When I was 15, I had anorexia. It was a year of big changes. From the security of living in a middle class family in Hong Kong, I was sent to an all-girls’ boarding school in Scotland. I had to leave my friends and a boy whom I fancied then, and suddenly found myself in a very cold country, with people speaking in an accent that was difficult to understand. At school there was only one other Asian student: I jumped 3 grades and had to study subjects which were totally foreign and I shared a room with two other girls who seemed to get along fine, but found me strange. At 15, that was a lot to take.
I felt rejected and abandoned, and very unsupported.
I wanted to disappear and remain invisible, so I hid myself in the library most of the time and studied to keep up with the good student identity I had built up for myself in Hong Kong. I felt very lonely.
I didn’t feel cared for, but did not feel I had any say in the matter, and so chose to just go along with the decision that was made for me. None of this felt okay, yet no part of me was aware I could talk about it, or even say no. What was not expressed verbally though, I expressed through controlling my body – I stopped eating.
I would only eat two things and in miniscule amounts – ketchup flavored chips and lemon meringue pie. But of course, that would be too obvious and I would get into trouble at school, so I would pretend to eat my meals and cut up everything on the plate and pick at it. Every morsel of food I put into my mouth felt like I was committing a crime.
Everything that did not feel right and I could not accept was not expressed, and it was my own body that I rejected to punish the world for treating me this way, although I thought it was freedom at the time. I was rebelling as a teenager from feeling the impossibility of being allowed to make true choices.
But I did choose, and I chose to withhold my communication; I chose to accept that children had no say in expressing how they felt to their parents in the culture that I grew up in, and when I did not take the responsibility to express myself, I also chose to punish myself as a consequence.
This pattern was carried on into adulthood: whenever I felt something was wrong in the world and it felt too overwhelming to express, I would reject the world by first rejecting myself.
How crazy is this?
If the outside world did not confirm me, it was as though I didn’t exist…. mostly, it didn’t. And when I didn’t get a confirmation from the world that matched the knowing within myself, I rejected life, and lived by constantly protecting myself from feeling hurt that no one saw me for who I truly am.
It was not until meeting Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine that I began to understand how truly precious I am, and that I do matter. In fact, everything begins with the love that I take responsibility for by first giving it to myself. This was a concept that is virtually unknown in the Chinese culture of filial piety and in the Christian religion that I grew up in. What I learned also is the responsibility of expression, from acknowledging what has been felt to be true within the body, and taking the further responsibility of expressing this truth outwardly, not in reaction, but with the love that has been built in the body from caring and nurturing myself.
Knowing myself to be a delicate, precious being, I am re-learning to live deeply this preciousness again. I am allowing the vulnerability of my body to be expressed and accepting it, along with the past and present choices I have made. I am choosing to let down the protection of perfection and/or rejection. I am allowing my body to again make its own choices, to be okay with making mistakes, as that is how I will learn to take responsibility. Most of all, I am deeply appreciating that for most of my life I have lived life honouring a deep inner knowing, and now, as always, it is amazing to deepen this relationship with my body further.
Although my weight has remained at about the same as when I had anorexia, what I feel in my body now is the steady warmth of preciousness, power in delicateness, consistency of joy and the solidness of self-worth I have never felt before – despite the fact that my body image does not fit into the normal standard that the world may be comfortable with.
It is important to appreciate how far I have come from having constant debilitating and depressive thoughts, to feeling deeply supported through this beautiful vehicle of expression. I am so honoured and humbled to express the greatest gift (love), through my greatest friend (the body) in the world.
Inspired daily by the wisdom of the body and the true relationship I am building, the teachings of Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine in commitment to self-love, self-care and self-nurturing.
By Adele Leung, Creative Director/Fashion Stylist, Hong Kong
Further Reading:
Healthy body healthy mind
Supporting children to express how they are feeling and to take responsibility for choices in life is the foundation of parenting – both for ourselves and for children.
‘But I did choose, and I chose to withhold my communication; I chose to accept that children had no say in expressing how they felt to their parents in the culture that I grew up in, and when I did not take the responsibility to express myself, I also chose to punish myself as a consequence.’
Adele, thank you for writing so freely about your experience with Anorexia and why it was triggered.
Many of us are suppressed when we are young from expressing how we feel. In the UK it is the culture of children should be seen but not heard and so often we retreat into our minds and disconnect to our bodies, which can lead to a rejection of ourselves so that we feel we do not belong in the world. By retreating into our minds is it possible this is the long downward slope into dementia later in life?
Nutritious, nurturing and nourishing of our Soul-full essences as you have shared Adele, brings a simple but profound change to the way of living for all those who choose to appreciate the wa we live when reconnected to our Soul. Without the True steps and movements that take place on the path of return it is as if we are annexing our self from our Soul by feeding our bodies a lot of old tripe and this we are consistently fed from our spirit as we are not taught this level of wisdom, for the spirit, when given free reign will never divulge the True wisdom that our Soul-full connective-ness can bring.
Adele, this is really interesting and makes me realise that this is something that I too have done and I am sure many others do too; ‘whenever I felt something was wrong in the world and it felt too overwhelming to express, I would reject the world by first rejecting myself.’
It’s not possible to say ‘yes’ to ourselves and ‘no’ to the world.
I agree Rebecca I was rejected by my family so then felt there was something wrong with me so spent years rejecting myself. Thank heavens I met Serge Benhayon and Universal medicine and with support came to the understanding that there is nothing wrong with me. We are sold a lie that keeps us small and in the smallness we do not ask the questions that release us from the lies we are saturated with.
‘In fact, everything begins with the love that I take responsibility for by first giving it to myself.’ I would say that this is not part of most cultures as a conscious way of thinking and being… but it really needs to be!
Absolutely Rachel, the lies we are fed by culture, family, religion and politically hold us in a conscious way of being that is never about True Love and nurturing our bodies essences.
Appreciation of who we are, and, how we are now is gorgeous and confirming to bring into our lives on a regular basis, ‘It is important to appreciate how far I have come from having constant debilitating and depressive thoughts, to feeling deeply supported through this beautiful vehicle of expression.’
‘…and taking the further responsibility of expressing this truth outwardly, not in reaction, but with the love that has been built in the body from caring and nurturing myself.’ I absolutely love this learning process that I am in about how the care and nurturing I build in my body supports me in expressing this truth outwardly. It’s a beautiful upward spiral of support: the more care and nurturing I build in my body, the more I take responsibility for expressing the truth and the more I express the truth the more I care for and nurture my body.
This is a big one, that I can also relate with, yet at some level as you say we chose this, ‘I chose to withhold my communication; I chose to accept that children had no say in expressing how they felt to their parents in the culture that I grew up in, and when I did not take the responsibility to express myself, I also chose to punish myself as a consequence.’
We say we love, but have we lived it? Have we prepared our bodies deeply in care to allow this love to come through? It brings expression to another level when it’s said as a whole body testimonial.
Learning to appreciate the natural beauty and love that we are tips the scales to reveal our true worth.
Truly it does. It tips the whole world back to simple truth.
The core hurt is from separating with ourselves and not meeting ourselves. This then separates us with the world and our life becomes a big separation from the place of divinity our relationship with our soul.
It is deeply alarming that a disconnection with ourselves is a huge normal in the world and we walk around like zombies for most of our lives wondering what is wrong. But not for long, we are all feeling the body much more than before and thus we have the opportunity to connect back to ourselves if we so choose.
Our unique preciousness warmth and joy within us innately is deeply beautiful to feel and it is through Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine that the truth and understanding of what is really going on for us all is offered to us to heal and make changes with in that really does bring us back to accepting and knowing the love and preciousness we are and loving ourselves absolutely.
The appreciation to Serge Benhayon is in our Livingness of all that we have understood in his teachings as a reflection to everyone around us.
Yes, I agree Adele, by living who we truly are in full, and reflecting our Livingness to the world we make a difference; and so we let everyone know we all matter, ‘It was not until meeting Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine that I began to understand how truly precious I am, and that I do matter.’
When we punish ourselves it is such a clear sign that we have lost that loving connection with ourselves and yet the path to reconnection is always there and awaiting our return. Thank you Adele for your inspiring reflection of that return.
Thank you Adele for our world is richer with your expression. For we are loving beings not evil beings, hence we need to life a different way of life than we are currently living and have accepted as our one and only reality. The world and we have never meant to be disharmonious, but our choice to separate a long time ago, has caused the distraction. But also that can be resurrected, back to our love..
Dear Danna the path of return is a stupendous package of joy, this is irrefutable by our body when we are committed to walk through the moments of discomfort in recorrection. And thus we are here to support each other in these times.
This is a wonderful example of how we can indeed change out internal environment at any point, and become aligned to love, from the inside – and not needing it (or rather the substitute for it), from outside: “Although my weight has remained at about the same as when I had anorexia, what I feel in my body now is the steady warmth of preciousness, power in delicateness, consistency of joy and the solidness of self-worth I have never felt before”
It takes a while for the physical to change but how we feel is the most important at any given moment.
Thank you for the insight into what was going on for you when you had anorexia. It is clear from reading this that food is far from the main problem, it’s just the tool of choice to rebel and have some form of control in a world where you feel unheard or unable to express.
Understanding it is just a tool, we get to also see that we all have our own tools we bring out to deal with our hurts (in this case feeling unheard or unable to express), and that we have no right to judge and every right to deal with those hurts.
When we feel we are not met, the choice although almost unknown is to meet ourselves. Now that I have tried this and have chosen it consistently for myself from meeting Serge Benhayon, I could meet others for this to ripple out.
A fifteen year old knows what is true for them, children of all ages knows what is true for them To give a child space to express and allow them to be with no imposition whatsoever is a beautiful gift but also a loving gift for oneself.
My son is 15 this year. He knows what is suitable for himself. He is given the opportunity to express himself and the space to choose. More often than not, he will choose according to what is true by being honest to himself and not sabotage this relationship when this space is offered.
I wonder if the term “eating disorder” actually covers much more than just anorexia and bulimia. I think it’s time we included a wider spectrum of behaviours, for example what about over-eating? or eating the wrong foods? Or any behaviour that does not treat food as a nourishment?
There is nothing wrong with us when we eat disorderly. Let’s face it, every person in the world at some point in their lives have eaten disorderly,so we are in this all together. The question is never about food, but about our movement, the collective and personal choice of it.
‘yet no part of me was aware I could talk about it, or even say no.’ The effect that the culture we grow up in has on us is much greater than most of us are aware of, of course we are the one that make the choice to not express but without having a true role model that’s not easy. You are now a role model yourself, Adele living in he freedom of loving your body and making choices in honour of your body.
The immense grace that heaven offered to me felt in my body is something that is not possible to be kept for myself. It only wants to be shared and shared continuously.
Developing a more compassionate and tender relationship with ourselves can allow us to let go of the control we think is helping us with the overwhelm in life.
Yes – it is all about energy. For with is our greatest gift of the world — to actually see energy first and then the human existence.
Wow Adele, what you’ve shared here is huge. So many women have been through similar experiences as you and your transformation is deeply inspiring. I love the way you are appreciating the gorgeous and powerful woman you are and listening to your body with love and care. You are leading the way through your commitment to life and to inspiring us and showing us that there is another way.
The turn-around that you have made is pretty amazing, Adele. How many 15 year olds who have had anorexia, grow up into a woman without the angst, past trauma and the lack of worth that you describe, whilst also breaking the Chinese and Christian culture of filial piety… and not only break it, but live whole, full with a deep self honouring and worth? Changing the relationships, we have with ourselves is key.
Dear Rachel that relationship we strongly build with ourselves inspire the same level of relationships with everyone around us. Momentarily we see the breaking down of these relationships, but we also see the alignment, but either way, we are okay and we keep deepening with commitment.
I am pretty sure, that your body feels totally different now, although it has the same weight, as before. That is a great proof, that we feel energy first, before we mislike a shape of body or any other features. It is always the energy first that we register and sense as true or abusive.
Dear Stephanie that is true. When I know the intimacy I feel within me how my looks are become so much less controlling than they used to be.
I understood even deeper: The moment we don´t want to truly feel what the outside and its behaviours and falsity does with us, we have to go against the body, as this is the wisdom holder to feel everything. It is in sabotaging and controlling with food or going into professionalism and coolness. Both is a way to perfectly disconnect from what we are actually feeling with all our sensitivity.
Yes Stefanie, we avoid the pain, the hurt and so choose whatever it suits to numb and comfort what we feel. Yet no matter how hard and uncomfortable it was or can be there is always a way to heal the hurt so that it doesn’t have an impact in our lives today such as Adele so beautifully has and shared.
I am also continuing to learn: when feeling lovelessness I want to not be here and check out, so the commitment is to feel, acknowledge, accept and return to an intimacy with my body.
‘I felt rejected and abandoned, and very unsupported.’ Although I did not want to admit this to anyone at the time, not even myself, this is how I felt when I was at the all girls boarding school that my parents had sent me to. I also became very picky about what I ate and lost a lot of weight. AT other times in my life I have felt very similar and actually eaten more to console myself and put on a lot of weight. Disordered eating. To a much lesser degree this is with me still but I am feeling much more connected to myself now and enjoy the feeling of the loveliness that is who I am and appreciate the way that I am bringing more quality into my life in the way I am living. The weight fluctuations are there but they are minimal and I know that there will be a time when they are a thing of the past.
I know when I hide and blame I am not living my full Truth. I have allowed someone else to control my life (school, society, people). But if I take my power back and look at my own life, Express what is felt (usually what does not make sense) without blame, a strength comes back into me and my body let’s go of the protective armour it builds with over or under eating.
As children and teenagers, if we haven’t been met and honoured for who we are, it can be easy to turn against ourselves and feel a deep lack of self worth. Learning to reconnect to the fact that we can give ourselves what we are seeking others to give us, is empowering and precious.
This is the greatest gift to empower ourselves with by the grace of the divine and the body, for us to share it with everyone.
It makes so much sense Adele that when we are not confirmed in life we can contract within ourselves not even nourishing the body and becoming invisible.
Appreciating how far we have come/travelled/evolved is always a good moment
It builds on how far we have come and taking stock and appreciation is an absolute necessary in life. It is good medicine.
Self worth has to be a basic building block in our foundation because if it is not there our foundation is shaky.
Actually, if we would not have self worth issues, we would have no problems in this world as everything stems from not feeling enough and in effect treating another in the same manner.
Self worth is the core hurt we as women carry but something we can park aside with its full acknowledgement while we express in our fullness and authority, that intimacy and connection we have with ourselves.
Beautifully shared Adele, I too am getting to know my body as my best friend, appreciating that it has been with me supporting me all my life even though I have abused it so often, when its natural way is to express the love that lies within.
My weight in the last couple of years has been the lightest since I was young and at times I found myself trying to overfeed myself to increase it. The only thing that happened was my body fighting back in the form of nausea and stomach pains, so I stopped and began the process of finally accepting this was the weight it was comfortable with. But even though I have accepted my weight and now love my body and its shape, there are many around me who are struggling to do so, making comments quite often. Funnily enough some years ago when I was quite overweight no one said anything.
Sometimes it takes a horrible degree of difficulty for us to understand we have to change. Actually that’s pretty much the history of humanity – but we needn’t let that be the case for us – we have the power to choose Love before getting dragged back to truth by our body.
Humanity is not separate from us. What we choose, the sole purpose is to reflect back to humanity they are equally the same and have the choice to choose this. We all deserve to know there is another way.
