What does an unmoving sea amidst a cacophony 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.

Well, my friends, it’s been a while—two years and counting, in fact, since my last episode, number 55. I’ve missed you. And, apparently, some of you have missed me too, judging by the emails and DMs that came my way. I couldn’t think of a better day than Thanksgiving to say how much I appreciate you for reaching out. I’m glad to be back.

We had just finished discussing the first eight of 12 keys to end binge eating. They were:

Key number 1: fiercely defend your dream, which was about how you must have your own back if you want to stop bingeing

Key number 2: treat yourself with dignity, which was about relating to yourself from a place of compassion and self-regard

Key number 3: ease the pressure to be different, which was about distinguishing between data and drama, comparing yourself to who you were yesterday rather than to others, and letting go of added stress to stop bingeing and lose weight

Key number 4: eat good food, which was about the long-substantiated link between dieting and bingeing

Key number 5: understand your brain, which was about neuroplasticity, rewiring, and getting to know your lower brain and higher brain

Key number 6: welcome your urges, which was about what to believe to allow an urge and how to explore one

Key number 7: unlearn the desire to overeat, which was about why willpower eventually fails; four main sources of desire; psychological versus physiological eating; dopamine, hormones and hunger; the hunger-fullness scale; and why calories are ineffective as a sole weight-loss tool

Key number 8: practice epic self-care, which was about why self-care is so important, cortisol and sleep, how self-care can change your eating and be a gift to others, and the downfall of putting yourself last

Now, we’re at Key number 9, which is tune in and notice. And this is an invitation to turn inside.

So much of the journey to end binge eating seems to unfold amid a cacophony of external expert cajoling:

Eat this. No, don’t eat that.

Do this. No, don’t do that.

Think this. No, don’t think that.

Want this. No, don’t want that.

What are we to do?

What if, even for a few moments, we tuned into our own internal refrain?

If you’re willing, you can try this now. And if you’re not, that is also okay.

I don’t want to become part of your cacophony. I’d rather hum in your harmony. So if I ever say anything that doesn’t resonate for you, toss it.

Why?

Because if there’s one thing I most want for you, it is an internal sense of leadership, a solid trusting of what does and doesn’t align with you.

I often think that one of the reasons binge eating is so intractable is because we tend to lose all our authority to the doctrines of those outside, to those with alphabets after their names.

Now, don’t get me wrong. Learning from others is a beautiful thing. I’m even hoping you might be open to learning from me. But I would never want it to come at the cost of your own insights of what is true for you.

So what if we took a few moments to drop inside, to tune into you?

If it feels right, you can close your eyes—but, for goodness sakes, please not if you’re driving a freight train or experimenting with a new hand-held mixer.

If you’d rather not close your eyes, no problem. You might consider lowering your eyelids slightly, casting your gaze down or into the distance, or becoming aware of your breathing with no need to change it in any way.

What do you hear?

What do you feel?

What do you sense?

What do you see?

Maybe you hear discussions with divisions. One voice telling you that you should binge. Another one telling you that you shouldn’t. The first is begging with you to take a break, the second is dragging you through.

Maybe you feel a longing pull for strudel. Maybe you feel a fisted determination against it.

Maybe you sense cavernous hollows in your torso and a whirring stirring in your mind.

Maybe you see shrouded clouds all around atop a blackened unmoving sea.

Who are you?

Are you one of these? Are you several? Or are they parts of the sum of it all.

When my clients first come to me, many believe that they are binge eaters. In totality—a claustrophobic, imprisoning identity with no sign of a door, much less a key.

But there is always a door. There is always more.

The bingeing is just a part of who they are. It only feels like it’s all of who they are.

Remember, just because we feel something to be true doesn’t mean that it actually is true.

The part of us that binges is just that—a part of us. It only feels like it’s all of us when it slides in, slides across, and eclipses us.

And when we feel eclipsed—taken over—by the part of us that binges, it can seem like there’s nothing else … nothing behind, nothing underneath, nothing around.

But there is always something else. At all times, something does reside behind, below, around …

You.

How do you find you in the night, when all is dark, save for a ring of light?

You look for the diamond at the edge of the eclipse.

Why?

Because it’s the clue that will lead you to you as the moon moves.

And if you’re willing to let the phases of you move in time—and not force them to happen all at once—soon enough, you’ll be there. Brilliant, radiant, shining.

Uncovered.

This is the promise of tuning in and noticing.

Yes, you have a part of you that wants to binge.

Yes, you have a part of you that wants to stop.

Yes, you likely have a shaming part that hates the fighting and the fallout of it all.

And there is undoubtedly more.

But who is the one who’s doing the noticing? Who is the curious one? Who is the one who just wants to know?

That, my friend, is you.

And when you find you more and more, day by day, the external discord quiets to your internal shores where parts of you lap up or, perhaps, rush up to you, knowing you’ll be there.

Finding your diamond at the edge of your eclipse is the most important part of this journey.

That’s it for Episode 56. Thank you for listening! If you’re ready to uncover who you are behind the bingeing and what you need to let the bingeing go, join me in the all new Done Bingeing Academy. Doors to the inaugural term close Thursday, December 3, at 11:59 pm Eastern / 8:59 pm Pacific. Go to www.holdingthespace.co/group-coaching/ to learn more.

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.