about GOD. That is what is missing.
by Heidi Bylsma | Feb 8, 2007 | Blog
I am not really sure what is up with me today. I feel so disheartened. I am still feeling bloated…that doesn’t help me to figure out hunger, but I also have been “searching” or something today. It doesn’t help that I made some wonderful Amish Friendship Bread with granola, nuts and cinnamon sugar on it. Eating that for my lunch isn’t exercising much by way of discernment. I wasn’t hungry at all, either. Or if I was, it was hidden by the fact I was feeling bloated. Bleah…
As I look back over the day, I think I started by feeling “guilt.” Instead of processing my guilt–rather conviction— by taking it to the Lord and observing and correcting (confession and repentance), I just stewed and allowed the Accuser to just use it to beat me over the head. I mean, I haven’t eaten very much at all today (relatively speaking), but I haven’t invited the Lord into what I *have* been eating. That is not only NOT what I want…I NEED to be intimate with him in this area of my life–in ALL areas of my life…but it is also what got me to a place I never want to return again. VERY overweight and miserable!!! I refuse to derail all that God is doing!
So, I guess I was feeling beat up by my own “club of condemnation” and I got out my Dance Praise and began to do that…about 40 minutes into it, I really hurt my arthritic ankle. This happens every now and then, though it hasn’t happened in a long while. It makes it hard to use it at all even for walking let alone “dancing.” So I stopped. I was bummed about that, too.
I think a part of my unconscious thinking was that I would somehow exercise to make up for any “boo boos” I had made with my food. Man alive!!! This is totally DIETING mentality! As I sit here typing this, I am processing it…and seeing it for what it is…good grief!
God forgive me! Lord, I submit myself to you right now, in this moment. I want to be what YOU want me to be. I want to walk in all YOUR ways. I know that if I trust in the Lord with all my heart and don’t lean on my own understanding, if in ALL my ways I acknowledge you, You will make my paths straight. That is all I have to do, really…just CHOOSE you. You even work in me to be willing to do that!
So, Lord, I choose you. Forgive me for not inviting you into my eating/drinking/everything today. I confess (observe) and repent (correct). I choose to turn away from mindlessly doing whatever I want, even if it seems “mild” and choose to follow YOUR leading. It isn’t the eating that is necessarily the sin here…it is rejecting your guidance, your leading, your hand. I identify it now as sin, confess it as such, and gladly, joyfully receive your forgiveness and empowering for the rest of this minute, this hour, this day.
Holy Spirit, please flood all the empty places in my life. Fill me up again to overflowing! Cause your truth to penetrate my heart again and keep me focused on the TRUTH, not on lies. I rejoice that you have revealed the Truth to me. I am free to live according to the Truth! Thank you. Let me believe God and what He says about me…and to LIVE, CHOOSE, ACT like I believe what I claim I believe!
And I pray, too, for my ankle…that it wouldn’t hurt any more. As quickly as the pain came on, I know you can make it go. Please do, Lord. But if you don’t, help me to learn from you what you want me to learn during this time. Help me never to depend on exercise again to lose weight. You have shown me in so many ways that I don’t need to do that. Exercise is something I do because of the great joy you have given me doing it and also because it causes my body to be healthier…I don’t want to do it so that I can eat more.
Thank you for your patience, kindness and that it is your kindness that leads me to repentance. In repentance and rest is my strength. I choose repentance and rest….I know you will take care of being my strength.
Amen.
by Heidi Bylsma | Feb 7, 2007 | Blog
“…for in his own eyes he flatters himself too much to detect or hate his sin.” Psalm 36:2
This verse penetrated my heart. I have been so excited about releasing the weight and feeling like I LOOK so much better…talk about pride! It is one thing to celebrate God’s amazing work (and to keep on, as the work isn’t completed…). But it is quite another to flatter myself by repeated glances in a mirror…”Oh, my! I *am* looking different!” or returning to the closet to try on those smaller jeans…again… “Almost! Won’t be long now before they fit GREAT!”
Becoming captivated by my “progress” is arrogant, conceited and prideful. It also, according to this verse can keep me from detecting sin…which continues to need to be rooted out.
I posted some time back about how I am to do more than merely avoid sin. I am to HATE sin. This verse speaks to that. If I am so busy flattering myself that I don’t detect my sin, then I won’t HATE sin either…
I need to “break camp” and not stay put here celebrating.
Time to “forget what is behind” and to “press ON.” There is MORE ground to cover.
I AM thankful for all God has done, but I want to see what OTHER new thing God is doing!
by Heidi Bylsma | Feb 6, 2007 | Blog
I cleaned out my close over the weekend. I confessed to the Thin Within Yahoo Group that I had a fear of getting rid of my larger sized clothing. Well, it was cathartic to admit that. God used it to kick me in the bum to at least put all the clothes in garbage bags. I haven’t carted them off yet, but I plan to have the courage to do so.
The fun thing about cleaning out the closet was I found some things…some smaller sized pants that now fit…YAY!
I also found my largest short that I was busting out of…they were split..I think I will keep them for a before and after picture or something. I mean it really was a huge comparison. It doesn’t reflect where I began *this* time (I hadn’t gained back all the weight I had lost)…but it *does* reflect where I was when we first moved up here in October of 2002. It works well enough to give me a visual. Maybe I will glue them to my closet wall (it is a walk in closet) so that if I ever lose sight of faithfully continuing to obey the Lord with my eating, I can be reminded…”Do I want to return to that prison!???”
All for now. My keyboard is giving me fits.
by Heidi Bylsma | Feb 6, 2007 | Blog
Thoughts about 5…for me the real change in my thinking and results came when I began to evaluate “When am I no longer uncomfortable from hunger?” That helped me a lot. The truth is, in the past, I wanted to see how much I could eat *before* getting uncomfortable again. That was because I didn’t want to let go of food. It was that idea of that while I was avoiding sin, I was not hating it…so I tried to go right up close to the edge and *maybe* stop just before I had eaten too much. That phrase “how much can I get away with?” was true of me.
Now it is more “How little do I need?” No…not like the anorexic might do. If a person has that in her past, I would guess she would have to ask God to help her not to fall prey to that again…but for me it works well.
As I said before, Judy Halliday referred to 5 as being where you stop when you are energized and could get up and exercise without that “Oops, I ate too much” feeling! For me, after she said that, I tried it…I actually exercised after eating and found it really helped define it for me.
As I mentioned in chat, there is a range for me…from the minute I am no longer hungry, to what I used to call a 5….it is where I don’t feel the sensation of food in my stomach.
I asked my 14 year old son what a “5” feels like and he said “Nothing.” He has a point. It is a *lack* of a sensation and for me, that is satisfied. I think it is unusual to consider *nothing* “satisfied!” LOL! But frankly, when I feel food pushing on my stomach…or even settling against it…I don’t like that any more. So stopping before that IS satisfying. (I have to laugh…as I typed the above about my son, he announced from the table where he was eating a late dinner that he was STUFFED and that his hunger number was “12” and that he is going to be sick! Sigh!!)
Anyhow, if I add to this description, where am I comfortable (no longer uncomfortable from hunger) and energized so that I could exercise…well, that about sums it up for me! No erpy burpies…Yes!
I don’t know if this helps anyone else, but boy…it has brought clarity to me.
