Back to Thinking PINK - journeying back to the MC...

So here it begins...again. Before I can begin with this, I guess I should go back a few weeks:

September 10, 2008-

Day 10! Finally ready to end this cleanse and begin life with my new-found (well, really not so new – reawakened) outlook on life…

I feel like this cleanse has reset some habits in my gray matter...not only that but I feel much more confident overall. I won't say that it's been 'easy' exactly, but I wouldn't say it's been that difficult either.

More than anything, I think it’s helped me to realize how much I’ve used snaking as a mental/emotional crutch rather than recognizing my internal issues and dealing with them. I realized, going back a little that I've been like this for quite awhile. Food should be your medicine, but not it that way.

Also, more than anything, I have a lot of internal/mental anger that really needed to be dealt with. I tend to get mad over little things that I cannot control and would hold onto that anger, sometimes, I think, just for the sake of holding on. Expressing anger in a healthy way, is definitely healthy, to be angry, at someone, at the universe, at objects, for not fulfilling their duty to you, THAT is unhealthy.

It's completely normal to want great things for yourself and family, but it’s not normal to have a temper tantrum when things don't go your way. In some ways, I'm still a child, or child-like for the first time. My parents did not allow tantrums at all. I just didn't throw them. Ever. Actually, I was a very reserved child in that way – never really felt a need to throw a crazy fit. I wonder now, if I've spent a good part of my subconscious adult life throwing them, as I never really understood how to deal with anger. I just had to swallow it up, or risk the anger, guilt and dismissal of my parents. Of course, I don’t blame my parents in anyway. They always told me that I was a well-behaved child. I think I just chose to be calm and keep them happy in that way.

Part of me realizes I needed to relax back into my life, ‘to let go and let God’ instead of fighting things that I can’t control. Calm down, relax, stop trying to control everything outside of myself (as it's destructive in every way). Perhaps that's been the problem all along, I felt so out of control inside, that the only way I could compensate was to attempt to control the external – hence, my OCD. Very self-destructive and pointless. I’ve noticed that the more I detox and developed a healthier lifestyle (i.e. vegetarianism) the better I have been at overcoming aspects of my OCD.

I need to trust that this path I am on is the one I am supposed to be on, and have faith in life and the flow of life itself. The other part of me thinks, no, if I do that, nothing will happen – that I have the power to change everything and shouldn’t stop trying to do so– if I sit an just live life as it comes, I may miss something and possibly end up in some state of half-misery! As I progress, it’s all beginning to sound wrong to me. I’m truly beginning to understand why God fasted for 40 days, and why monks fast. It really is the best way (only way?) to heal the body, ridding it of toxins, but most importantly, rid the body of a toxic mind. As much as I know that that is what my mind is now able to tell me, I know this is only the beginning of healing and self-rediscovery.

The biggest thing for me and, quite possibly, the thing that made this all so worthwhile, was the realization of the differences between empty and hungry. Often times I was only looking to feel 'full', emotionally and spiritually. A mental distraction. It's never seems to be about the food, it's about the action of trying to fill myself. Granted, I don’t have a weight issue, but I do tend to overeat and eat for unhealthy reasons. Some people look to fill themselves with drugs, nicotine, alcohol. My drug of choice has always been sugar and in it’s own way it has done my body great damage. My body would never be able to completely heal/recover if I never first take care of my mind.

I never really felt hungry on this cleanse, which added to my ability to look within. Something that a lot of us don’t spend a lot of time doing. I always thought meditation was a waste of time. Now I realized that this and self-reflection is the healthiest habit we can have. Halfway through the cleanse, I started to feel so stagnant. I kept comparing myself to friends and people around me, who seem to be doing all these fantastic wonderful things with their lives and I am just sitting here, doing nothing, going nowhere, engaging no one – not even myself. I felt/feel lost, and disappointed in myself for not doing great, exciting things. Sure, I feel like I'm doing something and I feel like I'm accomplishing things, but what I often end up doing is neglecting myself. I start a million different projects, but never really finish. Always wondered why this was such a problem for me lately. I began to feel more dormant, then as I progressed through, I was able to realized what really has worth in my life, and as cliché as it may sound, how priceless my life and my health truly are.

Don’t get me wrong. I haven’t come to this huge epiphany – I’m just more enlightened. There's still a tug-of-war going on inside my psyche that I know needs to play itself out before I can fully 'heal'. I really do believe that psychic and physical health are very closely linked together. I've experienced it in myself and really do believe in the power of thought/mind. I guess I’ve subconsciously known for a while, my inner life has been chaotic, strained, frustrated, angry. All the things that I have overcome during my childhood – I think I’ve repressed a lot of it. Seemingly ok on the outside, able to live life without external problems – even seemingly ok on the inside, but my mind knows better and was doing quite a number on my body, no matter what I tried to tell it. It was/is like have a ménage trios, only at times, my ego wasn’t really involved. My mind and body pushed me aside and hashed things out on their own. The body became more dominant and the mind remained submissive. A body with a weak mindset (even on a subconscious level) is always means for disaster when it comes to homeostasis and health.

