Geneen Roth author of Woman Food and God finally stopped dieting when she realized it was her heart that was hungry not her body.
“My obsession with food ended when I stopped leaving myself and staying in the present moment. I learnt a philosophical, scientific, psychological, spiritual, body based approach that started with observing my direct experience. Instead of trying to change it all, start noticing what’s already there. Pay attention to what you already feel, sad, bored, happy, hungry, miserable etc.”
Being with feelings is not the same as drowning in them, with awareness and presence it’s possible to be with what you believe will destroy you without being destroyed. It’s the way into love. “ But if I don’t eat to push down my sadness, then I have to feel it, and then what?” The sadness is already present and that the only thing eating does is add another source of sadness, after the food is gone, the original source of the sadness is still there except now there is frustration and guilt as well. There are many forms of addiction but what they all have in common is that they shrink your ability to feel. Once this realization occurs you are able to focus not on the losing of the weight but on eating to nurture and nourish yourself with wholesome nutrients and saying goodbye to the scale.