Honoring our Body
Welcome to Day 4 of the theme body.
As we move through the body theme, we are looking at two concepts:
1. building a compassionate relationship with our bodies and
2. recognizing when anxiety is showing up in our bodies.
Today we are talking about listening to our bodies—and I should add honoring what it says. Ha! We might be good at listening to our bodies, but we don't always honor the message.
Last week, we talked about slowing down and getting into our bodies.
It is one thing for me to stop what I am doing during a busy day, stretch for the ceiling, walk around my house and then return to work. It is VERY different when I stop what I am doing to slow down, and through that process, I realize my neck is killing me, and I am exhausted. And then I have to make a decision, do I honor my body, it's tiredness and pain, or do I continue to get stuff done.
Anytime I meet someone new they ask me, so what do you do? I say I help people reduce their anxiety and stress. And I met with the response of, oh my gosh, I need that. I have so much anxiety followed by an ever-so-subtle smile of pride.
I remember that smile of pride. I remember wearing my anxiety as a badge. The belief is that anxiety makes me cranky, exhausted, and stressed out, but it makes me productive. It disconnects me from my friends and family, but I get a lot done. And unfortunately, we are living in a society that encourages the that belief anxiety is a badge of honor because it makes you more productive.
Even if I look like I have it all together, in truth anxiety leaves me with indigestion, headaches, and neck pain, but I'm seen as having it all together.
It is one thing to have compassion and loyalty to your body when you are breaking the habit of not slowing down, but part of why we don't slow down is because we would become aware of our pain and fatigue if we did. And then what?
I admit this is something I still struggle with. I have inflammatory arthritis, and typically people with my condition feel about 70% of their pain in the morning and 30% at night. For me, I feel stiff in the morning, but on days when I have a lot to accomplish, I get my coffee, and jump into work so I can fire up my adrenaline and jump from task to task until the evening. So by the time I finally relax and sit down, I become aware of my pain, and I can barely move off the couch. So I have not successfully quieted this particular default pattern. BUT I have changed over time.
A few years ago, if I realized I was tired. I would think, ugh, I shouldn't be tired—why am I tired?!? And I would spend the rest of the day trying to justify my fatigue or beating myself up for it.
Once I got to a point where I stopped beating myself up (for the most part). When I realized I was tired my mindset shifted to I deserve to be tired; I have earned it. I worked hard; I pulled all those weeds, and I talked with a lot of clients. I deserve to be tired.
Now I am at a point with quieting my High Functioning Anxiety where I can stop beating myself and stop celebrating my tiredness (for the most part). And here's what I am working on now... when I realize I am tired, and I think ok, well I am tired, I need to rest. No judgment, no justification, just 100% loyalty to my body is telling me I am tired. Then I can ask myself, do I need to rest? Change my diet? How long has this been happening?
What amazes me about this process is when I am more loyal to my body, when I listen to what she has to say, I get more done. I manage my energy better (which we will talk more about tomorrow). But my whole life, I believed I needed to justify my tiredness (again, treat your body like a machine). Over time, I am slowly distancing myself from that belief and recognizing that being tired has no bearing on my worthiness. It is just that I am tired.
Anxiety shows up in many ways in our bodies, including fatigue, headaches, and indigestion. Our bodies give us LOTS of signals that we tend to ignore. We will be revisiting this topic as we move through the spirals, but for now—do you shame yourself for being tired? Justify your fatigue? Or just allow it? How can you lovingly challenge yourself to honor your body even if it temporarily hurts your productivity?
See you tomorrow!