I WANT...

I WANT.

It is surprising how powerful those two small words are. How much control they have over me, how long they have been in charge, and how willing I am to surrender my own power to those two, small words.

I have known that I needed to make some major changes in my relationship with myself for some time, particularly in the area around food. I have started and stopped programs for various reasons over the years, from counting points to counting calories to watching macros. No matter what, I always end up back at the beginning, feeling worse than I did before and not really understanding why. As my teacher Rolf Gates says, “If you do what you did, you get what you got.”  I never fully understood the meaning behind that saying until just recently.

About two weeks ago, I started a detox program at the gym, eliminating all foods that contain eggs, cheese/dairy, soy, wheat/gluten, corn, peanuts, sugar, and practically eliminating caffeine. I thought, “I’ve got this in the bag. I’ve done countless programs like this in the past and I can do this.”  Life has a funny way of showing you just how arrogant you are. I was not into this detox three days before the I WANT gremlin reared its ugly head. What was it I wanted? Eggs. I dreamed of eggs and all the ways I could prepare them. Boiled, scrambled, fried, in a quiche, in an omelette. You name it, I've thought it. I would have done just about anything for a boiled egg, or two. And of that was not bad enough, right behind the egg gremlin was cheese. I fantasized about an egg and cheese omelette. What was going on here and where did that come from? I would have expected visions of bread and pastries dancing in my head, but eggs and cheese? What the heck?

That really got me thinking, and wondering what the real underlying motivation was. What am I trying to satisfy if I gave in to the I WANT? All of my nutritional needs were being met, so what was it? Why was the line between I WANT being blurred with I NEED? Even worse yet, the gremlin morphed from I WANT to I DESERVE. And it only took three days. Damn. That is when I realized just how deep I WANT had its hooks in me.

Then I remembered a piece I read many years ago in Yoga International called The Way Of Non-Attachment, by Eknath Easwaran, and I re-read it last night. I had never read anything by Easwaran before, nor had I heard of him, but this article really spoke to me and I have revisited it many times over the years. The first time I read this, however, was about a year before I started my 200 hour yoga teacher training, and had no knowledge of the eight limbs of yoga, much less the Yamas and Niyamas. Since then, I have had a superficial connection with both brahmacharya (non-excess) and aparigraha (non-possessiveness), especially when it comes to my relationship with food. In her book, “The Yamas & Niyamas: Exploring Yoga’s Ethical Practice,” Deborah Adele states that “brahmacharya literally means ‘walking with God’ and invites us into an awareness of the sacredness of life;” and “aparigraha can also be interpreted at non-attachment, non-greed, non-clinging, non-grasping, and non-coveting; we can simply think of it as being able to ‘let go’.”

Whoa. Non-coveting. Hmmm…now, where have I heard that I am not supposed to covet? How has this addiction affected my relationships with everyone around me, my relationship with myself, and more importantly my relationship with God? Getting antsy and irritated when I do not get what I WANT when I WANT it and the way that I WANT it?  How many times have I been in situations where I focused my attention on the food than on the conversation? How many times have I binged on something to the point of nausea (ahimsa, or non-harming), only to swear that I will never do that again? How long have I denied that there is a problem, lying to myself (satya, another of the yamas translates to truthfulness)? What about the future I have stolen from my family and myself by allowing I WANT to take control of my choices (asteya, or non-stealing)?

If I am being honest with myself, I have not truly been following the teachings not only of yoga, but also of the Scriptures. I cannot blame others for leading me into temptation. I have to own the karma of the choices I made, both good and bad. Fixing my focus is the key, and the struggle is real. It is no wonder that the cycle kept coming back around. I keep doing what I did, and getting what I got over and over.

This detox humbled me. It is also teaching me that I have a lot of work to do. This is a constant “work in.” I need to work on my internal boundaries. I need to differentiate between I WANT, I NEED, I DESERVE, especially when it comes to food. I am a continual work in progress. I have resources to help me, friends to lean on when I need them, and my faith to sustain me. I will be ok.