What do hot bike shorts on a British buns have to do with you and binge eating? Keep listening!

Welcome to The Done Bingeing Podcast. This is the place to hear about how you can pair the emerging brain science about why you binge with powerful life coaching to help you stop. If you want to explore an evidence-based, non-clinical approach to end binge eating, you’re in the right place.

It’s time to free yourself. You have more power than you know. To find out more, go to www.holdingthespace.co and click Programs.

And now, your host, Internal-Family-Systems-Level-3-Trained and Master-Coach-Certified Martha Ayim.

Hey friends!

I’m guessing you’re listening to my podcast because you’ve been struggling with binge eating for a while.

If you’re anything like me, you’ve probably tried every diet, program or solution you could find—so many of which promised rapid results. I understand the soaring hope as you start out followed by the crushing disappointment when the bingeing returns, because I’ve been there too.

It makes sense to me that you want to stop bingeing right now—or yesterday—forever.

But what I’ve learned from my and my clients’ lives is that living from a place of urgency and pressure for immediate change often leads to exactly the result you don’t want—slower change, no change, or backward movement.

If you identify with any of the following thoughts or beliefs, this may be a good time to look at time.

• “This bingeing has to change—now.”

• “I have to make progress faster.”

• “The number on the scale isn’t budging. Nothing’s working.”

• “I’ve just binged again. I’m getting nowhere.”

The journey out of bingeing most often takes time, and I have a hunch you didn’t want to hear that.

I never wanted to hear it either. I was always “so over it.”

I always needed to stop bingeing now so I could stop feeling sick, or so I wouldn’t be spending so much money on food only to then spend so much more money on people to help me stop spending so much on food. Now you know why I felt so crazy all of those years.

I always needed to stop bingeing now so I could fit into my swim suits for the summer beaches, or into my ski suits for the snowy hills, or into my dresses for my cousins’ weddings.

Wanting to rush is completely understandable, but it didn’t help me, and my guess is that it hasn’t helped you.

For many people, changing fast means making drastic and sweeping changes to what they’re currently doing, according to whatever a particular guru says.

Some gurus say there have to be three big meals, some say six small ones.

Some say yes to snacks, some say no to them.

Some say no more flour or sugar, some say you have to have at least some.

Some say eat during the day whenever you’re hungry, some say extending fasting hours of the day and eating within a smaller window.

Some say hit the gym, some say a little movement will do.

All of these ideas makes sense on some level and work for some people.

They tell us what to eat, how much to eat, when to eat, and how to move. These are the obvious areas, and they disagree on all of it.

Now we have confusion in addition to the rushing, which doesn’t usually add up to awesome results.

In his book Atomic Habits, James Clear explains the power of appreciating even snail-paced movement in not-so-obvious areas.

He tells the story of how the trajectory of British cycling changed in 2003 when Dave Brailsford was hired as the new performance director. Professional cyclists in Great Britain had performed so poorly for the previous 100 years that a major bike manufacturer refused to sell them bikes, for fear that they would earn a bad reputation, just by association with these cyclists.

Brailsford believed in the concept of the aggregation of marginal gains—the search for a tiny margin of improvement in as many areas as possible—even in places few people ever look.

He had the bike seats redesigned and used warmed cycling shorts for comfort and performance.

He rubbed alcohol on the tires for better grip.

He tested different fabrics in the cycling gear and under different conditions to determine which kinds reduced resistance the most.

He tested a variety of massage gels to see which enhanced muscle recovery the most.

He hired a surgeon to teach the team how to wash their hands properly to reduce illness.

He personalized the selection of pillows and mattresses for each cyclist to determine which led to the best sleep.

He painted the inside of the bike van white so that it would be easier to detect and eliminate the dust that could interfere with the finely tuned gears.

Area by area, Brailsford found ways to improve performance and, within five years, the British cycling team dominated the world once again in professional cycling.

This is the power of the one-percent improvement; and over time, these tiny improvements accumulate exponentially, not linearly.

Another way to think about this is the one-degree shift, so distinct from the 180 we usually go for.

When a ship changes course by one degree, in 24 hours it will be in an entirely different part of the sea.

I get the allure of 180 flip, I used to do that too. But every time, I’d flip 180 back in days.

As one of my clients said to me recently: “I don’t have to do this on fast-forward.” And she was right.

Give yourself permission to take this one step at a time, to look in places often unseen.

Did you know that the white space on a printed page is as important as the black ink.

Why?

Because it holds the space for the message to come through.

Did you know that the background in a painting is as important as the foreground.

Why?

Because it holds the space for the dimensions to come through.

Did you know that the silence in a song is as important as the sound.

Why?

Because it holds the space for the music to come through.

Sometimes it’s in the least obvious places that much possibility and much nuance is found.

It takes curiosity, persistence, and time to get there. But there … there in the silence, in the white space, in the background, you just might find the missing note, message, or perspective that, in one place and then another, take you exactly where you want to go.

That’s it for Episode 77. Thank you for listening! If you’re interested in private coaching to help you make gains toward healing binge eating, book me for a free consultation at https://holdingthespace.as.me/free30. Let’s get you on my calendar today!

Thanks for listening to The Done Bingeing Podcast.

Martha has the highest-level training in both the evidence-based Internal Family Systems approach and in life coaching, and she’s available to help you stop bingeing. You can learn more about her programs by going to www.holdingthespace.co and clicking Programs.

Stay tuned for the next episode on freeing yourself from binge eating and creating the life you want.