Ah-ha Topic >>>>>>> Changed Me

The OA topic was "suffering"... how suffering is a habit, how suffering is something we get really good at doing.

Suddenly the previous week flowed through my mind. Suffering was the flagship of the entire week, especially how I suffered (and was bored, tired, driven to binge on chips, sleepless, etc.) working on photographs for the book. When anybody asked me about the book, all I could say is how hard I work, how many long hours I struggle at the computer working in Photoshop, how little money I'm earning doing this book, how I have to sacrifice things I love to do (like read and write blogs). Poor me, I suffer so greatly.

Sitting in the meeting, my mind reached into a little lie I told my husband in the name of suffering. I told him I'd spent 4 hours working on just 1 picture in Photoshop and that I had 7 more pictures to go. Poor me. Poor me. Here's the truth, as far as I can recall: I had actually finished 3 pictures in 4 hours and played a couple of games of Spider solitaire as well. I only had 4 more pictures to go. Why lie? Upping the pity-pot quotient, I guess. Habit. Suffering. I'm good at it. I've been good at it, practicing it daily, for as long as I can remember.

No more. Baby steps toward choosing not to suffer, choosing to tell the truth, choosing to speak about the positive rather than the negative. Not that things aren't hard sometimes. So this week, when people have asked me about the book, I've told the truth, especially I've named the things that are working well.

Want to know the truth? I'm ahead of schedule for my 2nd submission. Recently I read through everything that's finished and honestly find it to be pretty amazing! It could actually become a timless classic, THE reference and inspiration book about beads and beading! That's my new truth, and I'm stickin' to it!

I'm also watching and listening to everything that comes out of my mouth... I try to notice any little exaggeration and to correct myself right on the spot.... with an apologetic... oops, I kinda overstated that.

This is a good change.... a relief to speak the truth... a relief to hear myself name the good things rather than the difficult things, to let go of suffering. And, I'm not Pollyanna. To put it in sportsman terms, I'll say I caught a fish (suffering), but the size of the fish will be realistic rather than drastically exaggerated. This is a very good change!

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And another good change... In my suffering state about the book, I started to eat a lot of chips... Chips every day and lots of them, stuffing in mouthful after mouthful... standing in the kitchen mindlessly munching on chips. Am I exaggerating? Hmmm... Well, maybe a little. But yes, I did eat a lot of chips.

From time to time, a little OA voice would tug on my sleeve and murmur, "you're binging." I ignored it until the day I decided to stop suffering. At that same time, the warning about binging struck me as truth. Abstinence is the OA answer to binging. And abstinent I have been since that day. No more chips. Yay! I'm feeling better about everything. Binging makes me feel crazy. I knew I was close to the brink of no return about eating. I've known it for several months. But now, it's OK again. Whew!

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Gratitude for the day: OA for sure, opportunities, rain, Robert, my family, Liz, Hollie, Lunnette, Christy, Christi, Mom memories.