It is really interesting this pattern of how we get hurt by the world and when we don’t deal with this we often then harm ourselves in some way- whether that be an eating disorder, conflicts with others, holding back our expression, using alcohol and drugs, overeating etc.
I truly love looking at hurts. I feel it is the greatest gift we are given hurts and the opportunity to deal with them, to rediscover a greater love within me.
It is the greatest gift to express the love from the body, and sometimes if not all the time, how amazingly simple the expression is.
There are many help centres for people with anorexia, but often it doesn’t seem to work or takes many years for them to recover. With the full understanding of what is presented here and in other blogs and the understating of what healing is through Universal Medicine Therapies a lot more people can be truly supported to come back to self love.
Our years as a young person are so important to get the simple basics in a way that is true, but as you have shared Adele, it is never to late to bring a rhythm that is self-nurturing and self-loving as our foundation, so we simply have to be open to re-connecting to our essence. Once connected our body shares a wisdom that is remarkable in the ways that it continues to share how simple life can be without all the have to and must. Then being connected to our divine essence allows our body to feel what ever we are doing and that can be the simple things in life like walking and eating, so we remain in that connection while doing any task.
Beautifully shared Adele. There is no greater gift in this world that living the love we are, as it is through this quality that the light of God shines through us here on earth, reflecting to all the truth of who we are.
Hear, hear Carola and it is through our body that we are able to reflect God’s love to humanity. God’s love and light is never imposing and it is always up to us whether we choose to reflect His light or not. How deeply loving is that?
“If the outside world did not confirm me, it was as though I didn’t exist…. mostly, it didn’t. And when I didn’t get a confirmation from the world that matched the knowing within myself, I rejected life,”
Wow this is a huge learning, rejecting life for yourself because the world rejected that which is you.
But I rejected my divinity and connection with soul first and foremost for all of this to play out.
Appreciating the ever present friend we all have in our bodies and how we make an awesome team when we work together rather than sabotaging ourselves in a myriad of ways if we feel unsupported by life. The more I am building a relationship with my body and listening to all it communicates the steadier I feel with everything that is presented to me in my daily life.
When we don’t have that connection with our bodies, it’s like we don’t have an anchor or a solid foundation, so whenever anything comes up that might be tricky to deal with, we leave our bodies further behind because we don’t want to feel the undealt with angst and unsettlement. By starting to consistently choose to be in and with my body, i.e. staying awake and aware of what I’m feeling, I started to feel more settled and more at ease with myself and the world – a far easier way to be in life rather than constantly fighting and attempting to control stress.
Appreciation is missing in many of our lives, when we are void of self love and self appreciation we make choices that harm us. We need to know we always have the power within to ignite that self love that always resides within, however self abusive we can be.
Yes.. so true that we can only make choices that are self-abusive when we lack self-love and appreciation. Turning this around takes a little bit of time and the consistent choosing to appreciate the choices that we make that are self-loving. However basic and tiny these actions and choices might be to start with, as we appreciate them, they slowly build and become more solid. Self-love becomes a foundation that we can then make more choices from, instead of self-abuse. We can either confirm and consolidate who we are through our loving choices and appreciation of those, or degrade ourselves by choosing not to actively appreciate, and focus on the negative, which chips away at our self worth and self esteem.
I found anorexia difficult to understand until I began reading firsthand accounts like this. Now this disease and the energy behind it makes absolute sense to me. Thank you for sharing.
I know this one as well when I was younger I felt so not in control of my life so the one thing I could control was my food. And years on our younger generation (and older!) are still going through similar patterns and cycles that are so unnecessary. There is a lot to change …. a lot more to make in life truly about people, connection, self-love, self-care and self-worth.
A great reminder that young people absolutely need true support and love to guide them through what can be a very challenging time
I feel so blessed to have read your blog Adele. I have a much deeper understanding of what lies underneath anorexia. I find it particularly interesting that you have not necessarily changed how you look on the outside but the feeling and the relationship with yourself on the inside is completely different.
I understand Adele .. and i.e. there is consequence whether you honour yourself in the truth you know, or not. The simple result will be the quality of the originating choice.
Adele, I am sure many people will find this so helpful to read. The inspiration you bring that this debilitating condition can be moved out of from building a relationship with yourself, your preciousness and delicacy, and that it doesn’t have to be life consuming.. which it can feel.
I have been noticing very acutely how there is a strain of misogyny that runs through nearly if not all cultures. This feeling is not just in men but women too. It is fed by beliefs that women are the lesser species, that they can put up with more pain, more endurance, more work, less pay less rights than men. That they are the weaker sex. That they should subjugate themselves to men and the desires of men or stronger women. There is an equality and respect for equality that is touted but not truly felt or lived. Everyone is out for himself or herself. The bigger picture does not feature. and the woman in her preciousness and sacredness and her truly nurturing ways is ignored altogether. It is up to us as women to reconnect to this preciousness, sacredness and deep nurturing and live it in the world so that a new woman can be felt, recognised and lived. A new way of being can be born where harmony is restored and we all appreciate the glorious beings that we are, each and everyone.
When we realise our body is our best friend who always tells the truth we learn to listen and treat ourselves lovingly.
This is a big pattern for many, to not fully express ourselves, and obviously there are consequences of making this choice, ‘when I did not take the responsibility to express myself, I also chose to punish myself as a consequence.’
We human beings are somewhat crazy in that all we deeply desire is love yet at the same time we resist love and its holding quality. Since I have been clearing and healing my old hurts and issues, I have now more space in my body for love and grace to flow, and the more love flows the more I love just being me.
Adele, this is really interesting; ‘acknowledging what has been felt to be true within the body, and taking the further responsibility of expressing this truth outwardly, not in reaction, but with the love that has been built in the body from caring and nurturing myself.’ What you are sharing here helps me to understand why I used to find it harder to express what I was feeling and how what I would say would often come out in reaction, since I have been taking care of and honouring myself more I now find expressing what I want to say easier and more natural.
When you think about it everyone has an eating disorder in one way or another whether they are aware of it or not.
Great sharing Adele as the more we open this discussion the more we realised the importance of caring and nurturing our self so we can connect to the love that we are and no need to live up to any perceived image.
Thank-you for sharing how you found such deep confirmation and appreciation from within and stopped punishing the very vehicle that was offering you truth.
I love the message within this blog that says it doesn’t matter what shape or size our bodies are and that they may not fit into what society thinks is normal but we can still learn to appreciate and love our bodies.
Great to come back to this article today and realise how my understanding of this subject is deepening and how I can relate some of my behaviours in recent years to those back in my school days. There are many layers to our behaviours especially when we have been protecting ourselves for lifetimes. To feel this in the body, which I do with the modalities presented by Universal Medicine, is to allow for the continual release of long term energetic patterns that have solidified in the body. It is awesome how we can release so much in such a short time. Supporting ourselves in this through our connection to our essence guarantees our unfolding awareness and consciousness.
It is interesting for me personally to read how you connect holding back your expression with your eating disorder. It lets me face my reasons of eating disorder I had when I was a teenager from a different angle. Thank you !!
It’s so true Adele, when we reject and disconnect from ourselves we also reject and disconnect from the people and the world around us.
Who else gives us such honest and direct feedback – what a great question. There is no one else in the world who is constantly by our side, giving us immediate feedback on how we feel, and what we’re doing, in any given situation, than our own body. So much to listen to and learn from in every moment.
Beautifully expressed Adele . . . Love is our greatest gift for this is who we all innately are . . . and I love that you call your body your greatest friend for who else in the world gives us such honest and direct feedback on a moment to moment basis?
Its amazing Adele hearing how far you have come, really beautiful that you share this with us. We can use food in all manor of ways to avoid the love we truly are.
Yes remarkable !! I love the sentence” I am so honoured and humbled to express the greatest gift (love), through my greatest friend (the body) in the world.” Very inspiring for women, especially from your country.
Interesting how we can turn to self-punishment as a revenge tactic against people who may have hurt us. There are many examples of this, like gambling and drug taking — but in reality, who is actually benefiting from these decisions? Revenge may seem like a relief, but in the long run it’s just another form of self-abuse that one has to then live with and in the body that is withstanding those decisions.
It is a grave evil that we are taught from a young our that our worth is measured and confirmed by the world we are surrounded by. As this could not be further from the truth. Our essence within us is what defines who we are and it is through our loving connection to our bodies that we can live the essence of who we are, regardless of what is happening in the world around us.
There is a lot to appreciate after finding Universal Medicine, as no matter what our loveless choices were beforehand such as being in anorexia, a workaholic, being an addict, or just plain feeling miserable, regardless of the outer symptoms, life can blossom again thanks to the reconnection to the presence of love within ourselves.
“What I learned also is the responsibility of expression, from acknowledging what has been felt to be true within the body, and taking the further responsibility of expressing this truth outwardly, not in reaction, but with the love that has been built in the body from caring and nurturing myself.” What an amazing journey you have been on Adele, Nurturing and loving ourselves is not something generally supported or encouraged in British society – the only one I know about. Time to change this.
Every person matters regardless of gender, culture or religion, simply because of the fact that at our core we are all equal.
Here here Heather – we need to look beyond what we can see and start to feel the truth of our undeniable connection with each other.
Adele, it is interesting how when we feel rejected by the world that we can then reject ourselves and can cause intentional harm to our bodies, for instance with stopping eating, for me it was the other way – as a young woman I overate and abused my body with alcohol and cigarettes. Also having been inspired by Serge Benhayon, nowadays I love to take care of and nurture my body.
Thanks Rebecca for your comment, instead of responding to pain by creating more pain we can indeed choose self love – it’s a great learning to have.
Adele, your blogs are always so soothing. As I read what you’ve written here I feel something ease off a bit of tension just sliding off of my fingers as I type this, and my body feels quite weak I must say – because the self-abusive thoughts that have been going through my mind over the past two days have been decapitating and deadening. Thank you for constantly showing us that there’s another way, you are a true inspiration <3
How profoundly beautiful that you have reconfigured your life in this way
““The body is the marker of truth” is something I learnt while listening to the presentations by Serge Benhayon and now know it to be true in my life as my body never stops communicating to me the truth of my choices. My choices lead to how I move and how I feel in and of life. So how can I get mad at it when the not human part of me, my being chooses at times to ignore the messages of truth. Before I started to care for my body it was not a place I wanted to be, like a room that gets left. These days I want to be in my body as the care I bring to it feels lovely to be with my body.
Thank you for sharing your experiences, Adele. I now have a much deeper understanding of what is behind anorexia. How awesome that your meeting Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine supported you to understand how truly precious you are and that you really do matter. I too had my eyes opened to this fact and that everything begins with the love that we each take responsibility for by first giving it to ourselves.
Your other great realisation, ‘What I learned also is the responsibility of expression, from acknowledging what has been felt to be true within the body, and taking the further responsibility of expressing this truth outwardly, not in reaction, but with the love that has been built in the body from caring and nurturing myself’, I too have found to be true also, no matter what the circumstances I find myself in.
It is beautiful to read the phrase the solidness of self worth. We build our confidence through our self care and presence and valuing who we are.
Adele, this feels very loving; ‘ I am allowing my body to again make its own choices, to be okay with making mistakes, as that is how I will learn to take responsibility’, I am finding that by not being hard on myself if I make a mistake and instead simply learn from the mistake then life feels so much more simple and joyful, spending time beating myself up and over thinking things is not worth it, it feels horrible in my body and is a waste of time and energy.
Becoming our own best friend is the only way to heal. When we value ourselves enough we can heal anything, bearing in mind that healing and curing are two very different things. To heal something is to get to the root cause of an issue.
Your utter frankness and honesty in this blog Adele is very inspiring. It can sometimes take a while to build appreciation for ourselves yet it is so so worth it.
Every part of life improves the more we accept ourselves for who we are.
‘Every part of life improves the more we accept ourselves for who we are.’ This is my experience as well, Samantha. Every healing, every clearing, every realisation has led to a deepening in my acceptance of who I am and as the self loving changes occur on the inside so too are they reflected on the outside.
I agree Monica, when we start to accept ourselves then our need for the world to accept us for who we are drops away – it simple starts to not matter. Mistakes that we make, not living up to others’ expectations of who we should be or how we should behave.. all of it matters less when we accept ourselves for who we are, right now. That’s not to say we don’t learn from our mistakes and take responsibility for them. But unless we can accept ourselves, we can’t move on and learn from our mistakes because we’re still bashing ourselves for them. With acceptance there is space and grace for learning and growing.
An amazing turnaround Adele, and inspiring to read how you freed yourself from depressive and debilitating thoughts. When we look to the outside world – another person, our job, or what we own, for example – to confirm us and see us for who we truly are, we get lost until we understand that we need to do this for ourselves, first. Unless we appreciate ourselves for who we are, it’s very difficult for another to do this based on what we’re reflecting outwardly.
Yes, people feel this very strongly and no matter how much love they are willing to “give us”, it will never actually be enough t soothe the deep yearning we feel inside.
” feeling deeply supported through this beautiful vehicle of expression. I am so honoured and humbled to express the greatest gift (love), through my greatest friend (the body) in the world.” I loved your blog Adele thank you , I have lived with so much disregard of my body throughout my life, though coming now to open up to self loving care, I just love how you appreciate and feel about the body being your greatest friend.
Adele it is beautiful read that you have allowed yourself to come back to your delicateness and tenderness, with the connection to your body. It is when we stop to listen to our body, do we truly understand how we have been treating it and the choices we have been making.
It is understandable that we would want to seek some form of control when we feel so powerless in our present situation. And in fact I had a period at school when I reacted to the cruelty of a particular teacher and ate very little and became very thin to the extent that my parents and their friends were very worried about me. Fortunately after leaving that boarding school I regained my sense of worth, enough at least, to gain the weight I had lost and eat so-called normally again. This hurt stayed with me which made me very sensitive to criticism and on a deeper level very insecure. I have addressed this over the years with different practitioners but it is only through Universal Medicine and a growing understanding of energy and how it works that this deep hurt has begun to heal. When I am truly connected to my soul it does not exist.
I am learning too that it is the quality through which I express and that is determined by the self-loving choices I make through my movements in every moment which brings forth healing or harm whichever the case may be but whatever situation I find myself in there is always an opportunity awaiting for evolution.
What I am learning is that the situations, the negative things I am feeling in my body do not come from my body and have only now put it all together like this. My body shows me energy coming through it, not energy/feelings/senses coming from it. And so to reject my body as the source of anything I don’t want to feel or accept doesn’t actually support the removal or the responsibility on my behalf to not have that which is not love coming through my body for me to experience. When I care for and be gentle and loving with my body it clears out everything that is not love joy-fully and it doesn’t waste time in doing so.
This is really interesting. Clearly denying what our body is feeling means we reject its message, therefore we say although I don’t like what I am feeling (isolated, rejected, ill-at-ease) we pretend I don’t feel or understand the communication. We convince ourselves we were wrong. That is quite big if truly understood. So the more we blame others, the more we bury the fact that we have a choice as well.
Nothing we do in this life can be really true if we don’t have our own love in it, and how I chose to hold back my own love and wisdom was to become a good girl, be nice and do the right thing. None of these things had the real me in them, and as I reflect back now, it didn’t even feel good to be this person.
It is really eye opening to read about the level of control you used to maintain yourself. As a teenager I was committed to being reckless with my body, I noticed other peers who used control and I wanted to be the opposite of that, but it was stil in reaction to not feeling like I was seen or heard or confirmed as a person or a woman.
