comfort-food – Dr Affie Adagio

Coffee addiction

Everyone who loves coffee enjoys the taste and the lift it gives, as well as the social interaction that goes with having coffee with people – friends or business colleagues. It is considered safer than alcohol or other excesses but needless to say coffee addiction is dangerous. How many people do you know who have reached the stage of needing to reduce the number of coffees they have in a day because of doctor’s orders? As I see it if you like coffee, better to drink a safe number of coffees per day than to have to do without it completely, should it get out of hand.

I prefer a cup of tea to a cup of coffee
yet when we are out my first reaction is
to ask if anyone wants to have a coffee?
which surprises me immensely
I realise it is a socialisation outcome
just the thought of going out and
having a cup of coffee over a chat
appeals to me whereas
a cup of tea is something I
have at home or with breakfast out

cup, photo by Uli Bartels, Berlin Germany

This too shall pass

I’ve written about burnout in the last two posts because it is so prevalent in our day and age. Having experienced it myself, I shared with you about how burnout crept up on me and its consequences to my health. Fortunately, I was able to nip it in the bud, nevertheless it had left me not as strong as I am normally. As a food addict in recovery this causes me to think of rewarding myself with trigger foods to give me the energy. However, I reminded myself of the saying this too shall pass. So, I gave myself permission to do everything at 80% level so as to recuperate and not put myself at risk of burnout again. Admittedly, it takes a while to get back to normal.

I was lacking in energy to go to hydrotherapy so
using an NLP (Nurolinguistic Programming) technique
to integrate the different selves
I got in touch with that self in me who
is responsible for this sabotage and found out
that it was a he, and that he wanted more recreation
so I agreed to spend time writing and sketching
which I had not done in at least a year
and was pleased to find as a result
I was eager to go to my next hydrotherapy session

Resentments

Every day we have mixed feelings about different matters. Resentments are strong feelings which we can bury deep within, contaminating our wellbeing. What’s worse is being in denial about doing just that. Resentments are so cunning that we can ignore their existence until it’s too late and we have surprising explosive behaviours. That’s why it’s far better to be in touch with our feelings and own them as being naturally ours, and in doing so they settle down. Then we need to observe their origin and what can be done to resolve this turmoil. The expression ‘befriend our demons’ means finding those feelings which we have suppressed, that have subsequently turned into problematic behaviour, and processing them.

she had long ago ‘befriended her demons’
as a result of intense therapy and
personal and professional development
she took pride in being a guide for others
on similar journeys of enlightenment
but she didn’t notice resentments building up
deep within, in her inner world
on the outside she was busy and happy
but something was not as it should be
she’d gained weight and had an insatiable appetite
it took 3 OA meetings a week to get real
about her buried unwanted feelings of
resentment, self pity, boredom, loneliness
which she was busy avoiding with activities
and for which she had paid the price
fortunately it didn’t take long for her
to tweak her choices back into healthy living

That look, photo by Betty Miller, http://fireyes.deviantart.com

New Year resolutions for 2007

As we wish everyone Happy New Year and fill our hearts with love many of us have made New Year resolutions for 2007. Some are realistic and some are just wishful thinking. Nevertheless, both types are useful for our personal and professional development because the process makes us visualise our dreams. Visualisation is an effective tool for achieving our goals because it means we prime ourselves for taking up opportunities as they arise, otherwise we miss them. They say ‘when Opportunity knocks, open the door first and ask questions later”. When New Year resolutions crumble then find another way of achieving them. Don’t quit searching for a way to succeed.

the year before last, feeling guilty for her behaviour
she made her New Year resolutions
and then felt hopeful but that didn’t last long
because she knew how hard it was to
stay away from the trigger foods that
were the cause of most of her ill health
she was overweight, had diabetes and
what’s more she spent her money easily
which always left her broke
then she remembered to try something new
for her carbohydrate addiction
success followed and her health improved
this year’s resolutions were more joyful to list
because she had achieved some of last year’s ones

Bill Kolios, Ioannina, Greece, http://www.sxc.hu/photo/678548

Remove the stress

Serenity and peace of mind are easier to maintain if the stress in our lives is kept to a minimum. That is, negative and positive stress. Both forms of stress put pressure on our system and we reach out for, or do, things that helps us to cope better. Often the things we use are not healthy for us. Then we make excuses as we are faced with the consequences of our actions. This could be putting on weight from overeating or being fatigued from working too many hours, being sick from too much drinking or smoking. The list goes on. Our first step should be to remove the stress then we can deal with the excesses much easier.

retirement had promised to be a relaxing time
and she’d looked forward to doing the fun things
she had promised herself for such a long time
but somehow she became so very busy
how did that happen she wondered because
her healthy food plan had faded away?
her coping method had been comfort eating
and promising herself that soon she would stop
then she realised that she needed to
get down to basics and
remove the stress from her life before
everything else could fall into place