By Karen Knowler
Last week I discussed raw foods and weight loss, and made a special mention about looking at things that, even though we might think we want to lose weight, can often subconsciously hold us back. This week I promised you “Food, sex, power and freedom”. Hmmm, I do like to set myself bold challenges!
My first inspiration for this article actually came back in August last year. Some of you may recall that this was when American raw food educator and sex expert Roe Gallo (pictured) came to visit the UK, lecture at my home and stay with me for a few days. We had a ball. What a woman.
Roe, I think, is a great role model. She’s in her 50’s but looks so much younger and her joy and enthusiasm for life are truly infectious and inspirational.
I found it interesting that Roe was discussing sex so openly, or more specifically, beliefs about sex. I haven’t seen this done in raw foods so far and was interested to see what she had to say and how she delivered it.
Well, she did an excellent job. And that’s probably not easy, because food, sex and power are all very emotive issues. So emotive (but potentially so incredibly transformational) that we have decided to run a class together at some point this year…
Now, I’ll be completely honest with you when I say that putting fingers to keyboard to write this article has been slightly daunting! I know that because these issues are so emotive there may be a bigger response to this article than potentially any other so far. Plus it’s a subject I have never written or spoken about before.
Well, I guess it’s time… it seems to come up for everyone eventually.
So going back to the last issue, I mentioned last week that my own lack of weight loss eventually, at a subconscious level, came down to fear of being attractive. More specifically, sexually attractive. Quite simply I knew that when I was slim I attracted an unusually high amount of male attention and when I put on weight this eased up and I felt less attractive and therefore my “vibe” was very different. So I attracted less attention not just through the way I looked but also, and perhaps moreso, through the way I felt about myself.
Now, before I go any further, I need to make it clear that this article is by no means exclusively about me! I know from the many hundreds of women I have worked with and coached privately that I am not at all alone in this situation. In fact, although it usually takes a few sessions to come up, eventually I find that most – if not all - female clients have issues around body weight and their attractiveness to others, and more specifically their sexual relations. Whether they have had painful past experiences that “makes” them retain weight to protect themselves, are not happy in their current situation (single or married) or just have not yet learned how to handle their own sexual power and energy, there are many ways that this can show up for us and it does – eternally – until we decide to heal and do or believe something different.
For the purpose of illustration of this issue’s key points I’m going to use a case study. This case study is but one variation on the theme of today's article, but by no means the only manifestation of “food, sex, power and freedom” issues. It is, however, the most common one by far. I may well address some of the others at a later time. Please note that this particular “case study” is a composite case study and is based on a combination of real life experiences and not any one individual:
Judy came to me aged 38, overweight and in pain about that fact, and although she had “learned to live with it”, she had hit the point where she wanted to get to the bottom of her weight gain once and for all.
Yes, of course she had tried all the diets going. And yes, she’d been on and off raw foods for a couple of years which was why she was speaking to me specifically, but a) she couldn’t stick to raw foods and b) she felt sure that there must be something more to it than simply the food; she didn’t understand why she couldn’t keep herself from the fridge, even though she knew she wasn’t really hungry.
During our work together a number of things became clear:
1) She had been sexually abused as a child
2) She had had various eating disorders throughout her teens and 20’s, although this had eased off now to the point where she no longer made herself sick or starved herself but instead just hated her body and, to some degree, herself
3) She had never got to the bottom of her pain; it was all far too much to explore and eating was so much easier and, for the most part, enjoyable (at least it was at the time)
4) She had never found out who she really was and what made her truly, madly and deeply happy
5) She was now married with children and her relationship was becoming a little stale but she felt too trapped in her own pain to be the beautiful, attractive, vibrant woman that she had always dreamed of being
6) She and her husband rarely, if ever, discussed her weight, their sex life or what she had been through in the past
7) Now, three decades on from when the first incident happened, she felt she finally had, with the help of my coaching, the time, energy and strength to take a look at what was there – yes, even if it meant feeling some of that long-repressed pain and addressing losing the weight once and for all
Through our work together we explored the four core issues at the heart of today’s article: Food, sex, power and freedom.
As far as food was concerned, Judy’s eating patterns had never been great. She’d been raised on a fairly average diet, had struggled with weight since her teens, and then during college and finding her place in the adult world she had used and abused food to lose or gain weight depending on how she felt about herself and her life at the time.
At the core of Judy’s eating habits was of course her pain. The pain she had from being abused as a child was still as alive at age 38 as it was at age eight. She had never dealt with it, never told anyone about it apart from one trusted friend and her husband. And although he knew about it, they never spoke about it, let alone addressed the healing of it together.
And so it was that the child inside Judy was still suffering, still reaching for food to quash the feelings that tried to come up every single day of her life. It also enabled her to create a frame that was big and “protective” and that, to her subconscious mind, would prevent her from anything like that ever happening again.