Lack of self worth starts when we are not met by our father for the precious little darling we are when we are young. It is not their fault as they were not met as the tender young boy they were. No one is to blame as for generations no one has been met. As we grow older we need to connect to and appreciate this quality in our self and let go of our lack of self worth and break the cycle with our own children.
Thank you Adele, it is through the constant appreciation of the choices that we have made and how far we’ve come that we embrace more love for our bodies and the acceptance of who we are.
Very beautifully expressed Francisco, this highlights how powerful appreciation is, and when we lack this in life we tend to struggle and life becomes very dull, heavy and mundane. But with appreciation our whole body and life lights up with joy in every way. How easy is it to apply appreciation? Why would we not use it to the max?
Well said Adele, we feel everything and when we cannot express this we can feel powerless and out of control. It makes a lot of sense why we develop dysfunctional patterns of behaviour to regain control. It would seem, that the anecdote is to address the underlying lack of expression and self acceptance rather than battle with coping mechanisms which provide short term relief.
I know how it feels to be a child and not be able to express and honour freely how we feel. That and not having it confirmed how precious, tender and gentle we are is a recipe for rebellion that in the long run is not good for our bodies.
This makes it so clear that anorexia is not about body image but about trying to garner control, any kind of control in a world that is out of order and doesn’t feel true. And eating or not eating are certainly two methods we can apply where we are in the director’s chair – a way to hold the world and our body to ransom and seemingly ‘punish’ the outside for how lost and terrible we are feeling.
The ease with yourself is lovely to feel Adele. Acceptance of our true nature let’s us live it and develop a deeper loving and honouring relationship with sacredness.
You raise some great points here, Adele. How far removed from truth are we that we are not taught from birth how precious and divine we are?
Yes, Adele, our lives can be turned around when we make our body the greatest teacher and friend.
Adele, this is very lovely to read, ‘I am allowing my body to again make its own choices, to be okay with making mistakes, as that is how I will learn to take responsibility’, it feels very gentle and loving to allow ourselves to make mistakes and not be hard on ourselves for these, we live in a culture where we think we have to get things right and this seems to start at school, making mistakes almost seems to be frowned upon and the targets seem to be about getting things right and being good boys and good girls and not about taking care of our bodies and expressing what feels true.
I think we’re in a society that when we see someone who we consider too thin or too fat we automatically judge this. But what you share Adele is so important and that is about the quality that is felt inside – regardless of body shape. Being anorexic comes with a mindset and a lot of the time very low self worth – but it is possible to be the same frame and be free of the disease because we feel full and powerful
In ourselves.
It was timely reading this again today as I realised that I have finally come to a place where I am totally accepting of my body, a body which is a lot lighter than it has been since my teenage years. When my weight dropped to this level I really struggled to accept how thin I was and even began to cover myself up just as I did when I was overweight, but when I read:“what I feel in my body now is the steady warmth of preciousness, power in delicateness, consistency of joy and the solidness of self worth”, I knew exactly what you were saying as these words resonated in confirmation throughout every particle of my body.
For years and years I worked very hard to avoid my body and what it was feeling, and today that does still happen at times as it hurts to feel what is unloving. But each time I return to my body, be open to what I am feeling there is a tangible warmth I can feel that is not emotional but deeply supportive. My body is so amazing and yet it feels like I’ve only started to appreciate and value what it does for me and for everyone else. Whenever I honour my feelings life becomes more amazing with each moment acted on, be that to rest when needed, speak up when I don’t understand, to say no to the thoughts that would have me work in a more pushy and tense way. This so beats living in my head with all the critical thoughts and the sense of being lost in the world without my feelings.
The body is my greatest friend. But throughout these years I have been reluctant to really be intimate with this friend. This fact is reflected in a lack of true intimacy with those around me, which caused a tension that was clearly apparent but I tried to protect myself from feeling by shutting out the world. I feel every relationship in the world is a reflection back to us our connection with our own bodies. If there is any relationship that feels less intimate than we know our love is being capable of, there is a part of us that can be even more intimate with ourselves which is for us to deepen in living.
What is truly beautiful is without any expectation or fanfare, the relationships close to me has become much more intimate, just simply so, and just simply beautiful. What an amazing reflection.
We often think we don’t have the choice or that someone else made it for us, but if truth be told we always make a choice, first and foremost to say yes to love or, say yes to what is not love – and everything that comes with both these energies – never is there a no.
Not wanting to know our choices are always self-made, is not yet wanting to know how powerful we are.
Understanding how precious our bodies are, right from the start, should be a fundamental part of our children’s education.
I just want to thank you Adele for as I was reading this i had a couple of ‘Oh my gosh’ (penny dropping/ lightbulb moments) that has now helped me to understand that period of my life better as i too had an eating disorder at 14-15 years. I have always put it down to my perfectionism and the desire to be ‘what every boy wanted’ – a skinny girl like all the models. But it was so much more deeper and detailed than this. ….
And that Perfectionism is a form of Protection – Bingo!
Thank you Adele
Much love
Aimee
Perfection is most certainly one of my biggest protections, and at the moment my life does not afford me to be perfect at all, every little thing I thought I could do “good” for security has to be surrendered. And this is the most amazing time in my life—to allow myself to trust that each and every time the deep love within is able to hold me. The dropping of protection opens me up to letting so much more of the world in, knowing not only will I be okay, but the world is actually waiting for my true reflection and I am opening up to theirs.
A great article on a road it would seem a lot of us travel. We get hurt by something and try and hurt back even though it all in the end hurts us more, so we repeat it again. Refreshing to look at these things with broader eyes and not just to treat the behaviour. The world places a pressure on us and it is our choice how we answer, we can react and try and pressure it back or we can understand deeper what’s going on and make a choice to be truly ourselves. There aren’t to many supports out there in this way, Universal Medicine is one of those who truly supports by seeing the behaviour but going beyond that to bring the awareness and understanding.
What a beautiful sharing Adele, thank you for expressing what you know so clearly, and for this to serve as a reflection for us all, as all girls and women are this delicateness and preciousness. The largest part of societies all over this planet are not honouring that, or not allowing themselves to feel it, so it’s up to us to start, to turn around the tide of self-dis-counting, self depreciating and replace those with truly caring, deeply nurturing and valuing of ourselves. And as you so beautifully describe, our body, whatever shape or form it may be, is our best teacher.
There is so much to love and adore about what you have shared here Adele. The growth and learning that building a loving relationship with our bodies is just the most important thing in the world. That when we do not, there is an absence, a vacancy that results in one’s life. Yet when we choose loving and self honouring choices, to express our feelings and who we truly are, there is an openness, an expansion in our bodies. Our bodies then are forever in alignment and confirm back to us our loving choices.
There is so much that goes on in families, some of it deeply destructive, but because of this culture of not expressing how we feel or the truth, or being open to one another, it just perpetuates.
You talk about the Christian tradition you were brought up in and that caring for self was frowned upon. It has always puzzled me why the words that Jesus is said to have spoken and that are often quoted “love thy neighbour as thyself” are misinterpreted. ‘Love thy neighbour as thyself’ implies that we love ourselves first and then we love our neighbour equally, doesn’t it? If the love for our neighbour was the measuring stick and foundation, would it then not be ‘love thyself as thy neighbour’?
How deeply transformation and inspiring it is to read of a woman who has re-found herself to such an extent that she feels “the solidness of self-worth I have never felt before”. Your blog here Adele challenges us to look at how we raise our children, how we educate them and how we indeed relate to each other at all levels of society – and what exactly, is actually and truly loving, and what is not.
The most empowering message I receive here in your candid sharing Adele, is that of responsibility. You went through some times which were very hard, resulting not only in the physical condition you had, but clearly also in a deeply personal sense of distress, with no apparent ‘out’… That today you honour the lessons learnt, and that we indeed always have the opportunity to communicate what is really going on for us – even if it challenges familial and societal expectations and ‘norms’ – is a deeply strengthening message for all.
I was having a conversation with a friend recently talking about our bodies and how telling they are about the choices we make and how quickly they communicate to us how we are living. It was a bit of an ouch to feel some of the choices made but also a great appreciation that the body is so honest and lets us know- like you say- a great friend.
“everything begins with the love that I take responsibility for by first giving it to myself” I have struggled with this concept most of my life. With it being indoctrinated into me at a young age that we give to others, that it is good to make others happy, I also gave a lot of myself thinking that the more I did so, the more someone would love me back. What I now know to be true is that it is imperative to give to ourselves first. To really listen to what my needs are, understand what I like to do and how I want to live, not being swayed or influenced by others, this is still a work in progress.
I was wondering – isn’t anorexia so much about being supported or feeling abandoned by others but a very clear decision that we are not worthy of love? Can it re-visit later in life and for both genders not necessarily as anorexia but as excessive weight loss?
Sometimes they are subtle, sometimes overt, but judging on the preponderance of obesity AND diabetes in the world, dysfunctional relationships with food are rampant …., and getting worse.
Learning to express what we feel and not be controlled by ideals and beliefs of how be think we are expected to behave is a beautiful freedom to be who we truly are.
I can relate to so much of what you express here and feel that this must be true of huge numbers of women. This is a great testament to your dedication to yourself, now a nurturing and loving one, and the teachings of Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine.
This is a major issue affecting so many people, especially women. The more we talk about issues like this with such openness and honesty, the more we can heal what is really going on for us. And hence what a great foundation of trust, love and honesty on the Internet for this to start to happen.
When I was anorexic I would wear an apron with a pocket in it at the dinner table and when no one was watching I would stuff my food into the pocket. If I was being looked at I would put food in my mouth and pretend I was eating it then spit it out into a tissue. I was so checked out that I thought I was getting away with it but now realize others were noticing but not wanting to deal with the situation so pretended they did not see. All parties were playing the game.
Amazing that you can talk about yourself in this way Adele and with such an openness after all you have put yourself through. We are such powerful beings, that have the power of choice, and when not used wisely, can be so detrimental to our health.
‘If the outside world did not confirm me, it was as though I didn’t exist….’ This is the sad state of our society. We live to be recognised for what we do and therefore always feel the need to achieve more as opposed to being satisfied with who we are first.
‘ I am allowing my body to again make its own choices, to be okay with making mistakes, as that is how I will learn to take responsibility.’ How beautiful to restore trust in your body again. Your approach here feels very loving.
Awesome to read who you have come so far from the constant debilitating and depressive thoughts you had to feeling deeply supported through your body. Our bodies if we just care to listen can be our most reliable and greatest friend.
Eating disorders are as a result of the disorder within.
We abuse ourselves to avoid expressing all we truly are in life. When we see it like this, we see in fact how beautiful, and powerful we are, but may choose to deny or hide.
Awesome Monica – love to hear you getting real here. I’ve been pondering on how holding back my expression can manifest itself in my body. It can come out as being passive aggressive and ultimately feels awful. As you say, expression is everything.
There’s no doubt that being moved to the other side of the world at 15 to a a foreign place must have been tremendously difficult – and felt like a huge rejection. Imagine being able to speak to yourself at that age – or your 15-year old self reading this blog. We don’t have to reach a certain age or hit a certain point to know how amazing we are and to know that we are our own best friend.
Eating disorders is something we often associate with girls and women, though equally boys and men experience this too, but this is often overlooked or not spoken about. And something we often look at is the issue, in the sense of we try to fix the eating disorder, the what we see on the outside without talking and looking at why this is there in the first place, the deeper issues and the route of all this. I have often found that eating issues with kids, because they don’t have to be a big deal, in the sense of clinically diagnosed can be dismissed. But if we look around the world today, not only in our children but adults as well 99.9 % of the population have an eating disorder of some sorts, be it obesity, over eating, under eating, eating foods that don’t support us. Do we actually need to look at and re-address what an eating dis-order is in the first place, so we don’t see it at its extremes, my answer would be yes, in the sense of an eating dis-order is eating anything and eating in a way that is not supporting us to evolve.
Controlling food intake and reducing it to a bare minimum when there is seemingly nothing else that can be controlled – it feels like giving up on people and the world and combining it with self-punishment and self-loathing.
It is a great pain we all carry that we don’t feel met for who we are, and that there are limits on how much joy we can have in life, for instance we can have a joy full time but then expect a sad one, so we don’t fully ever trust.
I simply love this Adele. It is divine and inspiring beyond words and I will be sharing this blog with all my relevant counselling clients, it’s gorgeousness to the bone:
“Although my weight has remained at about the same as when I had anorexia, what I feel in my body now is the steady warmth of preciousness, power in delicateness, consistency of joy and the solidness of self-worth I have never felt before – despite the fact that my body image does not fit into the normal standard that the world may be comfortable with”
This blog shares the point of how important it is to care for our bodies and to re-learn how. These blogs are examples of how we can actually become more aware of all the aspects in our lives and how to listen to things that our body is signaling to us. For example: headache.. Is there something we are very mindfull about that we do not like, are busy with , and so is our body showing us something? Things like these are the start of becoming more aware.. And to just explore what we feel and see how we go with it! It is our free will that sets us free.
‘If the outside world did not confirm me, it was as though I didn’t exist…. mostly, it didn’t.’ How much we destroy ourselves in thinking there is something wrong with us, or that we are not enough – all because we have invested in needing the world to confirm us.
amazing to see the links here between our digestion and appetite with how we feel about ourselves and what we are going through. The physical body and our emotions/feelings are inseparable.
To feel the delicacy and fragility within me as a woman recently and then to be with the delicacy as much as I can in my day has been a revelation. It feels so nurturing to my body when I feel delicate with myself in the things I do.
When we express in full there is no expectation and no assumption, simply a knowing of exactly what is being felt by you and another.
I attended boarding school growing up and I always championed that I ‘loved it’ as it was ‘better’ than home. My parents worked a lot so no-one was home much and when they were it was very tense with little connection. When I then went to boarding school I loved that there were so many girls around. However, there was a level of busy-ness with this and everyone was just surviving, things were kept at a surface level and no-one really shared how they felt- so on another level, it was quite lonely. There were many girls who experienced eating disorders but this was always just brushed under the carpet. What I have come to learn is that the nurturing I craved at this time is now something for me to bring to myself.
Wow Adele, this is so gorgeous to read, amazing that you know see your body as your greatest gift and friend, what a turnaround from punishing your body previously, it is great to read about how self-nurturing you are now and how much you care for your body and what a difference this has made to how you feel about yourself and how you are in life – truly inspirational!
Wow Adele this is a power packed blog, there is so much in it and something for everyone…. mainly how we hurt ourselves by making choices to hide and stay invisible by stopping to express our truth – so we shut down and disconnect from our bodies and from the world. We do it all to ourselves, and as such we all have the power to make different choices and turn our lives around at any given time.
Such an awesome blog Adele reminding us all of the the power of expression and how this builds more love and joy within.
It requires far more energy to try and control ourselves or life, than it does to express our truth within it.
‘What was not expressed verbally though, I expressed through controlling my body – I stopped eating.’ This is a great point. We are always expressing something – always. Our movements and the way we live speaks far greater than words.
It should be a crime to disempower a child such that they feel they are not allowed to express what is going on for them and how they are truly feeling. It produces an adult that does the exact same thing as done to the child to make them feel disempowered. And so the vicious cycle goes round.
Developing our self-worth is the essential building block for our evolution
We have the greatest pandemic in the world – of not feeling that we are enough just as we are, that we need to be better or strive for something outside of ourselves.. and from this stems so much of the insanity of the world – once we reconnect to who we are and know where we are from, then the journey becomes one of unfolding in full all that we are within…. and there is nothing outside of us that we need to reach. How much could this change the world if every person understood the preciousness they hold within and their absolute equalness with all.
