by Heidi Bylsma | Jan 27, 2013 | Blog
I haven’t been writing as much at this blog, but I have been writing at two others I have.
The first, my 1000 Blessings Blog, is something I like to add to as part of what I learned in Thin Within. Gratitude really does transform my life. For quite some time now, I have been adding to it bit by bit. Recently, I have felt a call to open my eyes more frequently, be still with more regularity and record the many gifts that are all around me. When I do, it radically transforms my heart…which is what I need if I am to live in freedom from the sin of gluttony.
The second is at my recently revamped website. My focus has broadened a bit to “Living Life on the Path of Praise” and, more specifically, “Moving from Fear to Faith on the Path of Praise.” I have been doing a series even as I walk through a very challenging trial. There, I share with the readers of the blog, strategies I am using to navigate the churning waters that threaten to consume me if I am not proactive. This definitely is related to Thin Within since many times in my life I have processed my heartaches with food. This time, I have determined to honor the Lord with my response. I hope you will come to my new blog and even subscribe! Join in or create a conversation. Let’s support one another. The first post in the series is found here.
I don’t intend to “abandon” this blog at all, but I did want the readers and visitors of this blog to know that my ruminating about life has been happening at other places, too, in case you might find either of the other two blogs encouraging. I hope you will join me there as well!
by Heidi Bylsma | Jan 25, 2013 | Blog
I have been married 28 years to the same man.
Nevertheless, one day a couple of months ago, I woke up next to a dieter for the first time in my life.
My husband had suddenly transformed–for the first time in my 30 years with him–into a calorie-counting, exercise-obsessed, dieting fanatic.
Ok, maybe that isn’t quite fair. 🙂
I have to tell you…this is a challenge for me! I came out of all of that. I was rescued from an unhealthy obsession. The same one I now see consuming him. If I had any doubt, I knew he had contracted the disease when one day he went to the gym, came home and watched football, plowed through a boatload of bean dip and chips and returned to the gym for a “two-fer.” Back in my dieting obsessed days, he called that “Bingeing and Purging” by using exercising for purging.
So how is this affecting me?
I am struggling!
We can be in the middle of enjoying a meal and he throws out numbers about the calories he is ingesting and the calories that the elliptical trainer at the gym reassured him he was burning. I remember this math madness that consumed me each meal.
Sure, I am thankful he is concerned about his health. He was at his heaviest ever and has now lost about 20 pounds.
When you put together his obsession with the fact that I am facing a difficult trial right now, I must admit…I am being sucked back in as well…I have been on a scale more in the past 2 weeks than in the five years previous! I, too, have lost weight. As great as that sounds:
I know this isn’t healthy.
Something is wrong. But my stomach hurts most of the time. I know it is anxiety. But my diet-obsessed husband (who has never dieted in his life, but has lost weight using the Thin Within approach) continues to affirm my weight loss. Don’t get me wrong–I haven’t been particularly overweight, really. Just at the higher end of what is reasonable for me. I am healthy, playing tennis multiple times each week and doing other aerobic activity a couple of times each week.
I remember those days…where losing weight–changing the outside–was so important that I didn’t pay attention to what it was costing my soul, my spirit, my mind…
So I press on. Asking God to help me find balance…find a way to live with a dieter without being sucked in…to rescue me again.
Do you have any thoughts about this? I would love to hear from you. How do you stay free from obsession when people you are with and care about are dieting obsessed?
by Heidi Bylsma | Jan 12, 2013 | Blog
This is a great mini-bible study by my friend Barb. In fact, it is the beginning of a series that I think can have a wonderful impact on anyone struggling with habitual sin! Let me (and Barb) know what you think!
by Heidi Bylsma | Jan 4, 2013 | Blog
When we first begin Thin Within or similar approach of eating between the parameters of hunger and satisfaction—we are thrilled that we are free to eat whatever we wish. We delight in what God teaches us about freedom in Christ. Breaking the bondage that diets have held us in for so many years is reason to rejoice!
But, for most, after three weeks or so, the honeymoon ends. We may come to a crashing halt, in fact. We may feel angry, dissatisfied, and/or resentful.
This is when it is vital to remember, we are called to fight for what is right. Jesus calls us to forsake sin and to give thanks in all circumstances. Contentment—in any circumstance—is our calling. We have desires. We are lured or urged to do, say, eat, think something that isn’t in line with our godly goals. It is at those moments when “suffering” is defined as denying ourselves. We say NO. “Not this time.” “Not now.” We fight against our flesh.
God tells us in Titus that the same grace that brings salvation teaches us to say no to ungodliness and worldly passions.
We have to make costly choices. We have to be willing to deny ourselves.