But of course, in spite of feeling protected and safe and numbing out the pain, she also had the flipside to deal with: Not loving her own body, not liking what she saw in the mirror, not feeling confident about the way she looked, feeling half alive, some minor health issues that wouldn’t go away, and not feeling sexy for her husband, not today and not really ever before.
So yes, as far as sex was concerned she never felt sexy, didn’t dress sexily and needless to say her sex life was not entirely fulfilling. And while there was lots of love in her marriage and they were both committed to each other, she never truly felt alive in her physical relationship with her husband and never had done. As much as this pained her, and she felt surely it must pain her husband too (but was too scared to ask), the potential pain of going through her "stuff" was even more painful, and that won out every time. Quiet yet ultimately deafening frustration reigned on.
Side note: Feeling alive and sexy are very much linked. Although often a taboo subject, we cannot deny that we are sexual beings as much as we are thinking, feeling and moving beings. It’s part of who we are, and depending on what we believe, have been told or taught, have had drilled into us since childhood and/or have read about, heard about or have personally experienced, we all have very different ideas about what this means and what is “appropriate”.
What I have found for myself and others following a raw food diet is that as we drop the various layers that have been holding us back from feeling fully connected to ourselves and to life, part of the transformation occurs sexually too. We feel better in our own skin, we feel more energy, we feel more alive.
The nature of energy is of course that it loves to move and to play. It is youth, it is passion, it is excitement, it is expression – and often expression just for the very sake of it. Energy’s sole purpose is to ebb and flow and do what it wants to do when it wants to do it in this physical world of ours.
So is it any wonder then that so many people complain of lack of energy?
Not only do most people try to feel alive on a diet that is devoid of life, but in combination with lack of clarity, direction, passion, permission, allowing and so much more, their own innate energy is repressed at every level.
As far as Judy was concerned, she was living her life running on very little power. Every ounce of energy that might have been available to her was subdued by her frequent fridge visits and carrying around a body that was too heavy for her and one that never felt or looked “right” to her. In public she could get away with it by making light of it and joining in with the office banter, saying things along the lines of “Well, you only live once” as she indulged in a cream cake at break time, or “I might be overweight, but a life without chocolate chip cookies is not a life worth living!” But of course behind the smiles and laughs were silent tears and an ever-present voice saying, “You know this isn’t what you really want”.
The fourth aspect, freedom, came into Judy’s equation in a distorted manner. On the face of it she had freedom to eat whatever she wanted – when she wasn’t on a diet of course! But this was her only freedom, really. Underneath the surface she had not allowed herself the freedom that is everyone’s birthright: The freedom to express, the freedom to feel what’s really there to be felt, the freedom to explore life and all that it has to offer, the freedom to heal and be healed, the freedom to live life on her terms, and yes the freedom to live in a body that wasn’t carrying extra “stuff” and to enjoy the benefits that that would afford her.
By bringing all these issues to the surface it became clear, as it always does, that food and weight is typically only ever the symptom and not the cause. Understanding this – really understanding this, can often be the start of a massive breakthrough.
For years she had thought, “If only I could lose the weight then I’ll be happy…” And of course the reality of the situation was “If I healed myself, gave myself full permission to find me and be me and LIVE me, THEN, yes I will naturally lose the weight, but either way, allowing myself the freedom to be fully alive, that would make me truly happy.”
And so it was, and so it is, that the four issues apply to all of us as human beings.
By allowing our sexual energy to move and play we allow ourselves to be more grounded, more earthy, more real, more human, more connected and more loving. From that flows creativity, expression, freedom, power and energy that can only feed back into the loop and make for a very happy life experience indeed!
When this happens, or even as part of the healing, food then slips back into its correct role – to nourish, sustain, fuel and satisfy. It can feed every aspect of us when our approach to what we eat is as loving as the approach we take to any other aspect of ourselves or our lives.
And this leads me neatly on to next week’s article which is: "Why Raw Foods Are the Only Foods That Support Us Fully On All Four Levels."
I’m hoping this week’s article was helpful to you, and, as for Judy, well I think you can guess how the story turned out: She got help to heal her pain, she visited the fridge less frequently, she dropped some weight, began to believe that she really could be the woman she dreamed of being, and allowed herself to get to know that woman better so that eventually in not such a long time at all, she could let the “old” Judy simply fall away. And that was physically, emotionally and mentally too. The new Judy was not really so new at all, just the one that had been seeded in her her whole life long, just aching to get out. And yes, raw foods did play a massive part in that!
© 2007 Karen Knowler
Karen Knowler, The Raw Food Coach publishes "Successfully Raw" - a free weekly eZine for raw food lovers everywhere. If you're ready to look good, feel great and create a life you love get your FREE tips, tools and recipes now at www.TheRawFoodCoach.com.
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