In June of 2009, I gave myself a pow­er­ful gift. Before leav­ing my class­room for the sum­mer, I pulled out a box of note­cards from my desk and wrote myself ten notes. My lessons were orga­nized in fold­ers labeled by month, so I dropped one note­card inside each monthly folder. Read more

Have you ever asked your­self that ques­tion? When I was in the throes of my bat­tle with food and weight, I asked it all the time. It seemed to me that a nor­mal per­son wouldn’t eat food out of the garbage can. A nor­mal per­son wouldn’t grab at the fat around her stom­ach so hard she leaves marks. A nor­mal per­son wouldn’t keep eat­ing even when she felt like her stom­ach would explode. These behav­iors seemed shame­ful and out of con­trol. So, I thought there was some­thing hor­ri­bly wrong with me. Read more

As I shared in part 2 of this series, I think there are times in life when numb­ing out is nec­es­sary. However, I also think that numb­ing out should be done spar­ingly, and the goal should be to move toward nur­tu­rance as much as pos­si­ble. Nurturing activ­i­ties are the anti­dote to our per­ceived need to numb our­selves. Let me go ahead and say it — most peo­ple really suck at self-nurturing. I sus­pect this is a huge part of why we’re often so dis­sat­is­fied, even when we have seem­ingly “good” lives. Read more