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** Quote From Kathleen ** For a while, you may struggle with the concept that 'doing the food' - something so simple and so not sexy - can be so powerful. **********************************************************************
** Testimonial of the Week ** This is Connie's response to a question about working with a daughter who has a problem with an eating disorder. Connie, if this does not work for my daughter, how did you get your DD to understand? By doing exactly what Kathleen just said to you. Doing the program myself! And sharing each step in a natural way. When my DD SAW the changes in me, and heard that it was biochemical, and about the family connections, it changed her whole perspective on it. Plus of course it resonated with everything she learned in her program too. We had so much fun discussing all our relatives and their histories and trying to guess from the outside, the degree of sugar sensitivity and what impact that had on their lives. Of course we would always say "but this is wrong" when you talk about other peoples' insides from looking from the outside but it was fun and it was family.... The other advantage of doing my own dang program was it totally got me out of my DD's business. Just like the booklets tell you. I could see from my OWN journey how key it was for me to pay attention to my own journal and how little mental energy I had to listen to anything else, other than the steps, the helpers here, and journal. And my DD could sense that I truly, honestly was leaving her recovery up to her, because I "got it" personally myself, and that made her pay attention to me, because I was about the only one in our circle able to not engage in that way. It all works together when you do the food. Connie **********************************************************************
** Radiant Ambassadors ** What do you love doing? Do you love talking about Radiant Recovery or writing about it? Are you familiar with social networking sites or can you make films? Whatever your skill, why not come on over to the Ambassadors list and put your skills to good use? There are lots of projects on the go at the moment - from writing Ranch press releases to creating a documentary about Radiant Recovery. Which one do you want to be involved in? Not everyone's involved in the big projects. Something as simple as sharing your copy of Potatoes not Prozac can make a big difference too! Selena Come join us if you are excited about spreading the news. **********************************************************************
** Radiant Kitchen ** Hi everyone, well this week I have been called to jury duty. I found out that there are no microwaves available, so that meant I had to come up with lunches that didn't require heating. It's funny, but I didn't realize how many of my meals are hot meals! So this required some thinking and investigation. What I discovered was that my health food store has vegetarian sandwiches that are fairly program-friendly. I got a fake chicken-salad sandwich that had some coverts in the mayo used but was otherwise fine. So I bought it and packed it in a bento along with cheese, almonds, apple sauce, cucumbers, ginger-miso dressing, and a few kumquats (little citrus fruits that have a sweet peel and a tart fruit, you eat the whole thing!). It was a perfect lunch to bring along. I didn't end up eating the apple sauce, but truth be told I rarely want it, I seem to bring the same one back and forth over and over again in case the mood strikes me, LOL. But I ate the rest of the food. Including the almonds and cheese as a snack since lunch turned out to be late yesterday. It was a great meal! Today I brought an egg-salad sandwich with an orange, cheese and almonds. No bento this time, but at least I am prepared! Heather For more great program-friendly recipes, check out these great cookbooks in the store.
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** Your Last Diet - More Than What You Think ** Well, you all know we have been having fun with chat transcripts last week, LOL. Glenn volunteered to write a special program to convert the raw data into an easy-to-read format. Heidi volunteered to clean and edit them and post them. We have spent the week testing and it looks like we have a new, improved and VERY efficient system in place. It certainly is making the chat process come alive. If you are not a YLD member, come and join us. Click here if you are ready to change your life or just have some plain ol' fun! **********************************************************************
** Radiant Recovery® Store ** David manages the Radiant Recovery® Store. He is also Kathleen's oldest son.
Please send questions and suggestions. I love hearing from you and truly want to help you do your program better. **********************************************************************
** Our Online Groups ** Radiant Practitioners is a new group we have set up to support people who are working as health-care professionals and want to incorporate the ideas of Radiant Recovery® in their practice. Come join us if you want to talk more. **********************************************************************