Truly simple, when we simply learn to express what we are feeling, it cuts out the complication and dramas, over-analysing, second-guessing and the rest… and is enormously freeing.
You write that “I would reject the world by first rejecting myself” and that feels like a familiar pattern. Little do we realise at the time how much it is hurting us when we think we are just directing this force outward – but it attacks us first, has attacked us first for us to be able to take this course of action.
From your bio. “simplicity is her new black”. Super cute.
Appreciation is definitely the key to tackle consistent lack of self-worth issues – as in appreciation we get to confirm more who we truly are, and to see and discard all those behaviours that are not truly us.
Just yesterday I was walking around with an enormous tension in my body… the product of all that is going on around me at the moment. My traditional way of dealing with that is to eat poorly, check out in front of the TV, find some way of distracting myself. Yet slowly but surely with the help of Universal Medicine I’m learning to simply recognise the tension, see it for what it is, and know the only thing I need to do is reconnect to me and express how I am feeling. The world instantly looks different and a true understanding of the tension is simple to find.
It amazes me again and again what I choose to turn my back on. Learning to trust the wealth we have within, seems so simple and yet we have made it so complex.
When we have held back in expressing how we feel for a very long time, this no longer is a lived experience in our bodies for us to come back to. The unfamiliarity of expressing our feelings therefore will stop us from expressing. There is a traditional phrase saying everything is “in the heart” or “heart reflected” and hence, there is no need to say it out loud. This belief defines what being Chinese meant, and this belief is one which is hurting us deeply, as expression is natural and when done in truth, it is pure medicine.
And so, even though expressing feels so foreign in my growing up, I could not ignore the fact that I am feeling all the time, and what happens when all these feelings are kept within? They cannot but be expressed, when I took the responsibility to love myself deeper.
Appreciation is massive and something I need to do more of. I know the more trust and love myself I learn to appreciate and understand myself the more I naturally appreciate and understand others.
Focusing on the external appearance of our bodies while neglecting our innermost points brings us back to our own emptiness. This is shared with me and observed hugely in the fashion industry that I work in. The level of comparison that happens and that we allow to control our movements and our thoughts, is hurting us deeply and our bodies are reflecting all of it. When self-love and self-care were not a part of my life, every comment made by people on how I looked knocked me down, the devastation and deep discomfort of being controlled by how others thought of me was alarming, and yet I did not feel the solidity to withstand this force, when I did not have a body that reflected love.
Adele beautiful to feel your sensitivity, and how now you are so appreciative and loving towards your body.
Wow what a very powerful story that we have lived our live honouring our inner knowing. With deep appreciation and celebration and also taking further responsibility to express the truth with love outwardly to humanity.
I too deeply appreciate how far I have come from the constant debilitating and depressive thoughts that I constantly lived with. If I think back on those times I can see how indulgent it was of me to continually feed those thoughts and wallow around in them. Now if I have a single thought along those lines I ask myself immediately as to why I have aligned to this negative energy and change my movements so as to be able to change my thoughts. No indulging and no wallowing in them. Thank goodness for Serge Benhayon who presented a way forward minus negative thoughts.
Thank you Adele for sharing your experience, it is so important not to be too hard on ourselves for choices that we have made, it is so much more loving to see them as lessons learned, and we are forever learning.
Your blog shows as a society we have been raised to not appreciate the wonderful being we are, but instead learn to criticise, judge and condemn ourselves very early on with devastating affects. Eating disorders are on the up and unless we look to the true cause then we are likely to see them keep on rising.
Adele thanks for your honesty and insight into what can underlie anorexia. To go from where you did, to what you feel today for yourself and in your body is quite phenomenal as I know how hard it can be to shift those deeper feelings of unworthiness and control that often appear to underpin these eating disorders.
For most of my life I have either held back or when I did find the courage to speak up it was mostly done in reaction. What I am finding is the more I care and nurture myself the less likely I express in reaction so what strikes me from reading this blog is how essential and important it is to develop self love so that I can express from this love which I have built up within my body.
It is interesting how we can think that self love and honouring of oneself is selfish or not “correct” in any way. It shows just how much we can be owned or controlled by these beliefs which are very clearly not true at all when we truly reconnect with our body
The picture that self-love is selfish is very cunning in preventing us from returning to a true connection with ourselves. When we deeply care and honor ourselves, truth can be felt and the need to react in life drops. Awareness is key, as when we feel into the picture self-love being selfish, it is simply not true.
I agree Adele, to demonise self-care and self-love as selfish is a clever plot to prevent people embarking upon this very necesssary first step that leads one towards an understanding of what is truly love, which by its energetic understanding naturally encompasses love for all.
Such an awesome article Adele. There is appearing to be a very clear correlation between lack of acceptance and trouble with eating and the stomach!
This data needs to be available to our medical practitioners.
The lack of acceptance of anything or anyone is calling for a deeper acceptance of the preciousness of our own bodies.
What you have presented here Adele is an extraordinary insight into how the man psyche works. Take a beautiful teenage girl who lives in a family in a warm vibrant city where she is starting to be really interested in a certain guy, and suddenly transplant her to a cold climate country where she knows nobody and can barely understand the language/accent, and what happens? The young girl feels she cannot express the horror of what she is going through to anyone and she feels uncared for.
As you have said ‘What was not expressed verbally though, I expressed through controlling my body – I stopped eating . . . Everything that did not feel right and I could not accept was not expressed, and it was my own body that I rejected to punish the world for treating me this way, although I thought it was freedom at the time. I was rebelling as a teenager from feeling the impossibility of being allowed to make true choices.’
This amazing blog should be shared with all medical people who deal with young people with eating disorder. Thank you Adele.
In quoting Serge Benhayon, ‘Expression is Everything’. And it really is EVERYTHING.
We can see the damage withholding our expression causes. Ultimately we are always expressing something even when we think we are ‘not expressing’. And, in withholding our true expression, we end up expressing something that is so unnatural to us – in this case, anorexia for example.
Who does not want to read about ‘the greatest gift and friend in the world? And to find out that we all have one that we spend every moment of every day with (our bodies) is just the best answer.
Awesome sharing Adele – it is so important that we learn to express and share those things that can otherwise get bottled up in our body, and ‘fester’ until they turn into a bad habit or a behaviour that is self harming in some way or another. I think most people can on some level relate to your story, even though we might not have controlled our environment through food – there are other ways that we have all learned to manage situations that we don’t like but have not been able or chosen to express at the time. Examples of coping mechanisms include intense study, over eating, indulging in alcohol or drugs or extreme partying or extreme sports. The list goes on. Essentially these are ways that we medicate ourselves to not feel or deal with a situation. Yet if we only just offered ourselves the opportunity to express, even if initially just to ourselves in full honesty, the totally unexpected can unfold from it….This is a great reminder for me this morning too…to keep expressing how I am feeling.
How important is it then to not judge people that have anorexia (or another (eating) dis-order) as there’s a reason behind the fact that they don’t eat. For me this shows the responsibility we have to connect to the people and especially our young people around us to support them expressing themselves. Showing vulnerability and openly expressing about what’s going on inside ourselves is just as important (role modelling) as seemingly listening to the child, but in fact interpret their behaviour rather than connecting to it. Thank you Adele.
Adele I am wondering how many people can relate to the following sentences: “If the outside world did not confirm me, it was as though I didn’t exist….” My feeling is there are a many who can relate to it and so I like it very much that you did not hold back and shared your experience as it is a wonderful reflection that there is a possibility to live differently.
We have been raised, whatever our culture, nationality or religion, to comply to outer standards. The innermost part of us is neglected in this world – its cultivation seemingly has no value. Those outer standards do not nourish us. No wonder then we do believe ourselves to be unworthy of nourishing.
Reading you blog again, it occurs to me that anorexia is less about the denial food than it is about the denial of ourselves and our worth. It is in acknowledging this, going to the root Adele that you have liberated yourself from the tyranny of self punishment through denial not just of food, but of love for yourself.
Self-appreciation and self-confirmation deepen from self-care and self-nourishing. This is the simple way to move through the huge force of illusion that we have to comply within society’s standards to be worthy, as the deep worth and value we are is always full and shining within our hearts and ready to move us through our every step when we are.
“whenever I felt something was wrong in the world and it felt too overwhelming to express, I would reject the world by first rejecting myself.” That feels so familiar to me, Adele, thank you for sharing your experience. I was brought up in a period very much inclined to believe children were to be seen and not heard. As a result, I was very backward in expressing how I felt about many things, something that has been a problem for me for most of my life. I had a great lack of self worth regarding my value as a person, and I too rejected myself, and for me, I buried myself in books, these were my solace as I came to imagine myself in situations that I read of, places I would like to be living etc. etc. I feel sure I would have led myself to dementia if I had not met Serge Benhayon and attended his presentations with Universal Medicine. I too have turned my life around. I so enjoy life now, and through undertaking a life of great self care, and building a body of love, I am now fully committed to life and to humanity and am building my confidence to express how I feel about what is not right in the world. I have so much to thank Serge and his family for in their constant support during this journey I have undertaken. No more fear of dementia for me, life is too busy for that.
Wow, it’s clear from what you share here Adele, that it is not the destinations we get sent to, the rooms we get posted to, or the places we find ourselves living, but the way we choose to express and be that actually hurts and imprisons us. When we see its this long-standing form of self-torture that has been harming us all along – then wherever we end up in life, we can always share joyfully and at last, be free.
Adele super powerful blog and love this – ‘This pattern was carried on into adulthood: whenever I felt something was wrong in the world and it felt too overwhelming to express, I would reject the world by first rejecting myself.’ – I wondering how many adults actually walk around with this. I know I did for my whole adult life until I meet Serge Benhayon and was inspired to connect to who I truly am. When you do truly connect to your Soul there is nothing but Love and you certainly don’t want to reject yourself. What I have struggled with is accepting that this is actually who I am and that it is ok to be this all of the time. Feeling tender, sweet, sexy, beautiful, joyful, powerful can be confronting when we having lived without it for so long. Once we get ourselves out of the way and truly enjoy All of who We Are then our normal quality of being will be of Truth. If we all take that responsibility to be this then we have One Unified Truth.
I too had a body image as a young boy growing up – only I always wanted to be bigger, more muscles, more tone. And what was underneath – not feeling that I was enough as I was.
What you share here Adele is beautiful and very inspiring, the level of appreciation and honouring towards yourself is truly powerful to read. This line is a gorgeous confirmation of this ‘ Most of all, I am deeply appreciating that for most of my life I have lived life honouring a deep inner knowing, and now, as always, it is amazing to deepen this relationship with my body further.’
Thank you Adele for your trusting openness in your sharing. It is an inspiration of the turn around and healthful healing that you have allowed. You bring hope to seemingly impossible situations.
Indeed Concetta, Adele does bring hope as when I was young I too got caught up in trying to please others and didn’t feel I had a right to speak up and so kept quiet for most of my life, I was basically giving up in that area. So many of us felt our parents or adults were the ones who knew best and so stayed silent and shut down our natural ability to feel everything so we could fit in and not rock the boat. This choice only succeeds in lessening us all.
The impact and power of not expressing how we feel is ginormous. Worldwide on different scales this is a major issue and creates these walls of protection to ‘get on with life’ to survive. Anorexia is one coping mechanism, others turn to alcohol and drugs while some may choose even the seemlessly harmless coffee. One is no worse than the other as all are the distraction from the reality we have chosen to disconnect to the True Divine Love that we are and hardened ourselves in the body and shutdown as a form of protection. Ludicrous as you say Adele but once we develop self-love, self-care and nurturing you start to feel that preciousness and that this is worth connecting to, deepening this relationship and sharing.
I too chose not to express in my life growing up, though I would always have strongly said I was not allowed to express, in fact it was a choice. I am now learning to deeply honour, nurture, love and respect myself, and this includes expressing and not holding back who I truly am. ‘But I did choose, and I chose to withhold my communication; I chose to accept that children had no say in expressing how they felt to their parents in the culture that I grew up in, and when I did not take the responsibility to express myself, I also chose to punish myself as a consequence.’ It feels so free-ing to finally begin to be me and to honour and express what is true for me in a loving way.
And it shows also what is possible once responsibility is claimed; such an awesome article and very important for all to read and take note; it can but inspire so many, offering such possibilities for healing.
This is such a beautiful blog, I feel it confirms everyone in making the choice to self love. As the not doing it is always abusive, it can be trough an illness like Anorexia or just living the way so many people live without regard for our own body.
Yes, we hurt an enormous amount of people when we are not ourselves. They miss out on a role model and we are not all of who we are which is painful for us.
What an amazing turn-around and incredible healing Adele. Very inspiring story that so many would do very well to read. Thank you.
Awesome blog to read this morning Adele, loved it and the comments to. This line stood out for me, ‘to feeling deeply supported through this beautiful vehicle of expression’. A gorgeous reminder that we give ourselves all the support we need, when we express ourselves in full.
Same here Michelle, I relate also to the self-loathing and self-rejection and always felt incredibly awkward as a teenager, and found it difficult to relate to others, and I am sure they found me odd! This pattern followed me into adulthood as I always felt uncomfortable around groups of people. Simply put, I held the world to ransom for the unloving place it was which meant I could not express my love – not realising then that I had a choice. These days, I am choosing to express and be comfortable with sharing more of me.
Thank You for being so open and vulnerable and sharing this with us. It is truly precious and important to read for all of us. And I love your short description 🙂 at the bottom of this amazing blog.
Yes, loved this too Nadine…especially that she discovered she loves people more than mountains:)) Love it and I very much relate!
Binge eating is a form of abuse that helps to numb the pain of living a life that is not true. Learning to feel what foods to eat and how much and when to eat can be a long process but a rewarding one.
Thank you Adele, the words in this paragraph represent many people’s experience, self included of Universal Medicine and Serge Benhayon’s presentations “It is important to appreciate how far I have come from having constant debilitating and depressive thoughts, to feeling deeply supported through this beautiful vehicle of expression. I am so honoured and humbled to express the greatest gift (love), through my greatest friend (the body) in the world.” It is alarming that so often our reaction to the world and how we are treated by other people is to harm ourselves further and then to expect the world to sit up and take notice, as if compounding the abuse is truly going to deliver the desired results of feeling loved, met and cherished. Learning to take responsibility for my pain, my love and how I treat my greatest friend, my body has been the biggest miracle I have ever experienced and one that continues to deepen in miraculous-ness! Thank you for sharing your struggle and pain and showing the world that hurting ourselves more is not the answer, the true way out of our insecurities, fears and rejection is in opening up to others and being extremely tender and loving with ourselves, a way of being not commonly advertised in this world but lived to the hilt by Serge Benhayon.
Beautifully expressed Rowena, hurting ourselves is not the answer…..and before I could turn this old habit on its head, I had to get honest with myself and admit how hard I had pushed my body and how much protection and hiding I was in – it has been a slow process but well worth it, and ‘the true way out of our insecurities, fears and rejection is in opening up to others and being extremely tender and loving with ourselves’. This is my daily focus.
There is so much to celebrate in your blog Adele but what really shone out today when I read it is your own deep appreciation of yourself. Beautiful and inspiring.
Your blog Adele has offered me a deepening of my acceptance into embracing my body as the greatest gift and friend, that is always love. I now ponder that I allowed so many other thoughts to distract me from this understanding and had me not express and live my truth, according to my body’s Wisdom that in reflection was always there. From this clarity, I realise that the expression is claiming my inner voice that knows me deeply and it’s unique to me but at the same time is universal as truth and love is all encompassing.