We are called by our Savior to live a crucified life. In this way we share in the fellowship of Christ’s sufferings. We experience intimacy with God. We count everything else as rubbish compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ.
He laid down his life. He shed His blood. He forsook His kingship in Heaven and perfect fellowship with the Spirit and the Father to take on the flesh of man that He might share in our flesh and blood and experience humanity…ultimately dying as a servant for sinful man. He went through so much and all he is asking of us is to say NO to our fleshly desires outside of godly parameters.
Hebrews 12:1-4 reads:
Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood.
I complain so readily, but *I* haven’t yet resisted to the point of shedding my blood…not even close!
When I think of how much I have grumbled, how apathetic I have been toward sin, how I have allowed food to regain more and more focus in my life…how I have not been vigilant against the enemy who has a will for my life…It MUST stop! The enemy’s will for my life (and yours) is to regain all the weight, experience defeat, failure, and become impotent in our testimony. It is to be a blight on the name of Christ.
I WILL CHOOSE TO REJECT SATAN’s WILL FOR MY LIFE. I am renewing my commitment to reject that will…RIGHT now. I want to ask you…will you join me? Will you reject the Enemy’s will for your life? Will you embrace God’s will? He who knew no sin became sin for us…and suffered accordingly…we are called to identify with him in his death…and say no to our flesh…
He waits. He receives us! There is NO condemnation in Christ!!!! If we confess our sins he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us of ALL unrighteousness!
Let us arise from the dust. Let us let him trade our sorrows for his joy!
Will you fight?
by Heidi Bylsma | Jan 2, 2013 | Blog
Instead, of a resolution this year, I joined in the My One Word campaign. I wrote about it at my new blog at my newly designed website.
My word for the year is: ENOUGH.
It is somewhere between NOT ENOUGH and TOO MUCH. LOL!
I have invited God to do whatever he wishes in my life. Here are two ways, He is using ENOUGH in my life to simplify things:
1.) There are many things I take to excess. He is challenging me to stop at “enough.” This can be eating, driving fast, talking, spending, etc. I also don’t do ENOUGH of some things, like organizing my home, praying, loving other people and serving. This side of my ENOUGH coin is very challenging for me, and there is much work to be done! I will let him show me and strengthen me as the year unfolds.
2.) The second side to my ENOUGH “coin”is: To experience the reality that God is ENOUGH for all my needs. God is ENOUGH when I am lonely. God is ENOUGH when I am hurting, when I am agitated, confused, delighted, angry, thrilled, disappointed…etc. etc. This side of the ENOUGH coin lets me ENJOY my God and experience him as my sufficiency and portion.
Practically, so far, I have seen great changes in my eating (which had gotten really slip-shod with a number of trials over the past year). God is driving home to me again what “enough” looks like. I am free to eat whatever I desire, but God’s Spirit whispered “Enough” to me after I had eaten a few french fries during a meal. He also whispered “ENOUGH” to me when I started to reach for a second helping at breakfast. Obedience seems simpler to me with this approach. I love it!
There is such freedom for me in this!
- I am not obsessing about my current hunger number. This simplifies the process considerably and invites God to use a single word that I pray each morning (and throughout the day) I will live according to.
- My family is in on this. They know when I say “I have had enough” that it means I am done and I am obeying God in this moment–don’t mess with me over this. 🙂
- This affects which foods I choose to eat when hungry. Sometimes, to be honest, because I am a sweet-a-holic, it is literally true, “That is ENOUGH cookies for the day.” It is true. I don’t need any more cookies to experience freedom!
- It also helps me to make wiser choices… “I haven’t had ENOUGH protein today…I am hungry, so will have some grilled chicken.” There is nothing virtuous about grilled chicken as opposed to fried, but in my case, I have had ENOUGH fried foods since I eat them so often. God is using ENOUGH to simplify so much!
Could this help you? Could using a single word through which to view this new year help simplify things–such as your struggles to eat more mindfully–for you?
ENOUGH has already been making changes in me. I am thankful that the Lord has given me a word that is so concrete and so life-altering!
How are you doing as this new year begins? How could you simplify things?
by Heidi Bylsma | Dec 31, 2012 | Blog
With the New Year upon us, the dieting ads are abounding! It seemed fitting to share this post, which is a re-posting from September 6, 2011. If you are interested, come on over to my new blog where I give three reasons why I won’t be making resolutions ever again and what I am doing instead!
Are you a dieter, hoping to find a blog that will offer you support and encouragement? I must apologize. I want to support YOU, but I don’t have the resources to support your diet. I would love to talk you OUT of being on a diet. I would love to talk you into being FREE for the rest of your life. Not free to be overweight, but free to lose the obsession with food and dieting AND free to find your natural God-given size, all the while growing in a closer relationship to the God who created you!
