Health For Sex

Golda Poretsky, HHC
www.bodylovewellness.com

Since I find myself spouting heresies every week at the Body Love Wellness Blog, I want to give you one more to chew on.

You Are Not Broken.

I say this because you are not an agglomeration of problems to be fixed and you are not in a race to see how fast you can fix them. I say this because you are really okay, right here and now.

I know that most of us go through our day connecting with what we see as our chronic problems. For many of you reading this blog, you have lived your life under the the spectre of your “weight problem”. Your “weight problem” colors everything you do, the way you interact with the world, the products you buy, the way you expect your body to function, the way you choose everything from your clothes to your lovers. And you think if you could just fix the weight problem, if you could just solve for x, everything else would fall into place, and you and your life would no longer be broken.

For others it’s not a weight problem. It’s some other problem that we’ve identified as being ours. It could be anything from infertility to cancer to crow’s feet. We all have certain problems that we magnify and see as the source of further problems.

We get lots of support in seeing our problems as the focus of our lives. Whether it’s an advertisment on television or a doctor’s advice, we’re constantly told that we need to get our problems under control, fix them, mitigate them, etc. We get the message that it’s our duty to elminate the problem so that we can then be happy and make everyone else happy. We understand that we shouldn’t rest until the problem is appropriately counteracted.

When we live our lives constantly focused on problems, we end up identifying with the problems themselves. As a result, we make poor choices and miss out on much of the good of life. (I can feel the chronic dieters out there nodding there heads as they read this.)

Only people who see themselves as having a weight problem would ever sign up for a diet program. Only a person who saw their weight problem as a major issue that had to get solved would sign up for getting weighed in at a meeting every week, eating prepackaged food for three meals a day, drinking diet shakes, starving themselves, making themselves vomit, etc. etc. If you don’t think you have a weight problem, you don’t do those things to yourself.

In other words, if you don’t see yourself as having a weight problem, you might actually be able to eat relatively healthfully, regardless of your size. You would be able to hear that voice inside your body that says, “I would like to eat that” or “I would not like to eat that” or “I’m hungry” or “I’m full.” You might also be able to hear your intuition more when it tells you things like, “I’d like to go back to school” or “I’d like to break up with my boyfriend” or “yoga is fun” or whatever your particular consciousness most desires. When you’re stuck in the problem, it’s hard to hear anything other than “I need to get this fixed right now in order to be happy.”

So, I will write it again. You are not broken. You are not a problem to be solved. Solving your “problem”, whatever you perceive your problem or problems to be, is not the key to happiness.

This week, I want you to identify whatever you think your big problem is. (For most of you, you’ll know it instantly.) Live this week as if your big problem was not a problem. Live as if it were already solved or wasn’t a problem at all. Notice what feels different. Notice if you feel better. As always, let us know how it goes in the comments below.

Attention New Yorkers! Golda and Body Love Wellness are now offering reiki treatments at a wonderful rate. Click here for more info!

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You Are Not Broken

Last week, I had the pleasure of going to a lovely dinner with my friend (let’s call her Amanda). The subject turned to the topic of dating. She told me how, about a year ago, she had wanted to meet a guy but wasn’t meeting anyone who piqued her interest, so she decided to start dating herself. In essence, she decided to be her own lover. She would take herself out to restaurants that she had been dying to go to, she would buy herself flowers, write herself love letters, make beautiful dinners for herself, and enjoy sensual time with herself. She so enjoyed dating herself that she ended up attracting a really great relationship in a matter of months. She joked that she was in a polyamorous relationship — her primary relationship was with herself and her secondary relationship was with her boyfriend.

What I loved about Amanda’s story was that she kept dating herself even though she now had a boyfriend because the benefits of dating herself were so great. So what are some of the benefits of dating yourself?

• Dating yourself allows you to get in touch with what you really want in relationships. It allows you to connect with how you want to be loved, how you want to be touched, how much space you need, etc.
• Dating yourself allows you to see how much you have and how much you are able to fulfill your own desires, without relying on someone else to do it for you. In essence, you realize your completeness.
• Dating yourself allows you to assert boundaries in your relationships in an easy and loving way. Sometimes it’s easier to say, “I need to go on a date with myself” than “I need to be left alone”.
• Dating yourself allows you to spend time enjoying the sensual pleasure of your body, which is so healing in terms of body acceptance (and so wonderful nonetheless)!
• If you are looking for a relationship, dating yourself gives yourself a reminder of how it feels to be dating. And, as you may have found, people often get more attention from potential lovers when they’re already in a relationship. Therefore, dating yourself can actually make you more attractive because you’re already in a relationship.

