Freewrite Wednesday

It has been a long time. Or at least it seems like it has been a long time since I wrote anything here. I have been journaling a whole lot at EXAMEN.me. I really enjoy that, and I have able to be private in my journaling. It is a lot like the seven years I spent doing the Bible Book Club. I would journal my thoughts online, and 3500 pages later, I had journaled through the whole Bible! Now, I am journaling through the life of Jesus in 30 days, and it has brought such joy to my heart. I love meditating in a passage and then praying through it. God has been uncannily meeting me. The passages he has given me have been PERFECT for the days challenges. How can anyone say there is not a God.

I have also been using this website to do an EXAMEN prayer in the evening or at least in the morning. Actually, the last few days, I have been taking a break in the middle of the day so that I can do a noon time EXAMEN. I have been reading The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius, and her recommends doing it after the noon day meal. So, I will eat my lunch and spend just a few minutes in examination prayer. 

I have loved this. I will always joke that I am very good about my time with God in the morning, but I am very different at night. It is hard for me to focus after my sleepy time at about 3 pm on. But the EXAMEN has given me something to focus on and to direct my day. I find myself doing many more things in the afternoon and evening that are life-giving for me rather than deadening just because I am lazy. 

One thing I think has been deadening is overeating. I know as a weight loss specialist (yes, I actually have a certification in this now) that there is a CortiZone period where we are in danger of stress eating. Stress hormones peak at 6-8 am. I am the best, most self-controlled eater in the world when those hormones are high, but when they hit there 3 pm-9pm downward spiral, I have no self control. I know all the things I need to do when everything is low. Natural ways to increase those levels. I have done VLOGS about them. I have developed handouts about them (HERE), but I have not always followed my own advice. I am lazy in the afternoons.

BUT this new focus of EXAMEN at this time has really helped me. If I were still working at OSU in the afternoons, it would not be a problem. Maybe I should take on two more classes in the afternoons too so that at least two afternoons a week, I would not be tempted to overeat. 

I once read a book by Ann Kimmel. She was a runner. Being overweight is not the issue for me (have not been overweight for the last five year - YAY!). The issue for me is similar to Ann's:

"In my eating, I have failed, too. People say, 'Ann, if you run ten miles a day, and one twenty-miler a week, you can eat anything.

Well, at times I have.
Twenty cookies in thirty minutes.
Half a cake.
Almost a whole recipe of cinnamon rolls.

Not always, but often when I am frustrated and anxious.

I know Jesus wants balance in my life. Fat is not the issue, but healthy diet, and self-control, and sensitivity to all those around me who cannot eat so much and stay thin."

That is so much where I am (though I have never eaten those amounts in one sitting). I want to not eat when I am anxious or frustrated. I want to ask, seek, knock when I am. I do not want to use food when I am bored. I want to balance too. I want self control. I want sensitivity.