Hi Adele – it is great that you have claimed the fact that you have lived most of your life from your inner knowing and that no matter what choices you have made – there has been an awareness around them. We all have this inner knowing in common and we all make choices that play in our lives. Thank you for giving us all the opportunity to celebrate and appreciate this inner knowing and how it has always been there even if we at times didn’t realise it.
“It is important to appreciate how far I have come from having constant debilitating and depressive thoughts, to feeling deeply supported through this beautiful vehicle of expression. I am so honoured and humbled to express the greatest gift (love), through my greatest friend (the body) in the world”.
You remind me with this line just how valuable it is to appreciate every little step we make in claiming who we are, and not all the other stuff, the negatives we can be with ourselves. Thank you Adele, a timely reminder for me until it becomes my everyday livingness.
Adele, I just love your bio ‘having recently just discovered the playfulness of hanging out with your own soul’. This here is inspiration for me in itself.
Oh yes such a beautiful way to express : “..‘having recently just discovered the playfulness of hanging out with your own soul’. It really does move one to want to do just the same …
Being sent to boarding school is hard enough in your own country and culture , let alone one that is totally foreign. I know our parents think they are doing the best for us when they do these things, but that is the problem they think instead of feel and that is when ideals and beliefs take the place over love.
Yes Gill love your honest sharing, food is a way where we can harm ourselves due to our own inner turmoil and hurts. As you say we develop many habits to disguise the hurt, pain….but it is in fact although appearing hidden, governing our lives and our choices all the time.
Adele, You came to such a healing ‘I feel in my body now is the steady warmth of preciousness, power in delicateness, consistency of joy and the solidness of self-worth I have never felt before – despite the fact that my body image does not fit into the normal standard that the world may be comfortable with.’ I can feel your joy in being who you are and the appreciation…and yes the ‘normal standard’ does not mean it is true wellbeing either…
What an honest and deeply moving blog Adele. It shows that challenges happen to us, but the greater harm is when we do not express and appreciate our selves, our bodies…it is like we hurt ourselves more by what we do to ourselves, for instance your relationship with your body.
Interesting point to pick up on Doug. I heard a parent on the radio yesterday saying how he and his wife had decided to send their child to boarding school because they believed their local (rural) school was inadequate. When the local school ‘improved’ some years later, they moved the child to it and back home. I had the strong impression the child was never once consulted in either move. Every decision came from a place of wanting to provide the ‘best education’ rather than what was truly supportive for the child and honouring of what he or she felt. Again, there is no judgement here but an observation of what can guide us to act in life – and often this is our ideals and beliefs.
All parents want the best for their children. Most of us just want to love and show care for each other, but our foundation is built not from love but from hurts. True education for the world is to start from the foundation of what true love is, and that we can only learn with our own bodies.
Great point Victoria, we all have taken on ideals and beliefs not fully realising how they box our thinking and then affect our actions and choices….. that is until we connect back with our bodies and start listening to our hearts.
I can really relate to many parts of your blog Adele, as I lived through some challenging times as a teenager where I didn’t express and turned inwards, leading to self abuse. Now by expressing what is needed frees up my body and allows a flow rather getting stuck in a rut.
It’s fascinating to observe how we can use food as some sort of proxy for expression (or lack thereof). I know I expressed the same core dilemma but in the opposite manner – by over-eating. There is definitely an oral connection here – between our capacity to speak v our capacity to manipulate how little or how much we consume.
And the key lies in the phrase ‘capacity to manipulate’ – it’s about feeling we have at least some control in a situation where we have lost any sense of our own power. We may feel voiceless and powerless but at least we have enough agency to be able to either starve or over-feed ourselves! It’s a proxy for-determination, albeit a harming one.
Adele’s observation that she ‘…chose to accept that children had no say in expressing how they felt to their parents in the culture that I grew up in’ is interesting too. Although I grew up in an Anglo culture rather than a Chinese one, this was something I chose to believe too. There was perhaps some leeway for expression but overall I have been stunned in later years to reflect on how compliant, and passive, I was. There is a strain in Anglo culture – perhaps also underscored by Christian beliefs – that one must honour and obey one’s parents, that our elders are wiser and ‘father / mother knows best’.
Add to this a momentum of lifetimes of not expressing and we have a situation where we end up, as Adele expresses here, ‘feeling hurt that no one saw me for who I truly am’.
The quality in which we move from largely determines how we are moved in life.
I recognise this proxy of expression Victoria. I choose to stop expressing as a child and then used food to numb how harmful and damaging this choice was for my whole body and being. Somehow this morning it feels important to be reminded of what I chose and nominate it, because at this moment I have much pain in my leg. No doubt related!
Wow Adele – your transformation has been amazing – I love how you share your love with us all
‘… whenever I felt something was wrong in the world and it felt too overwhelming to express, I would reject the world by first rejecting myself. How crazy is this?’ So instead of shining brighter we retreat. This is what we so often do when we are overwhelmed – great to bring it out Adele.
“whenever I felt something was wrong in the world and it felt too overwhelming to express, I would reject the world by first rejecting myself”… “so instead of shining brighter we retreat”- Thanks for pointing this out Jenny as this is the pattern I went into instead of choosing to express. I would blame the world for how it is and choose fear and anxiety to stay small, and not shine.
Adele what is inspiring is your preparedness to lay the truth bare for us all to feel … and the appreciation you are now celebrating more within also inspires and reflects in others the same … As read in the many beautiful responses to your expression
….it is when we begin to nurture , support and cherish our bodies as our greatest friend, that we see the truth of abandoning the preciousness of this gift is us rejecting the love we are. Doesn’t make sense to withhold this magic from its joy of being shared !
Adele it is great to read your story, it jolted my memory of how I would used food as a power game of control. As a child I was never encouraged to express my feelings, in fact quite the opposite, my up bringing was based on children should be seen and not heard, and there were parameters of what I could and couldn’t say and over stepping these meant I could be seen as being difficult. I never really ate very much either and this was always a bone of contention at the dinner table. Rationing and starvation (legacies of WWII) were still in the minds of most of the population and so wasting food was not acceptable, so refusing to eat my peas would have lengthy bouts at the table where I learnt to become very good at sulking and being moody rather than expressing what I felt. I can see now from your blog that I was not honouring myself in a loving way but choosing to play a game and hold the world to ransom.
Alison in reading your comment I found it fascinating we learn tactics to get around situations ( like not eating your peas) rather than use the one asset we have available to us, our expression. Just goes to show we have been here before and still are avoiding expressing, and how did we learn such tactics at such a tender age when we haven’t been shown them.
It makes such a difference when we are able to do just that – to look at our part in any situation. And by taking responsibility we come out of the victim role and into empowerment by allowing ourselves to make new choices.
Simply beautiful Adele, honouring and expressing the love that you are. You are an inspiration in taking responsibility for one’s own evolution and quality of life. Thank you for sharing your story, a blessing for us all.
Ah yes, the blame game, I know it well, it stops you taking responsibility and also stops you learning or moving on from the issue/ situation. Not such a fun game as it doesn’t support anyone least of all yourself.
I really relate to that feeling as a child of not being able to express what I felt, not feeling able to say if I didn’t like a decision that was being made for me, it literally felt impossible, yet looking back I can see how all I had to say was I don’t want to do that any more…
Encouraging kids to express themselves is so important.
It seems so bizarre that we have become unaccustomed to saying how we truly feel about something, in fact it’s even simpler than that, that we do not express how we feel ourselves. The pain and hurt this causes ourselves and others can never be truly fathomed. We need to start changing this trend and expressing how we truly feel.
I can relate to that too Laura, the sense of impossibility. I have occasionally wished I had been one of those children who was feisty rather than compliant. I have a feeling next lifetime I will be making up for lost ground. Or more appropriately, lost voice.
Speaking of lost voice (pun intended!), it’s interesting to observe how that voicelessness came hand-in-hand with frequent bouts of tonsillitis right throughout my childhood and into early adulthood. Today I have a thyroid condition – again, the throat. And have used food to compensate for my lack of expression. There is a definite pathology here in terms of how suppression of expression plays out in the body. Truly, we get away with nothing and our bodies reveal all.
The choice of futility feels complicated, we are looking for a security which lets us down, when we can simply walk with ourselves every moment and all the answers are there.
I love how you expressed that Adele – “… we can simply walk with ourselves every moment and all the answers are there.” So beautiful and something that can be practised until such time it becomes our way of being. Thank you for that beautiful expression
Yes Laura I 100% agree “Encouraging kids to express themselves is so important”. That’s where it starts for many of us, not expressing as children – truly expressing. Not for recognition or acceptance but how we are really feeling. As we get older we have been overriding how we feel for so long, that we begin to forget……I am coming back to this as is Adele, building a relationship with my body and reconnecting to what I am feeling and expressing from there. It is very healing and joyous to share who I am in the world as I continue to unfold.
Being nice and not saying or doing what feels true so as not to hurt or affect another person is a damaging picture for everyone. We hold back truth in being nice which is a suppression in our bodies, and we hold back evolution for everyone also, another level of delay in which our particles have to take the consequences for. But as we move and build upon the foundation of love within, this picture of being nice clearly has nothing nice about it, and this picture do not enter us and control anymore.
“I am allowing my body to again make its own choices, to be okay with making mistakes, as that is how I will learn to take responsibility.” this is so honouring to read. I for one put so much pressure on myself to get it right that I do not appreciate the wonder and marvel of all that I already am. Making mistakes is no biggy, ultimately they’re just opportunities.
Food is never the issue but through food we can observe the relationship we have with ourselves and hence with food and everything else. With a deeper connection with ourselves, the healing of unsupportive patterns naturally occur. But what does connection with ourselves even mean? For me it is simply an acceptance and surrender back to the body, feeling this solid support and then simply go about life with this simplicity. And to begin to feel a sense of surrender I love to go walking, and as this is built in consistency, the talking and many other movements follow in surrender.
Yes – utterly awesome. This blog has lifted the lid on so much. It strikes me that food offers us the opportunity to really master key aspects of our lives. Unlike other potentially addictive substances and or pursuits which we can complete and leave behind, we still need to eat. Developing a healthy relationship with food is surely a marker of true maturity.
Move from the depth of our worth, and nourish we will from this quality.
That’s another profound quote Adele and worth rereading.
” Move from the depth of our worth, and nourish we will from this quality.”
Adele Leung
I love the expansion of the definition of connection, as it’s one thing to say it but you have described how you live it and the flow on affect. Just a gem…. Thank you Adele
You are so right Katie – a book definitely seems to be on its’ way here …
You are a great inspiration for me Adele. I have never experienced anorexia, but I can see the same rejection of myself and my body by not being received as the beautiful and loving being that I truly am. When I have discovered that the love and recognition that I was craving for in the outside was in fact in my inside, all has been deeply and gradually transformed in my life. Yes, self-love, self-care and self-nurturing are the key.
We all have our version of anorexia to deal with it seems. We are all tasked with learning self-worth and self-love and having that be our foundation for life.
And once we have fully embraced this foundation of self-worth and self-love, all that we deal with and all that we encounter in life will take on such a different meaning and perspective, so awesome. Step by step we move back to this beautiful way of being.
Seeing our body as a friend we cherish and love naturally connects us with a quality of relationship with all of life that is there to choose in each moment, as our bodies are there in each moment.
That’s lovely Simon: to connect to our body and cherish ourselves means that cherrishment is there in all we do in life.
Lovely word – cherrishment 🙂 Need to use it often for us and everyone else too…
“If the outside world did not confirm me, it was like I didn’t exist…. mostly, it didn’t” I can totally relate to that, and I think many people with us. If our inner truth and love is not confirmed when we are young the choice to look for constant confirmation is one easy to make. The thing I am realising is that the world will not become different from me not expressing what I truly feel, it will confirm the way many people are not expressing their truth either. In the other way this also means that when I start to express what I feel is true, then others can be inspired to do so as well.
So true Adele…our greatest gift is our love and our greatest friend is our body – and they go hand in hand. If the quality of our body lacks loving care and nurturing then that cannot be expressed with others… however when we love, nurture and honour our bodies, all the love we naturally are can be expressed through them, and we all get to see we are all the same – Love.
“What I learned also is the responsibility of expression, from acknowledging what has been felt to be true within the body, and taking the further responsibility of expressing this truth outwardly, not in reaction, but with the love that has been built in the body from caring and nurturing myself.” You have captured here, Adele, a beautiful and loving recipe by which to live one’s life and also to enhance those of others.
“What I learned also is the responsibility of expression, from acknowledging what has been felt to be true within the body, and taking the further responsibility of expressing this truth outwardly, not in reaction, but with the love that has been built in the body from caring and nurturing myself.” You have captured here a beautiful and loving recipe by which life one’s oneself and also enhance those of others.”What I learned also is the responsibility of expression, from acknowledging what has been felt to be true within the body, and taking the further responsibility of expressing this truth outwardly, not in reaction, but with the love that has been built in the body from caring and nurturing myself.” You have captured here, Adele, a beautiful and loving recipe by which to live one’s life and also to enhance those of others.
In the few years that I have known you Adele I have witnessed a beautiful blossaming. You may not be any different in weight or size but you feel awesomely changed. There is a fullness and radiance that is gorgeous and a deepening of grace and elegance. You feel vital now and that shows in your shining eyes.
I did not know Adele a few years ago but can agree that today Adele has remarkable grace, elegance and is exquisitely delicate to be in the presence of.
Here, here absolutely…I recently met Adele and was blessed by her power and grace, and your body Adele emanates the strength and delicacy of you.
If all children were to be met and allowed to express truth eating disorders would be a thing of the past and there wouldn’t be the amount of messed up adults that we have living in the world today.
And the responsibility of us as parents is to always live deeper this connection with ourselves and never hold back the love and reflection for our children as well as for everyone else. As love cannot be compartmentalizied, life cannot be compartmentalized, it is just one and the same.
Absolutely one and the same.’ Love is a beholding Light’ Serge Benhayon
We all have a responsibility to reconnect with the preciousness that we are so that we can inspire and see it in everyone and from here move out of all the jealousy, hate and comparison that causes all the unrest and conflict in the world.
Hear hear so true Kevin.
The greatest gift is the love we are. It is not ours to own, so it is not ours to hide.
Love the simplicity and power of this Liane, and the reminder of our true purpose in life…to be all the love we naturally are, openly expressed through our bodies for all.
Love that Liane. The love we are is there for all, it can’t possibly be coveted or it is not Love.
It is ours to feel live and share so everyone gets to connect to their love, feel it and share – how awesome that will be when the world lives this way.
As a society we need to deeply nurture young girls and women to learn to value their own true worth. Instead we bombard them with images of what they need to be in order to feed the notion that they are not enough as they are. Want to stop anorexia – simply start expressing to women every single day how much you adore them, and how much they mean to you – every single day, whether you are a man or a woman. I would not be so naive as to suggest this will prevent all anorexia, for ultimately it is always the choice of every human being to see themselves and the world as they choose – but it would go a long way to creating a culture where women feel the freedom of being loved for who they are, regardless of their physicality.
There is a responsibility in expression when we realize is love is who we are, as love simply emanates and reflects, what is held back or hidden is the choice from us and not from love. And further, any expectation (or changing or fixing anything or anyone in the world) is also only from self and not love. So in love it is simple, only and always express the love that wishes to come through via a body that allows it to come through in its deepest purity.
