In a little over two weeks, we will begin our new study using a book called HEAL – Healthy Eating & Abundant Living by Allie Marie Smith and Judy Wardell Halliday. Whether you are new to Thin Within or a veteran, this material will meet you where you are. Allie and Judy have provided a fresh approach for a younger generation and even though many of us are not in that “younger generation” necessarily (I know that I’m not!), I have found that most of us face similar challenges. In fact, often the challenges we faced when we were in college are the same or similar to the ones we face now!
My initial announcement about this study may be found at this link. Feel free to have a look. To purchase the book so you are ready to go, you can visit Amazon and that link is here.
For the study, we will continue to make use of the principles we have been using during Barb Raveling’s Weight Loss Bible Study. I will encourage you to renew your mind and to truth journal.
Here is how it will work…(I think! LOL!)
Each Monday, I will post a video that gives a preview of the week’s material. In this video, I will mention the assignment–highlighted also in the day’s post. There are six chapters in the book, so one chapter a week will be what we go through. When you get your book, get familiar with it.
Then, through the week, I will post content here at the blog that you can use whether your in the study or not. Even if you aren’t in the study, the material here will be intended to support and encourage you. If you are going through the study, it is my intention that the material I post at the blog will supplement and complement the study of the HEAL book. This has been my intention with the Weight Loss Bible Study, too. That way, whether you are plunging in with the study or not, you will find content here that supports you!
The section in the chapters marked “For Group Study” will be woven throughout the blog during the week–but, again, even if you aren’t doing the study, you can participate in that and be encouraged by it!
On Fridays or Saturdays, I hope to wrap up the week’s study with a summary.
Our study will conclude about the second week in June (if I have it calculated correctly). I hope you will join us!
What questions do you have about the study? Feel free to ask here–chances are if you have a question someone else does too!
Day 3 of our Ditch Your Scale Challenge: What promises of God are you “standing on” instead of standing on the bathroom scale? 🙂
I can hardly believe this is week 6 of Barb Raveling’s Weight Loss Bible Study! It has been going by so fast.
And it sure seems like a lot of you are experiencing some great breakthroughs. I have gotten to visit with some of you on the phone, in Skype, and in email and WOW! Your stories are amazing!
Please consider writing up a testimonial and sending it to me at heidi bylsma at gmail dot com. Let me know it is your testimonial that you would like posted to our Testimonials page (or you can just go there and post it in the comments, but I prefer to put it in the page itself!).
This week we get to deal with yet more pertinent issues related to the way we think that affects our eating. Here is a video about the first part of the week (the rest will come later this week):
If you are an email subscriber, please be sure to visit the blog site, as the emails don’t include the videos.
I am editing this post because God led me to do some renewing of my mind about “This is Hard.” I want to share this with you. You can make a list like this and then read it out loud daily for your own “renewing of the mind” experience:
This IS HARD. That is true.
BUT:
God will use this FACT and make me more beautiful – more Christlike inside and out through the hardship.
I will persevere
When it is hard, I am perfectly poised to see God show up.
In my weakness, he will be made strong and visible.
When it is hard, I get to see HIM as the Redeemer.
I CAN keep going when it is hard.
I HAVE to keep going when it is hard.
He never promises that Life will be easy.
I share in the fellowship of the sufferings of Christ.
THIS IS LIFE! Life IS hard!
This is training for more challenging things in the future.
As I just DEAL with it and GET OVER MY DESIRE FOR EVERYTHING TO BE EASY I will develop and grow and change and be a better person—the one that God has placed me on this earth to be.
When life is hard, when eating 0 to 5 is hard, I know that I am becoming more like Christ. I am being trained to BUCK up for things yet ahead in my life.
I can PRAISE my God through this trial and blow the lid off of my own piddly expectations! GOD IS GREAT and He will show me His glory!
Satan doesn’t get to have his way with me.
LIFE IS HARD and I can LOVE it that way because I KNOW that this is for my good and God’s glory.
Through this being so hard, I get to develop a deep dependency, a greater intimacy with my God!
This week, your assignment (and mine) is the following:
Evaluate your renewing of the mind goal that you set earlier. Do you need to adjust it? Do you need to recommit to it? If so, do it! What do you need to think differently about?
Early on, Barb challenged us to commit to three days of staying within our boundaries. How about doing it again this week? Can you commit to just THREE days? Three days of saying YES to God and the boundaries that he has set for you? 🙂
Complete Day 11 – Following my boundaries – Losing Weight – is HARD Eating of Barb’s Bible Study.
Continue to journal about the questions Barb asks and share with our community here. I know we are in the final stretches, but let’s finish STRONG! If you aren’t at the pace that I am posting at here at the blog, go at your own pace! 🙂
What has been the most rewarding thing about this study for you so far? What has been the most challenging thing?
If you are an email subscriber, please be sure to visit the blog site, as the emails don’t include the videos.
The reasons I chose it for our study:
The survey said people wanted a deep study of Thin Within. The GOOD news is you can get HEAL for about $10 or so shipped. Check this link. So while this isn’t the Thin Within workbooks, it does teach the same principles or it wouldn’t have Judy Halliday’s name on it.
