10

Week Ten



The Lists and

Acceptance

















My Yellow List
Rewrite your yellow list adding any new items that “could” interfere with your journey.
1. ______________________________
2. ______________________________
3. ______________________________
4 _______________________________
5,_______________________________
6. ______________________________
7._______________________________
8._______________________________
© Keep in mind, if you are struggling, you always have the choice of repeating weeks. Repeating weeks is not failure! The only way you can fail is if you give up..

















My No Matter What Red List - Week Ten

1. _____________________________ 7. ____________________________
2. _____________________________ 8. ____________________________
3. _____________________________ 9. ____________________________
4. _____________________________ 10. ___________________________
5. _____________________________ 11. ___________________________
6. _____________________________ 12. __________________________

© Stopping the fighting and admitting that on your own you are defeated by your food addict; is the first step in excelling in this program. You have to give up your old ideas before any new ones can move in. It was only after I gave up being in charge that I found peace and serenity. I was carried on the wings of abstinence from my No Matter What Red List foods and you can too.
I have never been very good at moderation in any part of my life, and with food I was a complete failure. Especially if the control was to be supervised by me. Hence, a year and a half ago, I turned my portion control over to my digital scales. For the last year and a half, I have weighed almost everything before it goes into my mouth. I’m not implying that everyone needs to go to such extremes, but I did. In order for me to be totally free of my addict, I had to turn control of my food portions completely over to my digital scales. Even my addict, who is excellent at arguing is rendered speechless when trying to quarrel with my digital scales. That is why I have suggested so strongly that you purchase a digital food scale. Since my addict can argue and win with any other types of food scales, I figure yours can too.











Your Green List - Week Ten
Your Green List is the same as last week.
1. Continue to drink your eight glasses of water or equivalent each day.
2. Your lunch at home or away will remain twelve exact ounces of vegetables again for this week.
3. Your dinner at home or away will be the same as last week, exactly
sixteen ounces.
4. Breakfast- 4 ounces protein
8 ounces fruit
Optional small serving carb..
Lunch- 5 ounces protein
12 ounces vegetables
1 ounce fat
8 ounces fruit
Optional small serving carb
Dinner- 5 ounces protein
16 ounces vegetables
1.5 ounces fat
8 ounces fruit
5. You need to continue leaving at least four hours between your meals.
© Another reminder from your disease:
Allow me to introduce myself. I am the disease of food addiction. I am perceptive, puzzling, and powerful. That's me! I've killed millions and enjoyed doing it. I love to catch you by surprise. I love pretending I'm your friend and lover.
(Keep in mind how your disease feels about you as you read the following insights):
© In my nineteen year journey, I have found few things that make my addict lose control as much as exactness and No Matter What. That’s why you hear me preaching about them again and again. It was just a year and a half ago that I realized this and was willing to embrace exactness with all my heart. Over the last year and a half I have weighed all my food without exception. Yes, that means in restaurants and others' homes. Hence, the last year and a half have been the clearest and most serene of my 52 years. If you want what I have, you have to be able to go to any lengths to get it.