Yep, and too, creating a culture where people truly meet one another. Being truly met is a way that one is able to meet themselves, and this proves that people need people, to be inspired, to feel engaged and feel connected. The modern day constant use of mobile devises, causes the head down looking into a small screen to talk, communicate or read creating a real barrier to meeting or engaging between people. This gadget usage provides the greatest excuse to avoid truly meeting a person. And this fuels the isolated and negative ideas one may have maintaining this separative living quality. To be lifted out of this cycle comes with being met by a real life face to face person interaction.
“I am so honoured and humbled to express the greatest gift (love), through my greatest friend (the body) in the world.”
This is a gorgeous line. I love that moment when the son of man realises that he/she is actually the Son of God. It just goes to show that while we may hide from divinity, divinity never hides from us. The light and love of the Soul is forever there in connection to us and we need only make the choice to re-connect to it in order to feel it all once more. More and more we are awakening to the truth that the riches of Heaven lay within these forms of flesh and that on this plane of life, true marriage comes from this union.
Making friends with my body has been a slow but awesome process. Like you Adele, I have spent a life punishing myself for my lack of expression and rather than appreciate that it is through our physical form that the path back home to God is found, I bludgeoned my body to create a roadblock to afford me an excuse to not go there. The Way of the Livingness is helping me restore the loveliness of the light that I am and in the process, the shadows that seek to obscure this are fast fading away.
What a journey to appreciate Liane, as on our way back to truly expressing we also learn deep appreciation and understanding of ourselves and therefore of the world..
It always comes back to that – first us and then the world, so easy really once understood.
” I began to understand how truly precious’ I am, and that I do matter. In fact, everything begins with the love that I take responsibility for by first giving it to myself. Adele thank you for sharing such words of wisdom, you are so beautiful, so full of light!
What a beautiful and honest blog Adele, your delicateness is felt but so is your power. When we rediscover the love that we are and take the responsibility to live and evolve in this love we can leave all hurts and negative patterns behind, this is the power of love, the power that we are.
Adele, our body is indeed our greatest friend in the world, and the most wise too. To connect to it, be present with it and to feel what it is sharing with us is the way back to who we truly are.
And it has so much to say in so many ways, just to listen now and learn to understand it will make such a difference to everyone.
It never occurred to me clearly as it did from reading this blog that we can hold the world to ransom by punishing our own bodies. It shows the complexity of thought the mind can take us into in avoidance of the love there within us – and the love we naturally hold for all others. I also got another deepening of understanding from this blog that the conditions of anorexia, or obesity for that matter, are only truly healed by first uncovering the preciousness and sensitivity we hold inside and when we begin to allow love for ourselves to shine through.
‘Although my weight has remained at about the same as when I had anorexia, what I feel in my body now is the steady warmth of preciousness, power in delicateness, consistency of joy and the solidness of self-worth I have never felt before – despite the fact that my body image does not fit into the normal standard that the world may be comfortable with.’ – Wow Adele, this is powerful. It goes to show that when we truly deeply care for ourselves, there is a natural sense of worth, an innate knowing of who we are and that it has nothing at all to do with what’s on the outside or the recognition we gain from outside.
” I would reject the world by first rejecting myself.”. This line says it all really. How many of us play this game of holding the world to ransom by harming ourselves first…some crazy logic indeed.
Yes Joel, this “game of holding the world to ransom by harming ourselves first” is so pervasive, despite it’s craziness.
It just come to me that we are great at following instructions and directions in the many ways to reject ourselves, but fail to listen to the still small voice that is always there to simply be ourselves and express from our bodies our truth. Freedom is not so free when you look at the consequences of where we have ended up because we did not listen to the options.
This is true Joel we have many excuses to stay with our hurts and our protection. To let go and open our hearts will then seem dangerous to us and we blame the world for not being able to go there. But what if we have the say in this and letting go of our hurts opens us up to the great love we hold within? This love is what will fulfil us and when we are fulfilled we do not need others to do it for us. And so we won’t be hurt or disappointed when we are not met for who we are. It is a cycle that we have the power to break.
It is truly a sad game and not worth playing at all, as it’s a losing game for all.
It is really important to appreciate where we have come from to where we are today, I too feel so much more at ease in myself less having to seek approval and recognition for what I do but rather knowing I am enough, my quality of being changes everything. It is awesome to feel amazing on the inside and to be able to say “i am feeling really well” when asked how are you, I used to shy away from sharing how I felt; I will also share when I am not feeling great and be open and more honest generally. It is a far cry from the nervous, anxious, aggressive person I was.
Adele your story is inspirational because it is so relatable to girls and women the world over. For there to have been a holding back and hiding of the true and precious you there must have always been a knowing of the truth and that being a young women with great power of communication. How beautiful that the process of uncovering yourself again came from this precious gift of your body, bringing you back to the inner knowing and loveliness of you that was there all along.
Thanks Adele for sharing your experience with us. It is quite incredible the many different ways we come up with to be cruel to ourselves first, such a game we play when innately we know, that it is just a game, but we choose to play it to fit in and play with others. Serge Benhayon and the Benhayon family are showing us that we do not have to play this game, that we can, choose love.
Just before reading your blog Adele I happened to take a few minutes to lie down, close my eyes and feel my body, the absolute lightness and aliveness in it, the joy and wonder of all that I am. Your blog is a beautiful confirmation of the healing power of building a loving relationship with our body for as I’m learning every day holds and shares truth with us if we’re prepared to feel and listen.
Thank you Adele for sharing the intimate details of your life for us to feel the amazing love and changes you have made and the beauty and honouring of yourself now and the transformations we can all make for ourselves. Your are an amazing inspiration.
The greatest gift (love and divinity) can only be expressed through our greatest friend (our body) when a truly honoring and loving relationship and movment has been built between us and our body. This is the most amazing relationship in life, one that I will never run out of appreciation for, as there is always honesty and space for deepening, which is what a relationship is about. And through nurturing and appreciating, what this friend is naturally able to bring forth is heaven on earth. There is no secret, only a commitment to moving in relationship every moment.
Thank you Adele for sharing so honestly your experience of anorexia, amazing that you have turned it around and now hold a deep appreciation for yourself. Absolutely very inspiring and a great reminder to build a more loving relationship with ones own body.
Indeed Fiona there is no hint of blame or victim in Adele’s honest observation of the impact on her of boarding school. This level of honesty allows for an openness to look at one’s own part in difficult situations.
Beautiful Adele that was a wonderful honest blog – your honesty made this blog also very inspirational for me. You wrote: “This pattern was carried on into adulthood: whenever I felt something was wrong in the world and it felt too overwhelming to express, I would reject the world by first rejecting myself.” My feeling is that this is something people can relate to but some will not admit it to themselves or to others. Not to express what is deep inside is really a rejection of ourselves.
“Not to express what is deep inside is really a rejection of ourselves.’ This is profound Ester and an importance revelation as we tend to find ourselves outside of us and yet all we need to do is accept what we feel deep within and express it.
This is deeply inspiring for me Adele, for I have had an abusive relationship with my body throughout my life, and pushed it beyond what it was ever meant to do, and expected it to always work for me. The inner knowing you mention was there when I reflect back, but I kept on overriding it, even while becoming a body work practitioner, and performing physical theatre. It affected my eating patterns, and I am very aware now that this behaviour numbed my sense of having a connection between my mouth and the rest of the body and the digestive system. The second part of your blog after you finish talking about the harshness of your early life, is suddenly filled with the energy of love, gentleness and tenderness, and my body responded. You offer us a great opportunity to continually feel what this feels like, and how it can transform the way we are with ourselves on every level.
Your comment is inspiring Joan, as is this blog. Yes it is our relationship with ourselves that matters the most, and can help us to build the love that we long for from the world.
And emanate that love then to the world – so everyone will be touched.
For every person who has in any way used food to control, suppress or diminish the fact that they do feel, that they have a lot to say and that they know what is out of kilter in the way we are living today, to the way it really is – this is an article for all – honest, accessible and true.
Well said Matilda, with understanding and compassion it can be seen that we all have used in this way.
Reading your comment Matilda has me deeply amazed at the complexity we go to not live our truth. It just doesn’t make sense that this practice is adopted so freely and immensely encouraged for all to do.
Well said Matilda – there’s hardly anyone that hasn’t used food or other distractions to deny and control what is truly going on in their lives, rather than expressing it as it is. How deeply healing it is when we start to address it the way it is.
well said Matilda, we have all in one way or another and to varying degrees used, and use, food to deny what we are truly feeling. To become aware of this will support greatly in reconnecting with that which we feel, know and want to express.
An article for all indeed – such wisdom and experience and learning within that will benefit anyone who gets to read this.
“I didn’t feel cared for, but did not feel I had any say in the matter, and so chose to just go along with the decision that was made for me. None of this felt okay, yet no part of me was aware I could talk about it, or even say no. What was not expressed verbally though, I expressed through controlling my body – I stopped eating.” To not express what we feel is hard on a body which is made to express. To cope with this our bodies have to change from that natural way, Adele’s changes were accentuated by stopping eating, but I also know from my own experiences that I feel a tension inside and a nervousness when I don’t express what I feel – and also if I express in a way that’s not true.
It absolutely does not matter that your image does not fit into the normal standard, for the worlds normal is far from true health. Instead you now reflect to them the power of having a deep connection to your body and true commitment to honouring it, something the world cannot but be inspired by.
What an eye opener to have such an honest and open account of what goes on behind the scenes of eating disorders. Thank you Adele, for allowing others to feel into the devastation of anorexia and why that choice is made in the first place. There was a death in my family long ago from this illness and I have grown up thinking that it was a body image thing with weight being the main player. But with your understanding Adele, it makes more sense to me now that punishment and self-rejection are huge influences over eating disorders.
Yes Susan all of the above be it drinking, smoking, eating, and extreme hobbies, and in this present age also using electronic gadgets extensively and just plain working non-stop, all of this is punishing our own bodies dressed up as being normal in the world. Holding onto any behaviour we find dear and cannot let go of in life, while compromising life itself from this precious body, how intelligent and honest is that?
It is great to come back to this blog, Adele, and find a gem each time – “I am allowing my body to again make its own choices, to be okay with making mistakes, as that is how I will learn to take responsibility.” I love the simplicity in your words, and can feel how powerful this is as a way of being with oneself.
Very apt Janet to highlight those parts this time – “I am allowing my body to again make its own choices, to be okay with making mistakes, as that is how I will learn to take responsibility.” I relate to that too and the power in those words are felt deeply as we connect to this truth.
Adele, thank you for sharing this. I also had a time in my youth being abroad, were I came close to anorexia. I also never have put up the same weight I had before. Hearing your story I already feel not anymore alone with this experience. I learn and accept more and more even so my body is thin I feel amazing and vital.
I agree Richard. I have spent so much of my life being very hard on myself. Trying to be perfect is such a burden, and of course there is no perfect. I can relate to feeling a huge sense of release when I started to free myself from the prison of how I thought I should be, and switched to simply accepting who I am.
This is an interesting observation Richard. I too have often wondered where the love is in many religions, and how can we love our neighbours if we don’t first love ourselves? The word love appears in many religious teachings, but it’s not something I have ever felt from them.
That’s a great point Fiona. We do eventually come to a point where we need to ask ourselves, where does blaming others get us in life? When really if we want to move forward taking responsibility as Adele has done is an inspiring example of how we can turn things around in our life.
How right you are Jennifer – the body sure doesn’t like how it feels when we blame others. It feels poisonous and very disempowering. How the body loves fresh clean honesty and a humility about what is going on – it expands, it loves, it glows.
Great question to ask ourselves Jennifer, ‘where does blaming others get us in life?’
Or we can choose to be responsible and bring understanding to situations and the transformation from this is incredible as Adele has shown in this blog.
Rebuilding trust in ourselves is so important. I remember having that trust when I was a small child, and how gradually over the years it got eroded away, until I felt so unsure of myself, I was always seeking the opinion of others, or consulting magazines and other media for how I should be in the world. Adele’s story is very inspiring because it demonstrates how we can turn self loathing back to self-love; our natural way.
beautiful Debra, Adele’s story is super inspiring and is something so many people are living today that is inspired by Universal Medicine and the amazing practitioners who live with this love for themselves, it is so wonderful to be inspired in this way.
The mind and the outside world can tell us how we look if we let it, as I did for most of my life. Now I find myself having made a total turnaround and am listening to and feeling what my body confirms for me the truth; that I am this amazingly gorgeous woman because my essence tells me so.
Brought to the point Amina, ‘blame is an easy exit and does not allow us to change.’
Our body is our greatest Gift and friend in life and needs to be honoured and taken care for as such. Ignoring it by for instance going into anorexia is not the way to cope with life as by doing so we are also ignoring and rejecting ourself and with that our connections with the world and all of life which we are a inseparable and important part of. The fact is that we are rejecting life if we choose to reject and from there abuse our body and with that we are also rejecting our being and the divine origin we belong to.
Such an important message Nico “our body is our greatest gift and friend in life and needs to be honoured and taken care for…”!!
Yes I love that too – it is our best friend as Adele puts it – so true and all we have to do is treat our body just like we treat our best friend – with love and appreciation and gentleness.
Thank you Nico, your opening line is exquisite and made me think how different the world would be if we were taught this from an early age – ‘Our body is our greatest Gift and friend in life and needs to be honoured and taken care for as such’.
Spot on Nico, Anorexia is not a the way to ‘manage’ life, but nor is the other plethora of behaviours that we turn to such as over eating, intense study, extreme sports, consumption of alcohol or drugs etc just to name a few. We have become very good at self medicating with these behaviours. It is a very inspiring story that Adele shares where she has so beautifully become aware of this self medication as a result of not expressing, and she has been able to turn her life around to a life that is more and more full of expression and hence less of the tensions that used to lead her towards a control of life through food or lack of it. When we allow acceptance of ourselves, then the rejection is no longer and life becomes a completely different ball game.
“…whenever I felt something was wrong in the world and it felt too overwhelming to express, I would reject the world by first rejecting myself.” I resonated with this Adele and am carrying a lot of hurt from this pattern which i’m still working with, understanding now that appreciation is key and my body is hurting without me giving this to myself. It was beautiful to read how you have chosen differently now and have brought a huge level of love to yourself, thank you.
Yes it is super inspiring to read about the incredible shifts in Adele’s relationship with herself. I wonder how many of us live every day with a self-denigrating attitude towards ourselves, rather than a self-nurturing one? And as Adele has said, it is this shift that is changing everything for her (the ripple effects of which are huge). So simple and absolutely possible.
I remember when I first started using the our cycles app and the feelings section where there were words like amazing, light, sexy, beautiful I just found it so hard to press even one, often going for a safe word like – calm – would be excruiating to witness myself being so hard on myself and utterly unwilling to say I was beautiful now 4 years on I can some days want to press all the words as I feel full and breaming with love for myself and others. What a difference!
Thank you Adele for sharing your beautiful journey in discovering your greatest gift and your greatest friend to now appreciation yourself for who you are. Our body is indeed very precious and your blog brings awareness to how we are choosing to treat our body does matter and how we feel does matter and therefore expressing how we feel is extremely important so our body does not have to hold onto what we choose to hold back.
Thank you for adding this point about expressing how we feel Chan. I agree it is a very important part of looking after our bodies, although at first it may not seem at all related. When we don’t express we can walk around with emotions that can be stuck in our bodies for days, weeks even years. Saying how we feel is definitely part of looking after ourselves.