I kind of feel like, at times, that I'm getting eaten up from inside my brain. Even more reason this cleanse is a good thing, I’m sure That's what this was for – to detox all the crap out of my body – and, I now realize, to detox my brain. I feel like I did an entire spring cleaning on mind, body and soul.

That's not to say that I haven’t had major breakthroughs and done the tough stuff, but more often than not it's brought upon by outside circumstances. I resist and resist until the world forces me to look. And we all know that those are the most painful, and sometimes shocking transformations to make. So many are afraid to look inside

I mean, I know this isn't forever, and I can have this emotionally triggered craving or that one. I think that's the key to the mental part of this. It's not forever. Everything changes, and so will this. It's about developing a certain patience - a personal acceptance of natural transition. If I allow myself to gracefully flow through this cleansing process (or life’s process) the difficult moments become easier to handle/deal with. It creates a certain acceptance and compassion for self that I have been obviously lacking lately. By allowing myself to be emotional or tired or hungry or whatever else allows the cravings/feelings to be noticed, experienced, and allowed to pass with understanding. I haven’t been fighting these things in myself, or outside of myself while on this cleanse - not as before, and I think that is why I am not struggling the way some do or will on this cleanse. These moments are only that, moments. And there are millions of them in a day – each day.
“This too shall pass.”

It's also interesting how this fast has allowed me to make a clear distinction (or link) between my emotional feelings, and physical feelings/sensations. I can see that when I'm angry or experiencing negative emotion, I feel much more compelled to eat than I do when I'm relaxed and at ease. It's started to help me, once again, differentiate between the physicality of my current experience and the emotionality of it. Something I think many of us have trouble doing. I’m one who had never learned how to properly 'digest' my internal emotional world, per se, and I this fast has definitely shed lots of light on that. In the past, I thin I’ve just learned to swallow it all down, and even now it times of frustrated, I seek to ‘swallow’ be it lots of sugary snacks or whatnot.

For me, the emotional, mental part of this cleanse was harder to deal with than the lack of food. Then again, I think that’s because that is where I chose to put my focus from the start. (Also, of course to heal my abscess.) Wherever you go, there you are - and thoughts are things, they are the cause of any effect. Thoughts always become things, and my thoughts, I think, were/are beginning to show up in my health. I say there is no reason behind the fact that my teeth are going crazy on me, then I come to realize more and more that there IS a reason. I am that reason. Once I truly understand that, I think that personal challenges like this fast become a whole different experience. I no longer fight myself. I am working with myself for a self-defined goal – balance and acceptance on all levels. Challenges and obstacles make us stronger. Cliche but true. Accept that there are going to be moments when you are hungry, cranky, trying to talk yourself out of staying on the fast (or whatever current life challenge it may be). Always trying to justify things to your advantage. The human brain is a wonderful and sometimes crazy thing

My whole attitude to food and eating has completely changed. I see, now, what is emotion, feeling and what is true hunger. I can now begin to separate thoughts and biological hunger. I have relearned my body to understand the differences. They actually sound different in my mind and feel different in my body.

Feeling empty and being hungry are not the same thing. I needed to feel each individually and in unison. Emptiness is a mental and, oftentimes, emotional state. Hunger is a physical and biochemical one. Completely and one-hundred percent different. I had to experience the differences between 'empty and hungry' so you that I could begin to tell myself – yes, I’m hungry, or no, I’m not hungry, I have something going on emotionally that I need to recognize and deal with. Food is medicine, yes, but sugar and junk is not that way to medicate my mind. It will only hurt my body and my health.

I followed the MC with 6 days of organic juicing and felt on top of the world. I felt so in control of my health and my body. I was benefiting in so many ways and what I thought was so many levels. I eased back into eating as you're supposed to. I went back to my vegetarian (almost vegan-like) diet that is based on as many natural organic items as possible. For some reason in the past 4-5 days, I have become an obsessive compulsive eater. I have always been a bit of a snacker, but I have never been on this level of gorging. I feel like I have lost all self-control and it scares the shit out of me. I can't figure out where and when this happened. SO, the only thing I can conclude at this moment, is that my body wasn't done detoxing and didn't reach the level that it needed to. Maybe its stuck in 'detox-limbo' ???

All I know is that I feel stuck and lost and the only time I really felt like I had a hold of life is when I was detoxing on the MC.

So, it's back to thinking PINK. That was the main goal of the MC - to obtain a pinkish hue to my all-to-white tongue. It actually developed a pink cast about 4 days after I stopped fasting (Sep 20th or so) Kicking myself for stopping when I did. I know that I would've easily gone longer - maybe even still been fasting if it wasn't for my dental fears, which has gone away since then leading me to believe even more that my body was healing an underlying issue. Now, I just need to work on healing the mental underlying issue that recently bubbling to the surface...