I would be so blessed if you would let me talk you into ditching your diet–forever!
I bet you know how to diet with the best of them. If you are like I was in 1999, you have lost weight a bunch of times. The trick is, we just can’t keep the “performance” up. It wasn’t until I began to believe that my list of “good foods” and “bad foods” was NOT helping me and that I had to try a different approach that I was finally able to lose the weight for good. I lost the *thinking* that had kept me on the pendulum swing, too!
Many of us are fearful about throwing away fat-gram counters, diet books, the special foods, measuring cups and food scales. Having a meal where we don’t have a death grip on our food content FREAKS US OUT! We are terrified of what the scale will say in the morning, even if we have “been good!”
I just don’t believe that God intended us to live this way…in fear. Fear is not of the Lord!
He wants us to experience the provision, presence, and power of His Spirit in our lives. As we walk in dependence on Him, asking Him about our body’s need and what fuel He has provided to meet that need, we come to see Him as He is…a GREAT provider! He never intended food to TORMENT us!
This is part 4 of a series of posts about how “Junk Food” is a myth. My view is there is no such thing as JUNK food. In fact, I don’t believe some foods are fattening. Over-eating IS! 🙂 You can over-eat and get fat on ANY food.
If you are afraid that if you start eating burgers or fries or whatever else, you will expand to double your current size, let me share with you how this works. 🙂 Before I stopped focusing on the nutrition content…back when I was having to step out in faith and start eating according to my physical hunger and physical satisfaction cues without counting points, calories or whatever else, I kept a loose mental note of nutrition facts relative to my eating. I did this as a sort of “insurance” policy and also to see if this thing was really likely to “work.”
Here is what I found: If I am physically hungry and slooooowly eat a more calorie-dense food, and really listen to my body as it signals physical satisfaction…well, it doesn’t take much of a calorie-dense food to satisfy my hunger. This translates into fewer calories than some might think. The thing is, many of us assume that if we order a burger and fries, we will eat the entire thing! But we don’t need to do that. We can eat only what our body needs and it knows that it isn’t hungry after just a few bites. It may not take many bites of a calorie-rich food, but those bites are deeply satisfying! I don’t end up frustrated and ready to indulge at the first discipline failure.
Dieters know that fat has more calories per gram than carbohydrates or protein. So it stands to reason that things with more fat are likely to sustain me a bit longer and it is likely to take less of it to get me to a place of physical satisfaction. LESS of it. That makes a huge difference! If I eat LESS of a regular hamburger…say 1/4th of it, isn’t that better than eating TWICE as much of a fake-burger? When I eat the entire fake-burger even though I am not hungry, is that really healthier? Overeating diet foods or eating smaller portions of regular foods…which keeps me healthier mentally and spiritually? Well, for me, it has been smaller portions of regular foods. In the past, eating the diet foods, just resulted in me giving in later out of frustration and eating BOTH…the “diet” food AND bingeing on the “bad foods.”
With the dieting mentality, food was my god…either because I was over-eating it, consuming massive quantities out of the sheer compulsion to do so … OR I was obsessing about counting this or that, weighing this or that and being sure I had special foods with me when going out with friends. That is a “god” there, too! I wasn’t free of my idol just because I had switched from over-eating to counting everything. With both mentalities, my focus was FOOD FOOD FOOD! Not to mention the worry of losing or gaining and weighing. It drove me nuts!
When we embrace the freedom to which the Lord calls, we are free to be grateful and thankful with a humble heart and to enjoy any food. We begin to care more and more about how our bodies feel and begin to gravitate toward foods that we know intuitively make us feel better–more energetic and less bloated (for instance).
The “forbidden” foods no longer have a hold on us because they are not forbidden! We can have any food any time we are hungry and suddenly when I know I can have Chocolate Turtle Empanadas at On the Border any time I want, I don’t need to have them all the time! When I order them, I don’t need to overeat…I can slowly enjoy a few bites and discover that I am physically satisfied…not to mention emotionally *gratified* that I got to enjoy something so wonderful! Spiritually, I am praising GOD for the incredible tastes and textures in the food as well–AND that he has made my body so efficiently that it doesn’t take much food to sustain my energy!
I can keep this approach up for the rest of my life. That is why I don’t gain back the weight! This is a lifestyle change. And I continue to eat with gratitude and joy just as the Scriptures seem to indicate I should! I am not taking on a form of legalism as if it is godliness. Instead, I am learning to depend on the Lord as I seek His leading in the moment.
It just plainly takes less calorie-dense food to satisfy me than it does something that I don’t want in the first place just because it has fewer calories!
What do you think? Are you willing to give it a try?
