august 13: hitting the reset button

i'm starting to feel a little bit more reconnected now! i spent the morning cleaning house and although i still have dishes to do, the laundry's been put away and i've tidied up a bit, so i feel like it's ok to blog a bit!

i threw my back out somehow over the past 3 days - this happens every 3-5 months or so, just the leftover imbalances from misalignments in my hips/sacrum. it's not too bad this time, although sleeping last night was interesting, as it always is when this happens, because i have to wake up a little in order to roll over carefully. but i feel like it's untweaking itself on its own this morning, just from moving around, which is awesome, as it usually takes me at least 3-4 days and a massage or 3 to work the kinks out. i'm hoping that over time, my yoga practice and raw food diet will work together to correct the misalignment! that's my hope.

yesterday i met with a guy who's doing an "observational film" about people eating. i decided to do the project - anytime in front of a camera! - which will involve me going somewhere, spending $20 on food, and then eating it. and then sharing my thoughts i was having while eating. could be interesting, but no harm in trying!

i had more overt fats yesterday than i've had in quite awhile, and while they tasted good, it wasn't the greatest moment ever - i prefer my mangos! so i've decided to go absolutely no overts again. my spoonful of tahini every day has just turned into a bad habit, and i don't need it. and for the next 3 days, i'm also going just fruits, no veg, in hopes that my digestion will improve as a result. apparently, that's dr. doug's recommendation for people with IBS, colitis, crohn's, etc. for the first 3 weeks, no veg, just fruit! so i'm going to go just fruit and see what happens, and maybe see how long it takes for my digestion to improve. i'm also thinking i need to stop smoothie-ing everything. i love my smoothies for sure, but maybe i need to just simply chew and eat.

i love how simple this whole 811 thing is. eat fruit. chew and eat. don't eat anything that you wouldn't want to sit down and make a whole meal of. it's kind of like perpetual "DUH!" and then, every once in awhile, have some gourmet raw or some nuts or some avocado. but i like, finally, having a daily diet that i can totally live with. there's just no conflict to it, and i can show you 5 1/2 years worth of journals FULL of food conflict on raw, and another 10 years of journals before that on cooked food conflict. i always wanted to be skinny, healthy, and hot. and on a cooked food diet, i was NONE of those things, and working in the fashion industry, that really hit me on a deep level. i had a lot of existential angst about it, honestly! i feel, very strongly, that beauty is our birthright, and that everybody has the potential to be stunningly beautiful. and feeling it so out of my grasp was literally painful. not being able to see my own beauty was agonizing. and i'm not exaggerating, and i'm not shallow or vain.

i honestly beleive that all of our low-self-esteem body images and messages are authentic and accurate. it didn't matter if so-and-so thought i was attractive, or if i ever fit into a specific size. my body image was horrible. my ex, rick, and i used to fight about it all the time. he wanted me to dress "hot." actually, he wanted me to dress "hoochie," which would never fly with me. but he wanted me to look slut-tastic and couldn't understand why in the world i wouldn't dress that way. i guess he thought my body was hot enough, but he was very into these hot wrappers. i, on the other hand, couldn't imagine my body as being appealing or attractive, and wanted to cover it up in a way that was "chic and sophisticated." he thought i looked conservative and boring (and "conservative" is fightin' words, as far as i'm concerned!!). it was such a horrible catch-22, because also in order to look chic, it's very important to be very thin. which i never was. oi, it was a constant battle. i hated it.

and the battle didn't end when we broke up - i've been fighting it on my own for 8 1/2 years since then! i feel like i've maybe, finally, won the war. i look in the mirror, and i like what i see. plenty of room for improvement, but i've only just started eating this way. my mind has changed, though, before my body did. because my body is now happy. it's letting go of old stuff it doesn't need, including this long and arduous battle for sexiness, and it's rebuilding itself in a way that is actually beautiful. yes, i do wish i had a partner in my life who could see what i'm seeing and more, but this is fun for me. i had a blast in whole foods last night - heads were not just turning, but ROCKING! it was so much fun to have attractive men look at me and me not wonder why, but to just smile back. it's pretty awesome.

this journey hasn't been very fun for most of the trip, but if this is the reward, to be here now, and happy?! i'll take my journey. this is worth it, and this is just the beginning of the good stuff.