** Entitlement and Blame ** Kathleen DesMaisons, Ph.D.
Many people ask me how they *know* that they are on step 7. Is it a date, you hit detox, and then wham, there you are? Is it having a perfect program, every step clean and organized and sorted? How can someone on Step 7 muck around or be sloppy with the food journal? Do they have to revert? If they wobble, do they *lose* their status? Now, what I am going to say here may surprise you. But step 7 is really about a state of being rather than a destination. Step 7 is affectionately called the *getting-a-life* step, but really, that hardly defines it. It is about how you meet the world and it is radically different from how the world was before you started the program. Let me walk you through the transformation. I know from lots and lots of experience that the hallmarks of untreated sugar sensitivity are what I call entitlement and blame. We feel done unto. My husband, my boss, my mother, my children, my life, my stress, my health *made me*. You feel victimized by circumstance. It made you be this way. If he hadn't....I wouldn't be this way. You do not take responsibility for what happens around you because you do not feel empowered. You feel helpless in the face of things happening. And you blame the outside world for things not working. At the same time, because you feel victimized you feel you are entitled to things. Well, I deserve to be...because..they owe me. Often this is about the company owes me because I am poor and work hard and they make lots of money. I hear this as I deserve to not have to pay for the program because I am poor and am entitled to it for free. These feelings are biochemically induced. Now, that sounds pretty outrageous doesn't it? However, these are the very feelings that change with the program. Working with your journals helps you to see connections, and something called consequence. If I eat this, this happens. No one does it to me. There is a connection between what I do and what happens. You start making little connections..and over time they grow. As you get more steady, you can make more powerful connections. Yes, my husband is abusive, but I stay here. Things like that. You start seeing yourselves as players rather than victims. And even more striking, when people critique you, you have this remarkable detachment. You take what is real, own it and are even grateful for the feedback rather than being devastated by it. For example, early in the program, if I offer a suggestion, not even a critique, but a simple reflection that perhaps eating a potato the size of a football might not be the best option, the person who started the program 3 days ago feels either brushed off or outraged that I do not understand their special situation and they go off in a huff or unsubscribe from the program for a year. If I say that to a person in balance, they say *Oh my, whatever was I thinking about. Thank you.* I listen for this change. Sometimes it comes early. But most often it is the change that tells me most about Step 7 consciousness. One of my leadership people makes a mistake. We have a code for mistakes called the FANTASTIC! code. They say, *Oh fantastic, let me go clean that one up.* We laugh and it is no bigger than an error to be corrected. Or someone wobbles, and I say, *Hey, how about a sabbatical while you steady up there?* and they say...*yah, yah, let me go catch my breath and tighten up my plan. My timing is off, I am eating out too much.* And they do. Now let me tell you, working and playing with people in this energy is beyond comparison. You all feel it drifting through. Those of you on the more senior lists drink from the well. Those of you just starting know this is what you want. This is part of radiance, this humor, this joy, this resilience. It is way more than no longer yelling at your kids. It is getting a life. No more blame, lots of taking responsibility. No more entitlement, just humble willingness to work, show up and participate. Pretty nice from where I sit. Here are the folks who are helping put the newsletter together:
Gretel, our webmaster, puts it all together. David runs the Radiant Recovery® Store. Selena provides the weekly Ambassadors column. The banner photograph is by Patti Holden. ©2008 Kathleen DesMaisons. All rights reserved. You are free to use or transmit this article to your ezine or website as long as you leave the content unaltered, use this attribution: "By Kathleen DesMaisons, Ph.D. of Radiant Recovery®", and notify kathleen@radiantrecovery.com of the location. Please visit the Radiant Recovery® website at http://www.radiantrecovery.com for additional resources on sugar sensitivity and healing addiction. You are getting the weekly newsletter from Radiant Recovery® in response to your signup. A copy of this newsletter may also be found posted on the web at http://www. radiantrecovery.com/weeklynewsletter.htm. |