Correct Marika, so focusing on treating anorexia through food does not address the real issue. An on-going learning to honor every particle in this body and feeling deep appreciation for myself is what is steadily re-correcting the relationship with the body, and also naturally then with food.
I really hope that as many people as possible get to read this blog Adele as through your beautifully honest writing we all get a healing and for some it may be a cure.
So true Kevin – it’s a blog that is so important and I hope it goes mainstream too.
Learning to know that we all hold the same preciousness within, is the greatest gift we can ever give ourselves, this is the one true way to observe and not absorb whatever life throws at us, so as to not go into an untrue mechanism in order to survive.
So true Kevin. Our protection mechanism cause us more trouble than the issues we are trying to protect ourselves from. Our fear of what could happen is often far worse than what actually happens, and when we have our armour on and guards up, things just get more complicated than needs be.
I agree Kevin, a most precious gift to us, turning upside down and out, the beliefs we hold about how life should be.
What massive changes for a young woman Adele, your journey has been nothing short of amazing. Thank you so much for sharing your preciousness and beauty. Something every young woman is. May many be inspired by what you have written here.
An amazing story Adele. What stands out for me is the reality that your body weight is not too different to when you were not well all those years ago, however it’s irrelevant now because of the enormous difference you feel within yourself. To go from essentially hating yourself to now loving and appreciating yourself is huge.
Exactly, Elodie, It is not about our body weight but if our body is filled with love or not and that is what truly matters. The more love that we embody the more love we are towards ourselves but also towards anyone else and life in general.
Yes Elodie, we get hung up on numbers like the perfect weight or height etc, but what is ignored in this quest is how we feel. When that becomes the focus, the numbers no longer matter. If a person is at ease with themselves and content inside their body, you can feel it a mile off, regardless of their shape, or size.
Absolutely how you feel in your body is what everyone feels, you can be the ‘perfect’ weight and riddled with doubt and horrible thoughts and this is what is felt. Never is it about weight.
So true Vanessa.
The most awesome thing Elodie is that there is no attachment to the image of the body even now, that there is no perfect picture to hold onto, but a simple honouring of what is felt.
“I am so honoured and humbled to express the greatest gift (love), through my greatest friend (the body) in the world.’
Such a beautiful confirmation and celebration of the purpose of our lives Adele.
Yes, Adele, feeling hurt that no one ‘sees us for who we truly are’ is a great excuse and effective way to avoid taking responsibility for loving ourselves and bringing everything we are to life and relationships. How much are others missing out on when we play the victim and hold the world to ransom?
This is a game I totally relate too. The fact we turned our back on the world first is something we aren’t so keen to put our hands up too. It’s like we created the world as it is with all its horror and lovelessness and say we won’t play again until they getter more loving! Madness, utter madness and totally irresponsible. We just need to see it, own it and move on as we are divine and nothing can taint that only we can keep it closed off and hidden away.
Women are more critical of their own image than men ever will be. It is not that men do not contribute to the problem with their often narrow and superficial view of women, but the truth is men as a rule are often more accepting of women’s bodies than women are. If only men dropped their guards and truly expressed how much they appreciated women in their lives, and if only women learnt to appreciate themselves more, the world would truly be different.
When we choose to appreciate ourselves we naturally appreciate others and from here, we have less or no issues with ours and other people’s image. With appreciation we can start to eliminate issues we create in our life.
How beautiful this support we have with each other Adam, how much to appreciate just to know this is the support men and women can be reflecting for each other every single day to grow, but are we taking this opportunity?
WOW, so well said Adam,
Thank you, Adele. It is so true that “everything begins with the love that I take responsibility for by first giving it to myself”. Growing up I too did not have this lived wisdom, or rather chose to override it. But when we start to love ourselves things around us reflect love in return.
I agree Adele, it is crazy we can turn against ourselves and self abuse as a way of trying to deal with what we cannot accept. Your blog offers great insight into the power of our every choice, thank you for sharing your story.
It is empowering to know that everything that happens in our life is a choice. Thank you Adele for bringing awareness to this truth, it is inspiring to feel how you now live in honour of yourself.
And I just keep considering the ripple effects of you living this way, Adele. Of course I want everyone in the world with any eating disorder/issue with food to read your article! But also know that your choices are having an impact far and wide already. A beautiful woman who has turned around the grip of anorexia, to live with, and honour, her preciousness – that is a game changer.
A lovely story Adele of your return to you. I agree our bodies are so worth honouring in every way.
That simple life actually is Victoria, by honouring and appreciating our bodies for what they bring to us does also bring appreciation and honouring to all of life, the world and the universe we live in and are an equal part of.
So true Andrew , it is essential to express. And from that I have learnt that there is no right or wrong – just expression. And it is how we express that matters.
Our ability to communicate and express is something that tends to be squashed in the face of adversity. It takes very little to shut someone up and gag expression, especially by an older person to a younger person. Kids’ expressions are gagged daily and it is here that all the trouble begins for when the expression valve is closed down, the pressure only builds elsewhere in the body.
Brilliant comment Matthew. The pressure of accumulated unexpressed feelings as you say builds up in our body, causes a huge amount of discomfort and dis-ease. How we deal with this pressure comes in many forms, abuse is often what follows.
I like how you have written this so simply Richard, ‘We have not learned to honour our bodies in this way and it is clear when we start to that they are connected to the source of true wisdom.’ If this was a known fact and human beings honoured instead of disregard their bodies we would all be much more connected to true wisdom and life on earth would be very different to how it is now, there would be more care of each other and our planet, and we could truly evolve.
I agree Fiona and Richard that we can access great wisdom and awareness through connecting to our bodies, which is in contrast to the commonly held belief that our minds are a greatest asset. I have learnt through experience that our bodies are much more discerning when it comes to feeling and reading energy than our minds.
There is a great point here in this blog about the importance of expression. If we do not express what we feel there builds up inside of us a tension or a misery that we will seek all sorts of ways to control or numb or bury. I know for me learning to simply express clearly what I feel has been a great liberation from the incarceration of silent resentment.
I agree Andrew; silent resentment is a horrible prison we can stay in for ages. It eats away at us on the inside, while outwardly we pretend all is well. Learning to express has been a huge shift for me, and I have definitely felt the benefits in my body that now feels much lighter and less tense.
This is a very powerful blog Adele which touched me deeply thank you. It is incredible that when we do not get confirmed by the world (and therefore feel rejected) that we then believe the hype and then reject ourselves or punish ourselves for it. It is like we throw a punch in on ourselves just for good measure! Learning to love, nuture, care for, honour myself no matter what is happening outside of me has been one of the greatest gifts I have learnt from Universal Medicine and my own body.
‘Throwing ourselves punches’ – put like that the madness is tangible. We are down and then we layer in some extra kicks. Whilst I can recognise this pattern, this article lays out super clearly our responsibility and ability to make different choices and to turn this oil-tanker of self-denigration and abuse around. This then changes the patterns so embedded in our society and builds a different way to interact and live. One by one we can call the changes. Thank you, Adele.
Adele thank you for sharing your story, its lovely to read and your sharing that “Although my weight has remained at about the same as when I had anorexia, what I feel in my body now is the steady warmth of preciousness, power in delicateness” changes our perception that anorexia is not only a weight issue but an overall quality of being and acceptance of the grandness we are issue.
The understanding and responsibility that you have brought to your situation Adele seems an important aspect of the healing that you have undergone.
When bad things happen to us, like an unsuitable boarding school, it is very reasonable to assume that it is our fault. That may or may not be true but to turn the guilt on ourselves and harm ourselves further can be self destructive. In most situations we have a lot of scope to work on the situation in a helpful way.
I can only imagine how that must have felt, being sent to a foreign country to boarding school, I was only sent two hours drive up the road in the same country and I have to say that was bad enough. No wonder you felt isolated and developed anorexia after not only moving countries but the huge culture shock as well. Why Scotland from Hong Kong?
Although our parents think they are doing the best for us being sent to boarding school for most people is a real shock to the body. I went from a tiny country school to a big city boarding school and had to toughen up over night and it wasn’t long before I started smoking cigarettes which looking back helped numb the sadness of being sent away.
You’re so right about parents doing what they think is best at the time. The truth is they know no better as their parents would have also made choices that perhaps weren’t ideal for them. With each generation there is an opportunity to learn and deepen the connection and understanding of all.
The impact on so many of being sent to boarding school is huge and that impact ripples out endlessly into the make up of society. I have just spotted the terminology as I write ‘being sent’, which is for most what it feels like, and the abject hopelessness of how this feels. As Adele said it cements our belief that we do not have a choice, which for many takes a lot of breaking out of. Boarding school builds survival into our bodies and lives.
Yes, absolutely. Anorexia is to do with not even feeling worthy of, or wanting to ‘figure on Earth’. All that plays out thereafter is the consequence of the issue and not the cause.
Thanks Adele for sharing – there is a constant knowing within us of who we truly are and our amazingness. Sometimes we make choices that are not honouring of this truth. Regardless, the powerful and life giving spark never disappears but always remains. Thank you for bringing your amazing light to others.
Mary and Lyndy, having deeply hidden too brings about the realisation that hiding is the movement of holding onto hurts and basking in the success of this protection and comfort. It is individualism and there is no evolution. Choosing evolution, the movement in life simply has to be change. For me, it started with connecting, appreciating and confirming myself and embracing the depth of this gorgeousness is then naturally expressed with others, as it is one and the same movement.
Thank you Adele for this honest sharing and it is beautiful how you now can confirm that for most of your live you honored your inner knowing. And all these self-abusing habits we take on is actually because it hurts to hold back from what we know and feel is true or not and, choose to not express. As you say, we reject ourselves first.
Thank you Gill for repeating this line, “I am so honoured and humbled to express the greatest gift (love), through my greatest friend (the body) in the world.” So simply yet so profound, the search for something greater outside of ourselves totally exposed here and shows we have it all if we are prepared to go within.
Agreed Fiona this is the power that Adele’s blog has to offer, instead of blame she chooses responsibility and as a result lives the results, true joy and honouring of herself.
This line is so good I can’t help but repeat it, we lack a great deal of responsibility in our world today and you have shared it here in bucket loads, thank you once again. “But I did choose, and I chose to withhold my communication; I chose to accept that children had no say in expressing how they felt to their parents in the culture that I grew up in, and when I did not take the responsibility to express myself, I also chose to punish myself as a consequence.”
Adele what an extraordinary sharing, thank you for opening up to us the way you have. There is so much to learn from your beautiful blog. Anorexia is an illness that is yet not understood by the medical profession and hence the many that suffer from it get very little support. What you have brought needs to be studied; lack of self worth being the root cause of Anorexia, if this is understood fully we will go a long way in supporting those that suffer from this very debilitating state of being.
It has been shown to me that with the choices of not expressing what was felt when I was younger, there is a gap in knowing and in expressing. Once this is observed, it is then very simple, just move in a way, consciously in my daily moments to allow this voice to express the truth that is felt. Instead of any criticism and judgement, there is deep appreciation from simply observing, and no delay in living what has been observed, also with deep appreciation.
As a little addendum, this is super cool, Adele. Bringing in the pattern of delay that can be broken when we simply ‘move in a way, consciously in my daily moments to allow this voice to express the truth that is felt’ … with ‘no delay’!
It is so amazing to read this very open and honest account Adele and to feel your appreciation for your choices that have allowed such a great shift in your life.
Adele I too could feel your commitment to the truth of who you are shining out from within that young woman of 15. I feel I too had a deep connection to the truth of who I am even as a young girl also. There were many instances where I stood strong in this, even though I was considered a shy child I knew what was right for me on that deeper level. Thank you for your beautiful inspirational sharing .
It is interesting how important control is to the human spirit who is constantly trying to fathom life in a world that does not necessarily exist purely for their own benefit and the things we do to our bodies as a result of the debilitation that we feel as a result. This is what makes self-love such an incredibly powerful tool for us, because with this love we have purpose.
Fiona, i have found this to be true. Regardless of what happened in my life and the choices made by my parents, releasing blame and taking responsibility for it all, helped me move on. And with greater breath of vision and wisdom, I’ve come to appreciate that those choices made on my behalf were part of my life’s journey and learning. Something to be treasured not resented.
Adele, I love how you talk about your body being your greatest friend, ‘I am so honoured and humbled to express the greatest gift (love), through my greatest friend (the body) in the world.’ I can feel that if it was common for us to treat our bodies as our greatest friends then we would not abuse them with alcohol and cigarettes, overeating and numbing them, we would listen to and care for them, not push them to the extreme, if they were tired we would let them rest, we would wrap them up warm and nurture them – how lovely, I feel inspired to treat my body as my best friend.
I agree Rebecca, I know I have sometimes viewed my body as my greatest foe rather than friend and I’m sure I am not alone in this, so this blog is very inspirational in its simplicity of how we can honour our bodies to re-connect with our divinity.
I feel very inspired by your sharing with us all Adele. To feel the love and commitment you have and how past choices that did not serve you as a child you have completely changed your direction in life to now take a self-loving, healing journey with your beautiful vehicle of expression.
I agree with you Adele – the greatest gift in this world is love, and our greatest friend is indeed our body.
Yes, and our body is a great teacher giving us completely honest, in fact truthful feedback. It may takes us a bit until we learn to understand the feedback but the rewards are immense.
And the willingness to learn with the body, to experiment, to listen, to even make mistakes but in gaining awareness is how we truly commit to living and in building respect and love for ourselves. That in itself is the most precious education Christoph.
Gill well said. We all have preciousness and should certainly not discount our expression.
I really enjoyed reading this article and can relate to believing my body was the cause of all of my problems and something I had to control, to now seeing that it was and has always been my best friend.
It makes me wonder how many people are in the same boat. How many know that things aren’t loving in the world yet not being able to express or be themselves despite it. Great thing to look at Adele.
By choosing to not express how we feel or nominate something that we know is not loving creates conflict, and it is harmful for us and others.
“If the outside world did not confirm me, it was as though I didn’t exist…. mostly, it didn’t.” If the outside world does not confirm us, we have to do it for ourselves through movement, rituals that ensure a flow that fully supports us. It is extremely important to appreciate the power we have and use it.
“we have to do it for ourselves through movement, rituals that ensure a flow that fully supports us” well said Eduardo. We are the best ones to confirm us. As we can feel exactly how we are if we are open to it.
Eduardo, the power of this observation in self appreciation, self confirmation and thus expression from this place is now the movement chosen to re-correct this past ill force, and in that there is deep joy no matter what comes head on to be seen and felt.
The force you have mentioned Eduardo is there every single day around us in a myriad of different faces, it gets expressed when there is the void of a lack of self-worth, so in effect, it exposes how we have been moving is confirming of this lack of worth; and yet, when different movements are initiated such as appreciation of self and expressing through this appreciation, we are moving away from the lack of worth back to love.
Beautifully said Adele – appreciation is a powerful and worthwhile medicine for our body and being. It does not give any side effects of symptoms but communicates the fact that we are greater and grander then our minds would have us think we are. I am re-learning the language of appreciation and know that it dissolves the negative thinking and creates space for us to feel the Love we are.
‘It is extremely important to appreciate the power we have and use it.’ I really like the simplicity in how you express this in your comment Eduardo. Because actually it is, we have strayed far away from this truth that the power we naturally have seems like something far out of reach.
Appreciate, appreciate, appreciate. Simply, appreciate.
