Tuesday 17 February 2015

Is my scale an idol? - food

So I am on a journey now of learning to get my happiness and peace from God, instead of the contra ban food that I crave.  It is going well.  Difficult at times, but I am learning to lean on God's truth instead of my addiction to food.   So you would think that since I have been following God's guidelines and not binging on fat and sugar, that I would be losing some weight.  However, the scale has been very disappointing lately.  I am not losing weight at all!  As a result I am struggling with depression and self-pity.  Why am I going to all this trouble to eat healthy, if I am not seeing any success in the weight loss department?  To be honest I am a bit ticked off at God.  The disappointment I feel makes me want to eat some cookies to comfort myself.

Why does the scale have such power over my emotions?  I am realising that I feel it is wrong to rejoice and relax, unless I have reached some specific marker of success.  I do not deserve to be happy when I am an obvious failure at meeting my weight goal!  Because I have not had success at losing weight, the feelings of anxiety and failure overwhelm me.   Until I have arrived at my goal, there seems to be no way to banish the anxiety and depression.  I must wait until my weight has gone down to be content and feel like I am succeeding.  This having to succeed before I feel joy or happiness, does not apply to just weight, but pretty much every goal I set in my life.  No wonder I am on anti-depressants and upset inside most of the time.  Add to that, that my goals I am shooting for are often perfection!  I have set impossible goals! I have sentenced myself to never being able to be happy or satisfied or feel like I am worthy.  This is crazy!  My own mind is the enemy of my soul.  This is why I need all my ducks in a row so desperately.  I have tied peace and joy to reaching all my goals and having everything just ducky and perfect.  So that has become my all consuming desire: to get everything in my life perfect and then I can relax and rejoice in things.  I can't ever accomplish that and even if I could I would find that once I arrived at perfection it was empty and unsatisfying.  I can not fill my soul by being perfect.  I can only fill it with God and a relationship with Him.

So what do I do now that I realise that I have set losing weight as determined by my scale, as the marker for success?  I am pretty sure that this is not the marker of success that God wanted me to set as my goal.  I guess I am trying to get happiness out of a scale instead of from God.  That is as empty as trying to get joy and peace from sugar and fat.  I just replaced my idol of sugar and fat to an idol of a scale.  I find journaling a great way to hear what God wants to say to me.  About a month ago I wrote down some stuff God said to me and maybe I should pull that out and see what He said.   OK here it is, "Let me be God and put the cares and responsibilities on my shoulders.  Rejoice in all the answers and blessings and praise me even when your mood is in a funk.  Obey minute by minute and let that bring you joy and peace.  Get back into developing good habits (such as eating right and brushing my teeth)  Your goal is obedience to the spirit, and to obey you must stay close to me.  Trust your emotions to my care and don't fear or worry but trust and rejoice.  Grab a hold of my peace and don't let go.  Evaluate your success by your lack of fear and your obedience to me, not by worldly markers.  Go for the gold, go for the best, Go for God!"  

Wow what he had me write down a month ago is overwhelmingly relevant for me right now!  God is so good and wise and supernatural.   Here are the clear answers that I have been longing for.  My goal needs to be obedience to God, which is this case is following the guidelines of healthy eating that He has been showing me.  My goal should not be losing weight as defined by the worldly marker of my scale.  I need to leave that to God to look after in His time.  I need to rejoice in each answer God gives and each little victory He enables me to succeed at.  The path to joy and peace is not in perfection or success as I define it, but in trusting and obeying God and looking for stuff to rejoice in all along this journey.  Peace is something I can decide to grab a hold of by getting it God's way not my way.  My way is so not working!  I can be a peace even if the scale does not show any progress.  My peace comes from obeying God and following His spirit.  I can be peaceful and joyful because I am obeying him and eating healthy.  I don't need to punish myself until I get to what the world says is success.   I can let go of the anxiety and be satisfied and happy right now.  I have been believing a lie and now I can replace it with the truth.  Satan has been stealing my joy and peace, and I do not need to let him do that any longer. I am not doing this perfectly but that is OK because I will not be perfect till heaven, and I am just aiming for improvement and obedience.

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