In the work that I do, I often find that different techniques work for different people when it comes to increasing their sense of self love and well being. If dating yourself sounds like fun to you, I encourage you to do it! In order to support you, answer these questions and start acting on your answers. Your lover is waiting!

• What kinds of communication would you like to get from the person you’re dating? (Consider: sexy text messages, love letters, loving voice mails.)
• Where would you like to go on dates? (Consider: restaurants, movies, museums, parks, boatrides, at home.)
• What kind of gifts would you like to get from a lover? (Consider: flowers, books, clothes, jewelry.)
• What kind of sensual experiences would you like to have with a lover? (Experiment with exploring your body. There are some great books on this topic.)
• What would you like to wear on these dates? (Consider: dressing up, lingerie, perfume, makeup, hair.)
• How do you like to set the mood for myself? (Consider: music, baths, self massage.)

Have fun with this. Do the things that sound pleasurable to you and forget about the things that don’t. And remember, the first rule of the Body Love Club is it’s all research.

Finally, the idea of fulfilling your own desires doesn’t have to be limited to dating yourself. Pick a desire that you feel you need someone else to fulfill, and try to fulfill it yourself, even in a small way. For example, if you’re looking for a new job, perhaps you want to pay yourself for a task that you do, just to get the feeling into your body of being paid for different work.

As always, let me know how it goes!

My 3 week teleclass to support you in your intuitive eating and body love journey has already begun, but if you want in, I’ll get ya in. The first session (and all sessions) are recorded, so you can still catch up. If you want to try out Health At Every Size for yourself, here is your chance!

And as always, let’s stay connected. Please stop by my Facebook group and become a member of the Body Love Wellness Group! You can also follow me on Twitter.

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Fulfilling Your Own Desires

by Golda Poretsky, HHC
www.bodylovewellness.com

Now that we’ve tackled how to move past resistance to exercising and we’ve come up with some suggestions for building your fitness level no matter what your size. Now let’s get an extra boost of motivation from a fat competitive dancing champion, founder of the Body Positive Dance School, and all around awesome woman, Ragen Chastain (shown at right).

Golda: Tell me a little about what you do.

Ragen: I am a competitive dancer who founded Body Positive Dance School and Company in order to make sure that dance is accessible to people of all sizes, to forward the principles of Health at Every Size, and to challenge stereotypes about dancers of size.

Golda: How long have you been involved in dancing? What about competitive dancing?

Ragen: I’ve danced and choreographed my whole life: jazz, cheer-leading, drill team, figure skating, swing choir, etc. I started competing in Country Western dance in 2004.

Golda: I think a lot of us assume that you have to be very thin to be accepted in competitive dance. How did you get past that assumption?

Ragen: It isn’t always easy to be accepted as a dancer when you have a non-traditional body. I’m lucky to have a lot of natural talent at dance and as an athlete. I also work very hard, and I love to perform. I never use my size as an excuse, and I have a continuing goal to be stronger, faster and more flexible than the traditionally sized dancer with whom I compete. While it may not be fair, people my size are judged by a different standard – anytime something goes wrong there is a tendency to just blame my weight, which, while seemingly obvious, has never been the actual problem. I’ve never found an issue in my dancing that better technique couldn’t fix!

Even so, when I first started there were judges who told me that they wouldn’t raise my scores until I lost weight, and a judge once told me that she couldn’t stand to look at me because my arms were too fat. Conversely I have had plenty of people who watched from the crowd tell me that I am an inspiration to them. I might even go so far as to say that I’ve been a crowd favorite. In my favorite incident a little girl came up to me with her Dad trailing behind. She told me that her Dad wouldn’t let her sign up for dance because she was too fat. While I was standing there he apologized to her, told me that I was amazing, and agreed to sign her up for dance class the next day. While I’ve had competitive success – including three National Championships – I find that by concentrating on being an artist and entertainer rather than concentrating on getting anyone’s approval, dancing has more meaning for me, and I am happier doing it.

Golda: What are your dance classes like?

Ragen: The classes are choreography based rather than technique based. That means that we focus on having fun moving our bodies rather than on having perfect technique. We always start with a reminder of the main rule – that there is absolutely no talking about weight loss in the class. We create a space in which we are more interested in what our bodies do than what they look like. We always start with a warm-up and end with a cool-down. In between we might do musical theater, modern, jazz, Latin or other styles of dance. The most important thing is that we have a blast.

