Thinwithin.org

New Things!

by | Dec 22, 2012 | Blog

Hi, everyone. My Thin Within journey blog has been returned to http://godisdoinganewthing.blogspot.com.

I hope you will come visit my new website and new blog. I don’t know if I will keep both up, but the same material that has been here since 2006 will continue to be here!

Say hello! 🙂 I would love to know you were here since things were offline for a while.

Thanks and have a wonderful Christ-filled Christmas!

See With Different Eyes

by | Dec 6, 2012 | Blog


Forget the former things;
    do not dwell on the past. 
See, I am doing a new thing!
    Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the wilderness
    and streams in the wasteland.
Isaiah 43:18,19 is a precious passage to me. God has used it to speak to me yet again.  He asks me if I can SEE what he is doing. Do I PERCEIVE the new thing he is up to!
I just returned from a wonderful horseback ride and it never fails to astound me that God uses my horses to teach me about life and about Him. Today was no exception.
Imagine walking through a dark alley after midnight in a part of town reputed for being riddled with crime.  What do you feel? Edgy? A sense of foreboding? Like at any moment you could be startled and it could mean severe harm? Believe it or not, that is how a horse feels much of the time! God has wired these amazing animals (since The Fall) with prey-animal instincts. This is true of wild mustangs, but also our barnyard trail horses.
Since horses anticipate they will be eaten at any given moment by a predator–not hurt, but killed– they look at the world differently than you or me. It makes time spent with horses on trails amidst forests filled with bogeys, replete with adventure.
Therefore, I have learned when I ride to see the world with the eyes of my horse. This way, I am prepared to help him when something unexpected frightens him and he jumps out of his skin (while I am still on his back). It might be a strangely moving rock (actually a lizard darting off the rock to shelter), a plastic tarp floating in the wind, or an inner tube hoisted above a fisherman’s head!
Today, a yard decoration twirled in the breeze on one side of the trail as a hiker approached with a child in a backpack on the other.  Poor Harley was convinced that his life was over. Because of the way I have trained myself to see with the eyes of a horse, I anticipated that Harley might need help and I was able to be there when he needed me.
Afterwards, as I considered how we managed safely through this experience in spite of Harley’s instinctive sudden leap sideways, I realized that looking at things from the perspective of my Heavenly Father also helps me to navigate life with greater tenderness and wisdom. What does He see when He looks at the teenager, the widow, my checkbook, my calendar? As my day stretches before me, if I choose to look at life with the eyes of my tender, compassionate Father God, what will I see? What will I know or be able to anticipate? What will become possible when I see things as he does?
My son reacts to something I say and, instead of disrespect, with my Father’s eyes I see that there is pain  deep in my son’s heart that he is guarding. I can come alongside and support him to process what is really going on.
A friend misunderstands me, challenging my motives and intentions, and, instead of being deeply wounded and going inward, I see with the Lord’s eyes the difficulties she has been facing and that I am a safe person with whom she can “decompress.”
His vision enables me to see that which I couldn’t otherwise see and provides wisdom to do that which I couldn’t otherwise do.
With my Father’s eyes, I see any of my “issues” and incessant longing to “just be normal” as opportunity to learn complete dependence on Him. Oh! How my struggle with this keeps me clinging to the hem of his robe!
Going through life, seeing with only my own eyes limits me too much, making me myopic or, what Jesus referred to as, “Nearsighted and blind.” I don’t want to miss rich opportunities that God intends for my growth as one of his children.
Today, I will choose to see with my Father’s Eyes.
How about you? What situation would be transformed if you could see it afresh through the eyes of your Heavenly Father?

Change Must Come From the *Inside* Out

by | Nov 28, 2012 | Blog

 This video is extremely powerful. It isn’t a Christian video, but it demonstrates *precisely* what one of my deepest concerns is about focusing on our weight and why I feel like the “Greater” calling of God on my life is to focus on HIM and WHO HE is… When my focus becomes Godward, I believe that *I* change…and these inward changes will affect my outward appearance.

It is my deepest conviction that the same is true for you! For everyone!

I hope that David experiences that transformation that God specializes in!

I Quit! — Sorta…

by | Nov 26, 2012 | Blog

I am done settling.

I am done with believing tiny things.

It is time to put my big girl pants on and dare to believe great things about my Mighty God! To catch a vision for the GREATER thing He has in mind.

Image Courtesy of iStockPhoto.com

 I want to wrap my arms (and heart) around everything that God has planned!

If you have visited my blog at all previously, then you know that my primary ministry for the past 6 years has been encouraging people with regard to eating between hunger and satisfaction. This has been “good,” but, now, a shift is in order. To continue with that focus would be to allow myself (and maybe you?) to be distracted from what is a greater, more worthy, focus.

I see it this way: I have a choice–will I allow myself to obsess about my size or even, perhaps, about the nobler thought of how my eating and weight may be a reflection to some people about the sufficiency of my God, or will I pursue the Greater thing that God wants me to pursue? Is it possible that I have been living the antithesis of what Jesus speaks of in Matthew 6? Read my anti-verses:

Heidi, worry about your life and what you will eat and drink. Go ahead and worry about your body and what you will wear, how it will look and what size it is. Your life is all about food and clothes and how you look. (Antithesis of Matthew 6:25) 

So keep up the worry–it is so productive! Obsess about what you will eat and drink and wear. The people in the world run after these things and God wants you to be just like them (not!). (Antithesis of Matthew 6:31, 32).