Acceptance
(Higher Power) Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; the courage to change the things I can;
and the wisdom to know the difference.
I really had this one mixed up. It took the first few years of my journey to acquire the wisdom to know the difference between what I had to just accept and what I needed to have the courage to change. In this section, I’m going to share what I learned during this time about acceptance, change and wisdom.
Recovery has taught me that I have to love all of me, the good and the “not so good." It’s important for me to accept myself exactly where I am at any given moment. However, accepting all of my “not so good” qualities does not mean I embraced them; it simply meant that I love myself regardless.
Now I believe that the “not so good” parts of me are thanks to my addict. I used to feel much shame about all of the “not so good” parts I had and thought I was a “bad” person, but once I started separating my addict's thoughts and actions from mine, I found out that I’m a pretty good person.
An example of this is that my addict has not learned the “If it’s not nice and not necessary don’t say it” rule. Thus, she wants me to think and make lots of unpleasant, unnecessary remarks to people especially my husband. She does this because it makes me feel bad, and when I feel bad she can get me to eat foods that are not good for me.
Actually, at this time, I’m working with my mentor on being nicer to my husband. I have contracted with her that if I say something questionable to him I have to be willing to tell her what I said. It has made a tremendous difference in what comes out of my mouth. This is because stating things to another person makes me realize how my words really sound. I’m appalled at my verbal behavior toward my husband. I used to feel dreadful because my mind played tricks on me about certain people. I sometimes found myself gossiping. Let me give you an example. Just the other day, I was at a meeting and one of my peers in the audience kept asking the speaker question after question, and if she wasn’t asking questions, she had a comment to make about everything and it was really irritating me. As this was going on, my mind was thinking, “She sure likes to hear herself talk." When we went on break, I wanted in the worst way to comment to a friend about how our colleague would not “shut up“, but I bit my tongue because I have learned through recovery that when I say mean things, it’s only hurting me and usually comes back to haunt me.
Did you know that we are unaware of up to eighty percent of our personalities? Everyone else knows about it but us. When I first read this piece of information I said, “No way!” Then I started thinking about people I knew who had certain personality traits and seemed to be totally oblivious to them. There have been instances where people I knew had no idea what they were really like.
It’s a very scary thought to me that I am unaware of close to eighty percent of my personality. It’s even more frightening to think that everyone else knew these things except me. I can see it in others so it must be true about me too.
I’ve had friends who talk about another person and say something like, "She thinks she knows everything," while I’m thinking, "Don’t you see that you're like that too?"
OK. Now that I had this scary piece of information, what did I do about I? How was I to learn what others noticed that I did not? I used a concept called the “mirror effect," which is essentially that what I see in others is most likely a part of me, too. One of the first traits I started observing in others was what I call the "know it all” trait. Consequently, I knew I needed to take a closer look at myself to determine if I fit the bill. What I did was ask a close friend if that was part of my personality and she begrudgingly said, “yes“. Hence, I knew what I needed to spend the next few months working on. (Writing this guide has been such a pleasure for me because I have found a constructive avenue for my “know it all” trait, something I really do know a lot about.)
Activity
Go to a close, “loving” friend and ask them to share with you one “not so good” personality trait that you have. Be sure it’s a “loving” type friend because this is not an easy activity to do. If their answer really blows you out of the water, you “could” get a second opinion. Coaching note: Share with me what they revealed to you and how you felt about it.
How many times have I heard someone say, “That’s not fair," then someone says, “Who said life was fair?" My experience is, that since I started focusing on what is “fair," my life has magically become very “fair." It’s in direct proportion to how much I look for “fair” and how much I find it. In fact, I can remember the exact incident when the fairness quotient turned around for me.
About fifteen years ago, I found out the hearing aides I was being fitted for were only minimally covered by my insurance. So here I was getting something that I did not really want (who wants to have to wear hearing aides at 35?) and having to pay fifteen hundred dollars out of my own pocket for them. As far as I was concerned, that was definitely not fair! A week later, I got a letter from my insurance company stating that the hearing aide company had to sell me the hearing aides for the price the insurance was contracted to pay and I would not be liable for the extra fifteen hundred. All I could think was, "That’s what I call fair." I even remember thinking it was so fair that it would wipe out the next 5 unfair things that happened in my life.
From that day forward, everything changed. All of a sudden it was “as if” magically my life had improved drastically in regards to “fairness." What really had changed was my focus and my attitude .
Activity
For the next week keep a fairness journal. On the first day you must write down at least one fair thing that happened that day; the second day two; the third day three and so on. Also, journal about the effect your new ”life is fair” focus is having on you. Coaching note: E-mail your fairness journal to me daily.


Now, let’s talk about life’s choices. Due to my teaching background, I oftentimes think of my life as a multiple choice test. When I’m faced with a question or a situation, I think I have select a, b or c. I never realized there was a “d” choice, which is always “do nothing." I find that in recovery, eighty percent of the time, the answer is 'd' the "do nothing" answer. Sometimes the “do nothing” is forever and other times it’s just until I decide which of the others is the correct choice.
Before I thought I had to chose a, b or c; which were three different actions. Nowadays, quite frequently, when I chose “d”, the “do nothing” choice, the situation dissipates on its own. I never gave situations a chance to resolve themselves without my interference. How much easier my life is now that I have learned this little “aha."(an “aha” is a life altering change of thinking). Many times in my life, I’ve gotten myself involved in unpleasant family and other altercations because I did not wait to see if the problem would take care of itself without my intervention.
Now let’s talk for a few minutes about mean people. If someone is not nice to me, I accept it then detach with love. It’s another energy case in point. I refuse to expend negative energy or stay around negative energy. If they are a friend or family member, I tell them to let me know when they are ready to be nice. Otherwise I get away and stay away for good. An example is one of the rude clerks at the store where I grocery shop. I try to shop on days when I can avoid her. If I ever have to check out through her, I am very nice and then get away. I definitely don’t waste time trying to get her to warm up to me.


What if you could will yourself to be happy? or believe that you're as happy as you're willing to be. “Could” happiness be a choice you can make? For me, I have found on most days I’m as happy as I choose to be.







































Focus
On
Fair


As Long as I Don’t
Give Up
I’m a Winner