Golda: What would you recommend to someone who wants to be more active but isn’t sure where to start?

Ragen: The people I have seen be the most successful at becoming more active have done so with a goal to enjoy activity and appreciate their bodies, rather than just focusing on trying to change their size or shape. Before you even try to become more active, start by appreciating your body for everything it does right now – whatever that might be. Just the simple things: your heart is beating, you are breathing etc. Keep the focus on appreciating all of the things that your amazing body does for you, and try a bunch of things to find out what you like to do – whether it’s yoga, dancing, kayaking or something else.

Golda: Please tell me more about the Body Positive Movement.

Ragen: My understanding of the Body Positive Movement is a journey to a place where we don’t make judgments about ourselves or others based on their size, whether they weigh 80 pounds or 500 pounds. A place where people’s self-esteem is not linked to their body size.

Golda: Where can people find you and your classes?

Ragen: All of the information about the classes (including videos of the Performing Company and the ability to sign up for our Body Positive Newsletter) is at www.bodypositive.org. My personal blog is at www.danceswithfat.org

Thanks, Ragen, for sharing your inspiring story with us!
Remember, we have lots of new and exciting offers at Body Love Wellness! Starting October 7, I’m teaching a 3 week teleclass to support you in your intuitive eating and body love journey. Register now to secure your spot! And for the New Yorkers, I now have office hours in Manhattan on Wednesdays! Email me or leave a comment below to set up your consultation.

And as always, let’s stay connected. Please stop by my Facebook group and become a member of the Body Love Wellness Group! You can also follow me on Twitter.

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Exorcising Exercising Bonus Issue — Interview With Ragen Chastain, Competitive (And Fabulously Fat) Dancer!

by Golda Poretsky, H.H.C.
www.bodylovewellness.com

In this two part series, I want to address an important part of Health At Every Size—exercise, or as Linda Bacon so eloquently puts it, “finding the joy in moving one’s body and becoming more physically vital.” We all know that exercise, when done in a way that is appropriate, has many wonderful properties, including mood elevation, improved cardiovascular health, and increased strength and endurance, just to name a few.

Finding the exercise that’s right for you and that feels good to you can often be more complicated than just getting to the gym or popping in a DVD. For many of us, we have to get through loads of guilt (like guilt over our barely utilized gym memberships or languishing exercise DVD collections) or shame (like feeling like the fattest person at a gym or track, or third grade gym class, or being picked last, or feeling ridiculed for our athletic ability as children) or overly high expectations (like, in order to be worth it, I have to exercise every day for at least 2 hours and keep my heart rate at x and get really good sneakers and join the best gym, etc. etc. etc.). With all these thoughts swimming (yes, exercising!) around our minds, we often psych ourselves out of exercising long before we even begin.

To be honest, some of my clients don’t even like the word exercise. To them, it connotes all of the above guilt, shame, expectations and more.

So, in the first part of this two part series, I’m going to address how to move through some of the gunk that will make exercising just what it should be: moving your body in a way that feels good.

First, take some time to free write about what “exercise” means to you. (If “exercise” doesn’t have strong connotations for you, try other words, like “working out” or “body movement.”) Just write freely and let the words flow.

What negative experiences did that exercise bring up? Spend some time acknowledging those negative experiences, even taking a moment to feel the pain of those experiences. And then, let them go. Acknowledge the pain and then let it go, knowing that those experiences were in the past and that they do not control your present reality.

Next, take some more time to free write on exercise, remembering some positive experiences. Maybe you enjoyed riding your bike, swinging on the swings, dancing to the radio, or certain sports. Spend some time acknowledging those good times with movement and feeling the fun of those experiences. Take a special note on any of these things that you might want to try again. Also mark any activities that you haven’t tried yet and might want to try. Let the words flow, without judging yourself or stopping yourself.

Lastly, spend some time free writing on your assumptions about exercise. Do you assume that exercise is boring, hard, only for certain people, only for weight loss, etc.? Bringing your assumptions about exercise to light will assist you in determining and moving through your negative associations with exercise and will allow exercise to become what it should be: fun, healing and enjoyable.

Doing the free writes above will allow you to exorcise your negative feelings and assumptions about exercise. Then, next week here at the Body Love Wellness Blog, we’ll get down to the nitty gritty about how to find body movement practices that are right for you.

As always, please become a member of the Body Love Wellness Facebook Group and follow me on Twitter!

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Exorcising Exercising — Part 1 of 2