I have been living as if these are the words found in Matthew 6…but who would really say these things to me? The enemy of my soul!

Instead, Jesus says:

  But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, 
and all these things will be given to you as well. 
~ Matthew 6:33
God is redirecting my life. I feel the *good* thing has been to speak to others about offering our bodies to God and pursuing “0 to 5” eating–and I still believe this is *good*.  But I think my focus on this has eclipsed the greater thing that God wants to do in and through me.
I am expanding my vision.
Will I take him at His word? If I seek HIM first, and HIS righteousness, to know Him, exalt Him, praise Him, adore Him, walk with Him…if I allow this pursuit to saturate my life through and through–not just be “first” on my list each day before I take off and do my own thing–is it possible that anything else that He wants in my life will fall into place? 
If what is said is true–that the good is often the enemy of the best–then I want to move on, grow up, graduate on into the *best*…that greater calling of God. I want to put the “good” in it’s place so it doesn’t stand in the way of the best!
How about you? What have you focused on in your life that hinders you from pursing that Greater thing that God is calling you to?

Seven Survival Tips for the Holidays!

by | Nov 19, 2012 | Blog

Need some strategies for managing through the holidays? Consider these tips (also posted previously in 2007 and 2011):

Photo Courtesy of iStockPhoto.com



1. Figure out why you are going to a social occasion like a party or family gathering. (See chapter 25 in Thin Within.)

– Write down your purposes in attending and plan accordingly. Most of us, once we have decided to surrender this area of our lives, don’t go to parties intending to overeat. So ask yourself if it is because you want to connect with family, friends and co-workers, it is easier to accept that food isn’t required for that.

– Then, when you get to the event, achieve your goal! Socialize or network or whatever it might be!

2. When planning to attend a social event that includes food, plan to be at a zero (stomach totally empty) by eating a smaller meal earlier in the day.

– It may be unreasonable for you not to eat at some events–like sit-down holiday dinners and the like. If your event is at 7pm, for instance, and you get hungry at 5:30 pm–you are definitely at a 0 at 5:30pm–then have just a few crackers or a cup of milk or something that will just remove the hunger. You don’t need to eat to a 5. This way, you will be more likely to arrive at your holiday dinner at a 0 and ready to eat.

– You can also “ride the 0” a little while unless you know yourself well enough to know that you will have a hard time eating slowly if you get “too hungry.” When we eat too fast, it is easy to eat way too much.

3.) When you are eating 0 to 5 at a holiday party and there are TONS of choices from which to choose, you can look at all that is offered and evaluate before you choose the foods you will eat which choices are most likely to be “teasers,” “pleasers,” and “whole body pleasers” (see chapter 18 in Thin Within). You want to be “picky” about what and how much of each “pleaser” or “whole body pleaser” food you select.

– Identify which foods offered are teasers and don’t even “go there.”

– If something is available all year long (like fresh french bread) you may want to forego selecting it in favor of something that is a favorite at holiday time (chocolate peppermint pie? LOL!).

4. ) Look around the party or dinner for a naturally thin eater and note their behaviors. See if you can spot someone who is naturally thin, but who is enjoying the party without overindulging. (This may be tough as most Americans use holidays as an excuse to eat way more than we need…thus the “average” American gaining 8 pounds in two month’s time.)

5.) Sometimes people give gifts of food. It is true that some people love on others by giving food any time of the year–all the more during the holidays! In Thin Within, there is nothing wrong with having a small piece of whatever food that you receive, of course. If you know that you can withstand temptation to overeat it, feel free to have it in your home, of course! But if you know that you can’t handle the temptation, then here are some suggestions:

– When someone wants to send you home with a bunch of treats 🙂 either politely tell them “No, thank you,” or oblige and state (or not) that you will be glad to share the treats with others…then re-gift them as soon as possible before temptations lures you into eating them.

– I found that friendships didn’t end and family members didn’t disown me if I refused food from them. Maybe your friends and family are different…but really, when you consider where “people pleasing” has gotten most of us, it is like a death sentence. Most people who love us well enough to give us food gifts are aware of our struggle. Depending on the person, I have admitted my weakness as I explain why I have to turn down their kind offer.

– When you end up with treats anyhow…THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH FLUSHING THEM DOWN THE TOILET THE MINUTE YOU WALK THROUGH THE DOOR! If you are like me and sometimes need “permission” to do something so drastic, consider this a blanket permission… “Flush the cookies, cakes, pies, candy, whatevers…down the toilet!”

6.) Put the fork down between bites when you are eating out or at a holiday party. This helps slow me down quite a bit any time…not just for holiday parties.

7.) Maybe most importantly, EXTEND GRACE to yourself. If you “blow it” for a party or a meal or even for a day or a week…just OBSERVE and CORRECT! This isn’t a diet, so you don’t have to feel like you “blew it!” Instead, you just had a step or two back on your path…but forge ahead “forgetting what is behind!” Remember this is a journey…a life long journey! God extends grace to you in all things, so extend some to yourself!

What about you? Do you have strategies that have helped you make it through the holidays?