September Book

When I went home in August my mom lent me Women Food and God by Geneen Roth. As you have probably guessed it's a self help book and while I'm not a compulsive eater or someone who diets or worries much about their figure I thought it was pretty interesting. The book is applicable to any type of obsession like, say, flipping mindlessly through TV channels or whiling away countless hours on the internet. Things that you do that numb your mind and leave you feeling crappy. Her thoughts on allowing yourself to be in touch with your feelings and letting go of all the emotional crap we carry around are the things I found most interesting.

The author tells you that there is nothing wrong with you. You are good and it's possible to overcome the way you perceive yourself. That the way you look at yourself is really how your parents or other people along your journey have seen you and not how you really are. She tells you how to become really aware of your feelings and to take the time to allow yourself to really feel those feelings- but not become lost in them.

She shares a thought from a buddhist teacher that hell is wanting to be somewhere other than where you are. How true is that? After moving to Charlottesville I spent so much time being upset and wanting to be home and just being completely miserable. Same thing when I switched schools after 9th grade. Instead of seeing the things I could have been doing I was so focused on wanting to be back at my old school. As for Charlottesville I can say that taking up knitting probably saved me. And that's mostly because it allowed me to get out and have some social interaction with kind people. I started finding things to do around Charlottesville and realized what a cool town it was. I started being present in my life and trying to live in the moment.

The author writes from her experiences of dieting and binging and searching for answers. I think she's really got something and if you want to free yourself from the pain and suffering that an obsession is causing you I'd suggest you sit down and read it.