This Post was written by Rachel, a former coaching client of mine. She also recently shared her decision to “divorce the scale”. See “One Foot in the Old and One Foot in the New”…
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You’ve had one of those days right? I was feeling so stressed this morning. My new job is great but it is CHALLENGING…. I am still learning and the team is brand new and the direction is somewhat unknown… When people ask me what I do in my job I have started to say, ‘I hug jello’. Do you know what I mean? That feeling you get when you try to put your arms around something but bits are seeping out the sides and you think you understand it all but then some more comes out the bottom and… You are so FRUSTRATED!!!
This morning after attending a meeting that went all the way wrong (or seemed to) I was so disappointed. All of the sudden a Snickers bar was flashing in my face!
I don’t even like Snickers – well I mean I like chocolate but a Snickers is not something I would normally go for. At this moment I was thinking, ‘I DESERVE a Snickers!’ Where the heck did that come from? Thinking about it now I am wondering, ‘What would make me think I deserve this stuff?’ I mean I am not saying I “can’t have it”, but “deserve”? Here’s what I deserve…
I deserve to be happy. I deserve a healthy life. I deserve to wear my hiking shorts later this month WITHOUT Spanx 
underneath them (who wears Spanx with hiking shorts?). I deserve to be free. I deserve the right to feel comfortable in my job. Is a Snickers going to give me that? Heck no.
Luckily I made it through without the Snickers. I say luckily not because I can’t eat a Snickers, but I wasn’t going to eat it because I was hungry or looking for a treat. I was going to eat it because I somehow thought this was payment for my emotional unhappiness. What gives with that?
Instead of a Snickers I made a visit to my good friend’s office. My friend who came to the new job shortly after I did. My friend who seems to have it all going right in her new job. I sat in her office and shared my woes. As they spilled out I realized I sounded silly. It’s true, I am trying to hug jello but that’s nothing new for this job. It’s going to be ‘jello hugging’ for a while – I signed up for that. It is a new organization and I am leading the team down a brand new path. No surprise there. Everyone knows this is the route we are headed down. Soon my worries sounded a bit silly. Soon I was laughing and my friend was comiserating. Soon I was realizing what I truly deserve in life.
So the Snickers remained back wherever it was. May I continue to remember what I deserve.
Rachel
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Ellen Shuman is a Life Coach who specializes in emotional and binge eating issues. She is the founder of A Weigh Out & Acoria Eating Disorder Treatment, Vice President of the Binge Eating Disorder Association (BEDA), and Co-Chair of the Academy for Eating Disorders Special Interest Group on “Health at Every Size”, ellen@aweighout.com
