I had a conversation with someone who said she felt the need to figure out what happened in her past that made her want to overeat. In looking through old journals she noted that she had written things like, “I don’t understand why I eat when I’m not hungry” and “I must want to be fat so I can be unattractive because something horrible must have happened to me as a child.“

She said she had been prompted by therapists, self help books, and the media, to look for something she said "simply wasn’t there."

Then she said: But I do have some work to do in terms of shaming myself and thinking I was a failure when it wasn’t the truth. It's going to be difficult to unlearn after all these years of hating myself."

My genuine, unironic response: Maybe the "horrible" thing that happened is that you were taught to shame and hate yourself.

While you were born in a body that is physiologically wired to experience the sensations we call shame, you were not born ashamed. You were not born hating yourself. You were taught to do that.

Being ashamed of yourself – hating yourself – isn't just par for the course. It's not an inherent way of being. It is not a personal failing.

It just feels that way because we've lived with it for a few thousand years.

They say a miracle is simply a shift in perception.

Unshaming is when you change your perception from "this is just who I am" to "this is what I was taught and conditioned to believe about myself."

Unshaming is both an individual process and a collective responsibility.

Unshaming is the ultimate in cycle breaking (even if you think you've already passed that ish down).

It's not too late.

Much, much love,

Karen

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