Transform Your Mind: New Year, New You

January.

The time of year when the end and beginning meet. The last year is over and the new one is beginning. An annual event unlike any other.

The new year shines brightly before us with so much potential. The beauty of it untouched. Like freshly fallen snow. It offers promises and hopes of better days.

It is a time when we pick resolutions that we vow to keep. For real this year, unlike last year and the year before. It is a time we take stock of all our failings and decide we must change everything about ourselves to be successful and have a better year.

Lists, charts, and vision boards are created with good intention. And every precaution is taken to guarantee success. New workout clothes/shoes/equipment/programs are purchased. Junk food is thrown out and all foods brought in are whole foods…meats and veggies and fruits. A booklist is made and books that promise life change are purchased. Church attendance becomes a priority. There is great effort put into starting new and becoming better.

The desire to be better is good. The desire to get stronger and learn new skills is great. Pursuing better relationships or maybe learning a new parenting style that better suits your child are admirable things.

But, what if this is all wrong?

This approach leaves a void. It neglects your MIND.   Many times when the resolutions are made, the mind is not considered. 

Anything you want to change about yourself requires you to think differently.

You want to lose weight? Then you need to look at what you are eating. Well guess what? That means you have to RETHINK your approach to food. What do you eat? Why do you eat it? Do you prefer premade food that is more processed? Have you decided to go completely organic and crunchy? This leads to then looking at what is readily accessible for you? Can you get fresh organic produce year-round? Can you get meat directly from the farm or do you have to get it from the grocery stores? What kinds of sacrifices are you going to have to make to actually follow through?

While many of these things seem to be surface level topics and changes, they are not.

Because you still have to live the life you have created thus far. Do you need to make changes in your finances to be able to change your eating? Do you need to look at food from a different perspective—look at it as a good and nourishing thing, not a source of condemnation and judgement?

This then leads to a whole other level of thinking and learning and understanding.

And this is where the change happens.

If you change your THINKING, then your heart and body will follow.

If food is a threat and you reframe it to being something GOOD and of VALUE, your nervous system recognizes it as a positive thing and can stop sending the stress hormones every time you eat, which can be causing you to gain weight. Instead your body can learn to use the fuel instead of being afraid of it.

I am going to speak about this a little from my own life.

I have battled weight my entire life. I was always bigger than my friends. I liked food and I stress ate. So that meant I weighed more.

I also grew up in 90’s diet culture. Truly awful!

Now, as an adult with 4 almost adult children, I realize my weight struggles were so much deeper than I thought at the time. And they were unnecessary.

While I was bigger than my friends, I was not fat. I wore a 10 for most of high school. I am 5’7” I worked out a lot. Took ballet, tap, and jazz multiple nights a week. Worked on a local dairy farm so had solid muscles. Swam a lot during the summer. I was solid.

Most of my friends were shorter than me. And were a size 0-4. Genetics plays a huge roll in it too. No one in my family history has ever been a size 0. I take that back. My aunt was a 0 when she was on drugs. Looked absolutely awful.

But, because my mother didn’t work through her own fears and insecurities, they got passed on to me.

And guess what?

I gained weight.

Why?

Stress.

Stress of not being good enough. Stress of being hungry all the time because I was only allowed to eat salads for lunches—salads with nothing but vegetables and maybe some fruit sprinkled in. And fat free salad dressing.

My skin was full of acne. Which my mother criticized regularly. Which created more stress and caused more breakouts and added weight.

From the time I graduated high school until I got married at 23 years old (5 years) I gained 25 pounds. From all the STRESS my mother created and put me through with food and lots of other things.

No matter how much I quit eating, or how much I worked out, or any of that, I was not getting closer to a size 4.

The one time I lost weight, without changing anything I was doing, was when my husband and I were dating.

As I have reflected on that, I realize the reason the weight came off is because I felt safe.

Now, I have been married 20+ years. I am the heaviest I have ever been. My body lived in flight or fight mode for so long due to an emotionally abusive parent, that all I knew how to do was survive.

A couple years ago, all of this began to change.

The abuse I experienced as a kid and an adult were being repeated on my children. From my mother.

She attacked my children for their weight/size. Criticized their very persons. Caused havoc when they tried to help her with something serious. It was ugly. But also eye opening.

I understood where my thinking about my value, size, and self-worth came from. I understood better what drove my eating habits. And I understood why I haven’t been able to lose the weight, regardless of what I do. Or if I lose it for a little while, it all comes back and brings another 20 lbs with it.

So I go back to the point when my husband and I were dating and I was losing weight. And when I understood I lost it because I felt safe, I can figure out how to pursue that safety again.

I have minimal contact with my parents. My children have minimal contact with them, as well. And while it makes me sad, it is what it best for now.

Then I start to look for other causes of stress.

The last few years have been a wild ride. COVID was something special, and the chaos that has continued since that mess has caused all kinds of stress in our life.

Financially, things are not good. The last five years have buried us. And that’s OKAY. Why? Because we have the freedom to change our lives!

So that is what I am doing. It is what my husband is doing.

He has changed jobs. I am creating my own. We are talking about moving to a place with more opportunity to garden and live outside while also costing less than where we currently live.

I am taking supplements to help my body heal and recover from a life time of toxic behavior and thinking.

For the first time in a long time, I am free. Free to be who God created me to be. Free to explore life and what He brings to us. Free to watch my children grow into who God is calling them to be.

And this freedom is bringing weight loss.

But it has required so much change in my thinking.

It is truly a daily choice to renew my mind and be transformed.

And the transformation is happening.

I am losing weight. My sleep is improving. I am finding purpose in life again.

I am learning what God’s perfect and pleasing will is for me.

So for me, I didn’t set resolutions this year. Instead, I made a list and a vision board of what I want to be different in my life. And have set about learning and understanding the MINDSET required for the changes.

For instance. My parents are going to be furious when the time comes for us to move. But I no longer care. Not because I don’t care about them. but they no longer have access to me or my decisions for my household. Instead, it is between my husband and me to make the best decision for our own household.

While I do not have this all figured out, and I don’t have a 5-step plan to guarantee positive change in your life, what I do have to offer is the truth of God’s Word as I have experienced it in my own life.

As this year begins and you set about making changes in your life, will you consider the idea of looking at your thoughts regarding the things you want to be different?

If you want more money, do you think with a mindset of abundance or lack?

If you want to lose weight and get healthy, what does that actually mean? For me, it means getting stronger. And restoring sleep. And understanding who I am and what I want from life. Heath is multi-faceted for me.

Everything starts with the mind.  The mind is powerful, and it is just starting to be understood from a scientific standpoint.  

I encourage you to really take into consideration what your mindset is about whatever you think needs to change this year.  Really try to understand how you got to where to where you are today.  What thoughts or ideas or voices impacted you?  What is stirring the desire for change?  What prompted that thought?  Who said something that registered with you and you chose to take action?

Dig deep.  Transformation is an ongoing process.  So let it take time.  Let it reveal to you in its own time what you need to know.  But pursue it daily.  Renew your mind every morning when you awake ad throughout the day, and then again before you sleep.  Then take action.

If you are a follower of Jesus Christ, then ask Him to reveal to you His way of thinking.

May God bless you as you grow and change and mature.  May He pour His Spirit upon you and give you understanding and wisdom.  May He grant you the courage to DO the change so you become changed.

Romans 12:2—"  Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.