HEAL touches on issues that I think are deeply connected to renewing our minds as we have been. I think it will be a great fit.
Because the book is a 6 week study, we will be done before summer gets rolling!
Although it is written with a younger audience in mind (college girls), you will find that we definitely identify with the struggles mentioned in this book. We have all been that age and many of us were right there in the trenches. I have talked with enough older women to know that many of our struggles are the same ones we had decades ago! The voice and refreshing approach will encourage you and renew you, as well as challenge you. We will continue to renew our minds as we use this material, too.
This study will be similar to what we have been doing. Each Monday starting May 6, I will post the assignment along with a video. Each Saturday there will be a summary and wrap up of some sort, usually with another video. Like I have been doing now, Sunday – Friday, there will be other material—all to support you on the Thin Within/HEAL journey!
If this sounds good to you, get your book here. Allow plenty of time for shipping so you are ready to start with us May 6th.
We will have about a week off in between Barb’s study and the HEAL study. I hope you will dive in and join us!
When I saw this image, it totally reminded me of ME! She has that “I can TOOeat this if I want!” rebellious look about her. AND she is redheaded and freckled like yours truly. Do you ever feel this way? 🙂 I hope not! But if you do, I am in company with you. I praise God that he is at work in me, though, and the moments when I feel this way are fewer and fewer! YAY, God!
I want to cover a lot of ground today. This post includes:
A Video about Overcoming Failure Eating
Announcement: Who is the winner of this week’s drawing
Updated Bible Study schedule
Poll asking you for what you would like to study next.
Video About Failure Eating – If you subscribe via email. please visit the blog to see the video.
Even if you haven’t been doing the study with us, you can probably relate to a day when you gave in and ate outside of 0 and 5. You may have given up for the day, not even trying any more to maintain your boundaries. This is NOT uncommon! This short video is an option for what to do instead! I hope it helps:
The drawing this week is a bit…well…unusual. I prayed as is my practice and my hand landed on NATALIA! She won the week of coaching week before last. So, if Natalia would like one of the prizes, she will get one.
But it also seemed like I should reach in again…so I did. We have two winners. 🙂
The second winner is Lesley UK. 😀
CONGRATULATIONS!!! I will send you both an email and you can let me know which of the prizes you would like:
A Thin Within book (donated by Joe Donaldson of the Thin Within ministry)
A Hunger Within book (donated by Arthur and Judy Halliday)
A week of One-on-One Coaching (donated by yours truly)
Schedule
This is what is ahead for the remaining weeks of our Weight Loss Bible Study:
Evaluation: How are you doing? Use this worksheet to find out. Week 5 March 31-April 6
Emotional Eating: “This will make me feel better.” Week 5 March 31-April 6
Hopeless Eating: “I’ll never get over this. I might as well eat.” Week 6 April 7 – 13
Good Food Eating: Hey, that looks good. I should eat it. Week 7 April 14-20
Bad Scale Eating: I didn’t lose weight. I might as well eat. Week 7 April 14-20
Social Eating: She’s eating. I should eat. Week 8 April 21-27
Preventative Eating? I have to write this one up if we are going to look at it, but I think it bears doing! Week 8.
Then I will probably have a wrap up during a week 9. A chance for us to debrief about some things and a looking forward to what might be next.
What Do You Want To Do Next?
What’s next? Well, let me know what YOU would like to see! 🙂 Here is a poll to help me figure that out. 🙂 This is the first time I have tried this “polls” feature, so here’s hoping it works!
[polldaddy poll=6998572]
Practical Questions:
You may see by now that I like to end most of the blog posts with a “bringing it home” set of questions. So let me ask you: What practical steps can you take today to maintain your 0 – 5 eating boundaries? What have you learned during the past month of our study that really stands out as something you can apply today? 🙂
How important is it to you to be thin? Do you feel like losing weight will solve problems in your life and just, well, make you happier? What if God were to offer you a wonderful change in your character, a heart that is being conformed to his, a mind that is not burdened, yet you weren’t as thin as you think you should be. Would that be ok?
This week, we have the opportunity to evaluate the premium we place on thinness and if we are thinking God’s thoughts about it or if we have some work to do renewing our minds about how we think about weight and size. I hope that you are encouraged even though the material may be convicting!
We will also have a look at Entitlement Eating–another BIGGEE in motivating much of our eating outside of our boundaries.
We are already in Week three of our Weight Loss Bible Study with a Thin Within Spin. 🙂 If you are subscribed to this blog with email or another reader and the video doesn’t show up, please visit the blog site and check out the video. Here is what is going on this week:
Continue with your renewing your mind goal and taking time to try renewing of the mind.
Can you resolve to not eat outside your boundaries for three days this week?
If you haven’t tried Truth Journaling yet, give it a go.
Read and do the questions and journaling activities for Barb’s Bible Study Day 5.
Read and do the questions and journaling activites for Barb’s Bible Study Day 6.
Continue to post here. Each time you do, it enters you in the drawing for a free book or free coaching…each Friday, I draw a name. The lucky winner gets to pick either a Thin Within book, a Hunger Within book, or a free week of coaching. Not only that, but you all are such GREAT support for one another! THANK YOU again!
