Food in the middle of a sh*t storm

Very little about the world is easy at the moment.

So if food is a coping mechanism for you right now, you’re not doing anything wrong. 

If you thought you put a food “problem” to rest and it’s back, you’re not doing anything wrong.

If you’re eating or drinking weird things at weird times, you’re not doing anything wrong.

If your appetite is in unusual places, you’re not doing anything wrong.

As we ride the waves of the current, anxious world we will certainly ride the waves of our coping strategies, too. 

If food is rearing its head right now, one way or another, well my dearest, I’m with you. When I look back on some of the hardest times of my past, food was always a crutch. Food is powerful. It is something tangible to lean on. It can be our best friend, enemy, it can be the thing we control, and it can be the thing we focus on when what life is asking of us is simply too much.

I want to share a story with you. It’s the story of food and shit storms, and it goes a little something like this. 

Picture yourself walking down the street. Everything is fine and dandy and then BAM, a class five shit storm hits. There are high winds, sleet and rain (aka: challenging feelings occurring within). From a distance, food sees what’s going on and thinks, oh no, that’s not good, let’s help her out. So food puts on its cape, as hero’s and heroine’s do, and swoop down to provide much needed assistance. When food arrives it says, I’m here to rescue you from the shit storm. All those things on your emotional plate – those hard feelings – the pain and overwhelm - I have a few ideas on how to skip over all that. Let’s have you think about me for a while. Let’s start with these cookies right here and play a game called: “Eat them, don’t eat them.”

The thing is, our coping mechanisms are always trying to help. They are always rooted in wisdom, as they try to buffer us from the hard stuff. Thank you, food.

No one is immune to coping strategies and especially not during shit storms. This is human survival. In times of challenge, learn to expect your coping mechanism’s arrival. The sooner you can get to know yours, without judgement, most definitely, most certainly, one hundred percent, the better. Stay flexible with it too, it shifts and changes as life does.

I’d like to share a few things I’ve learned to say to/ask myself in the middle of a shit storm. Please make them your own if you’d like. Words are powerful, so use those that speak to you.

I want to know the truth of what I’m feeling.

I want to know the truth of my coping mechanisms and how they play out for me in hard times.

I am an imperfect human doing my very best.

What will feed me most right now in this hard moment?

What is this shit storm teaching me? Showing me?

If you’d like more support on this, I was recently interviewed by a new friend Christina Premutati about this very topic. We get into some deep waters around food, love, emotions, and shit storms. I think it will be helpful for you if you’re thinking about this sort of thing right now. You can listen to the interview when it’s released during the Feed Yourself with Love  summit that comes out Monday, March 30. You can sign up for the summit and hear the interview (along with 20+ other professionals) here.

I am with you.

Love,

McKenzie