Oh, yes, appreciate, use and enjoy our power and don’t hold back!
Absolutely Eduardo if we wait or rely on the outside world to confirm and accept and appreciate us we are setting ourselves up for hurt and rejection. Learning to self-appreciate and self-confirm and build a foundation of self love in the body is very important as well as learning to express that love to the outside world which then begins to change the landscape of a lack of love that we felt was unsupportive in the first place.
Yes Gill eating disorders have become a very normalized form of self-abuse and we are looking at how to support people to build a better body image, but we don’t look at how teenagers are not offered the space to express themselves truly.
Always it is so important that we consider what is underlying an issue and Adele is so clear in identifying that her lack of expression lead to her later issues.
This blog is a great example how a movement, initiated by force (sending to boarding school in Scotland), set you to initiate a way of moving that embodied the ill of the path forced upon you.
I agree Marika, Anorexia is not a issue with food and to force the person to just start eating is not the answer. It is the deep self rejection that is calling for healing and to truly support individuals with this disease we must address the underlying driver first.
Agree also Kate. Forcing a resolution of the symptoms is a huge waste of time, if the foundation of that person is made up of a lack of self worth, then it will drive all future choices.
When we are seen for who we truly are beyond our issues we can begin to reconnect to what is true again and start the journey of true healing – such is what Serge Benhayon provides the world.
Agreed Kate, thank you for expressing this so powerfully.
For me anorexia feels like an incredible rejection of self, a complete denial of the amazingness that one is. It is so incredible Adele that not only have you overcome this disease but you have also reclaimed yourself deeply and are freely expressing this to the world. You are a true inspiration for all.
true Kate. and an awesome example of how getting to the crux of what’s going on does wonders and brings about change.
Thank you, Adele. I love how you have highlighted what can happen when as young people we do not express what we are feeling, and that you have now found your true voice to be able to share your learning with us all.
‘What I learned also is the responsibility of expression’, this line stuck me and gave me the deep feeling of responsibility we all hold to express. This is a line I need to feel everyday so I can feel what power I hold in my expression.
Me too Kim – expression and responsibility is not something I thought would go together. But this blog has offered great understanding to the fact that holding back what we feel and what is needed to be delivered is actually just as self-abusive as choosing not to eat. Holding back our expression still has an affect on the body, in fact, all our choices do whether we can see it on a physical level or not – we can feel it if we are attuned to our body. So, of course we have a responsibility to express what we feel, for ourselves and for others to learn, express back to or be inspired by.
Incredible Adele, to read where you have come from and to feel where you now reside, feels to me like a lost Angel who has found there way home back to God.
Such a beautiful description of Adele’s journey from being lost and hurt to now being empowered and loving.
Anorexia as a form of control or over-eating – they look different on the outside but the root is the same.
How powerful it is that Adele has come from choosing the ultimate rejection through her eating disorder, to a full accepting of the delicate and powerful being that she is. Again this proves that in every situation we have a choice.
Adele thank you for sharing so honestly.
It was this part that I feel so many of us can relate to ‘This pattern was carried on into adulthood: whenever I felt something was wrong in the world and it felt too overwhelming to express, I would reject the world by first rejecting myself.’
I am learning that more expression equals less rejection and that Re-learning to express ourselves is deeply healing.
A great point you are highlighting here Kathryn, that I can very much relate to as well. To express and share what is going on inside of us is an immense support to deepen our understanding of the world and everything that is occurring to us and that rejecting ourselves or making ourselves in anyway less is not going to change anything or help anyone.
Mary this is a deeply beautiful testimony to Serge Benhayon, and the way he has helped thousands come out of hiding to take their place in the world and shine their light. I, like you, was flying very low under the radar, just basically working out how I could get through ‘safely’ and ‘comfortably in the world, clinging onto the illusion that there could be ‘good’ in the world – when in fact all we had to do is embrace the truth that we are and be the bringers of that. We had abnegated our responsibility and so deprived ourselves and the world from our amazing presence.
It was really beautiful to feel you in your writing Adele, and your transformation. Additionally I felt this is a super healing blog for the world; to confirm that at any age, including as a young child, we have the authority and choice to express ourselves or not. Your write up about yourself is also very sweet, and can clearly feel the simplicity and enjoyment in your blog and hence, within yourself.
Adele Leung, I love your bio living intimately with 7 million others. This is an important role you play. If you were not intimate with people around you how does anyone else have a chance to know who they are? We are all that, important. We all hold a missing link we provide each other. It is worth letting in everyone we meet no matter their way to understand and confirm more of who we are.
Absolutely Rik Connors, rejecting living intimacy which is natural, we are rejecting ourselves, the world, and life.
Yes I agree Rik, this is a great call to make and can enrich our lives tremendously if we consider each meeting (deliberate or not) with another as a constellation that can contribute to the situation we are in at that point in time.
“Everything that did not feel right and I could not accept was not expressed, and it was my own body that I rejected to punish the world for treating me this way, although I thought it was freedom at the time. I was rebelling as a teenager from feeling the impossibility of being allowed to make true choices.”
The fear and at time terror I have felt in saying what I need to express, I have allowed to stop me expressing countless times, yet I have felt the harm and impact that has on my body, which is far worse than the fear. As I choose to deeply accept myself and honour my feelings it has become easier, and the feelings of rejection not as devastating as they used to be.
“I am allowing my body to again make its own choices, to be okay with making mistakes, as that is how I will learn to take responsibility.” Meeting yourself in your feelings and expressing this is the most joyous act to give yourself – it’s your innate responsibility. I agree Adele, denying yourself of what you deeply feel, and know, is a direct attack on yourself and all around you. How many people live like this, and take this as the norm?
I love your sharing Adele, and the fact that you have been able to come to love and acceptance of yourself and share with the world the beautiful woman you are. Having met you I can confirm that loveliness and the warmth you bring to all you meet. What would the world be like if we all realised that our bodies are our best friends if we allow them to be.
That the body is often perceived as a spoilsport or someone who lets us down as we expect it to do what we want to do with it without considering its true nature and indwelling intelligence. To know him being our best friend gives us access to a knowing and wisdom we otherwise lack to make the most loving, nurturing and supportive choices. Without honouring the body we are completely lost and our course through life dominated by a mind without any common sense for a true quality and the value and purpose of life.
The words you use to describe your relationship with your body really stand out for me: “… steady warmth of preciousness, power in delicateness, consistency of joy and the solidness of self-worth.” It doesn’t get any better than that, only deeper and more precious.
So many of us have turned on ourselves when we felt the lovelessness of the world. It doesn’t really make sense when we punish ourselves like that, yet it is so common. The way forward, the way we can bring ourselves back to love is by caring and loving ourselves deeply. You’re right Adele, our body is our greatest friend and treating this friend with love will bring us back.
Eating disorders come in very different shapes and forms so to speak, I feel many of us have an eating disorder, meaning that our relationship with food and eating is not coming from love and that we don’t eat to nurture our body. It just shows how disconnected we are from our body. I am very thankful to you Adele that you so openly share this.
Great point you are raising here Mariette, we are mostly eating for distraction, to stimulate ourselves and to fill the emptiness inside. Food is used in so many ways but to truly nurture our bodies.
True Mariette, and a great point is we cannot make a pact to our selves by saying disconnection be gone and expect everything to be perfect, as the mind cannot truly change anything. How this process works is by movement, a consistent and steady commitment in expressing in all the aspects in life, with the love we now feel in re-connecting with the body. From how we walk, how we talk, how we eat, how we dress, how we sleep, how we go to the toilet, how we type on the computer etc. everything is a reflection of this.
Thank you Adele for consistently reminding us to come back to the quality of how we move our body in every activity in our day – it is so true that if I have been living disconnected from my body throughout the day that I cannot then simply use my mind to control how I prepare my food and eat to get it ‘right’ or force myself to be connected. Nor can I solely blame mealtimes and food for feeling off which only really distracts me from looking at the whole and how I am with everything.
I love the reminder that our relationship begins with ourselves rather than food when responding to disordered eating patterns. Thank you.
Great point Susan ‘Nor can I solely blame mealtimes and food for feeling off which only really distracts me from looking at the whole and how I am with everything.’
This is a huge distraction in my life when I choose to obsess over food instead of looking at the bigger picture and my movements throughout the day that got me to the place of wanting to overeat or eat food that doesn’t feel good in my body. Mealtimes are only a slight portion of the day, so what is going on for the rest of it?
Absolutely Mariette – WOW in fact. I had not made that connection before but it makes total sense. When our relationship with food is about control instead of love then we have a disorder with eating. The control I engage with is to overeat to not feel what is going on with me or others, this is a punishment too and even though it looks ‘normal’ compared to that of the extremity of anorexia, it is still not a loving choice.
“What was not expressed verbally though, I expressed through controlling my body” – for you the control came through eating but the reality is that we all use multiple things to make up for the things that we have not expressed…they build up and so we have to find out a way to deal with them.
This really does emphasise the importance of expressing all that is going on, and is a great lesson on how things do play out in the body in the form of illness and disease if our expression is so suppressed.
Absolutely Joel. For me it was to have an attitude problem and keep everyone at arms length whilst having the toughest exterior.
We’re so very clever when it comes to finding ways of shutting down.
“It is important to appreciate how far I have come from having constant debilitating and depressive thoughts, to feeling deeply supported through this beautiful vehicle of expression. I am so honoured and humbled to express the greatest gift (love), through my greatest friend (the body) in the world.” Here is a partnership that I took for granted, I overrode, abused and ignored, yet when I reflect the unconditional love it has offered me has been consistently there from day one. Serge Benhayon and Universal medicine present a mirror that rebinds us to this ever-present love and from here we begin to identify and shed all that is not.
“Everything that did not feel right and I could not accept was not expressed, and it was my own body that I rejected to punish the world for treating me this way, although I thought it was freedom at the time. I was rebelling as a teenager from feeling the impossibility of being allowed to make true choices.”
I can so relate to this Adele, I went to a girls boarding school in England where this kind of behaviour was rife – it was common place for girls to have eating disorders or to cut themselves. We rebelled, punished ourselves and this set a benchmark for the lovelessness that we walked into later life.
Waiting for the world to confirm us in all our glory is something we all have done at one point or another and it hasn’t served us well.
So many great points you have shared Adele. When we are willing to accept the truth that our bodies are our vehicle of expression enhousing our Soul, we will realise that holding back our expression is what harms us the most, and as such all of us, as we are holding back the Love we are and sharing this with the world. We are not designed to exist in lovelessness. I am realising that more we express the more we live in connection to our Love and it is this that guides us all to live who we truly are in this world. Our greatest gift in union with our greatest friend, a powerful union indeed.
Well said Carola. The fact that such a situation creates an enormous tension within us shows that we are not naturally from lovelessness as every part of our being pulls us to be love.
Imagine the lengths we go to to not express, how powerful expression truly is then when the divine is allowed to be expressed through us. No wonder we are tempted and fed so many images that try to prevent us from truly expressing, for once we commit to that, it is true power.
Adele I can only agree to what you have shared in your powerful comment – it is time to face this kind of temptations and images as truly expressing is something what is also really joyful.
It is beautiful to the feel the love that you express, Adele, as I feel the love within myself as I read your story. “Knowing myself to be a delicate, precious being, I am re-learning to live deeply this preciousness again.” This encapsulates it so well.
“What was not expressed verbally though, I expressed through controlling my body – I stopped eating.” In reading this I feel many people who do not express in words are expressing through their behaviours and it would be great if we could start learning to read these other ways of expression as they are huge signs of people not feeling good in life.
Great comment Lieke, there are many many more “not feeling good in life” and expressing through behaviours in our current times. Learning to read and understand them would be a great start..
So true Lieke – a few years ago I used to work with people with differing patterns of behaviour and this was very clear – we all communicate in this way and perhaps sometimes those with more distinct behavioural differences are being a little more honest.
Great point Michael “perhaps sometimes those with more distinct behavioural differences are being a little more honest.” The people who are able to function perfectly and without any extreme behaviours are often far more trapped in the illusion that all is good when actually there is a lot of love lacking in our society. The ones who do not fit in and show behavioural differences are in a way indeed more honest as they are not playing ball with the systems.
Great point Lieke, when we find ourselves in an oppressive situation where our voice is stifled we still express our pain albeit in other, non verbal ways.
Yes Kate, and if we would start to listen it would be way more obvious that even with all the technological advancements we are not doing so well in a world where more and more people getting lifestyle diseases, depression or simply not feel joyful in life. The latter is actually already a sign something is not right.
Lieke, great thing to notice and be aware of. Would be awesome for people to observe these instances all over the would and begin then to actually open up the conversations that can follow.
Yes beautifully said Emily. When we take these non-verbal expressions and see them as a start of a conversation about what is truly going on in the world we would learn heaps and the world would soon be a much more loving place.
Yes, what a needed thing to do. Reading between the lines of how others are expressing is an awesome tool to help us all connect to all and not stop us from ignoring those we think don’t want to have anything to do with us. Because at the end of the day everyone simply wants to be loved and cared for.
Yes Elodie having that line: “Because at the end of the day everyone simply wants to be loved and cared for.” as a marker for how someone is feeling would bring light to the fact that many people are not feeling alright in the world as it is.
Lieke, understanding this about ourselves, we are aware of it happening to others, and it is true that the support we can offer each other in reflection is constant and powerful.
That is so true Lieke a lot of us are expressing through our behaviours. It would be great to be able to read them but also would it be great if these people would also learn to express verbally – so they have more possibilities to express themselves at any time.
Adele the level of responsibility that you have taken,is so deeply felt and it feels that it is this responsibility that has been the lynch pin in transforming how you feel.
What I am learning is that if and when I behave in a harmful way to myself, it is actually not me who is doing it. I am responsible for letting the harm in so this is no reason at all to be irresponsible but I am not naturally harmful to myself, so when I do behave in such a way – is it really me doing something that is not me?
When we feel we lack power, we develop all kinds of ways to control life. Like a clamp that locks down a plank to a desk, things may seem secure and tight. Yet the truth is all of these controlling games are more like stabs, so corrosive to our delicate beauty of our heart. Far from keeping secure, they keep us imprisoned in a lie. True freedom is to understand our absolute power, that when we live in connection to truth, we will understand that we are much more like superheroes than any victim. All we need to do is is stop hiding under our cape.
What a very beautiful and inspiring blog Adele, I really appreciate what you have shared and expressed;
“I began to understand how truly precious I am, and that I do matter. In fact, everything begins with the love that I take responsibility for by first giving it to myself”. Such a divine and powerful message which really resonated with me.
I too could relate to a short period in my life when I rejected life and myself because I wasn’t confirmed in it.
What amazing and powerful changes you have gone through by reconnecting to love and the beauty within.
It is palpable as I read your blog, reminding me of the importance of self appreciation.
“It is important to appreciate how far I have come from having constant debilitating and depressive thoughts, to feeling deeply supported through this beautiful vehicle of expression.” When we have self worth issues, appreciation is something that we completely dismiss, as the negative and debilitating thoughts take over our whole way of being. It is great that you are able to get past the body image that is often imposed onto us by media and our own perceptions of how we think we should look.
This is deeply inspiring and beautiful to read Adele and claiming how far you have come from is a real testament to how you now live and who you are. The knowing that “what I feel in my body now is the steady warmth of preciousness, power in delicateness, consistency of joy and the solidness of self-worth I have never felt before ” This is very precious loving and beautifully shared thank you.
Yes agree Monica, anorexia is about food rejection, though to withdraw from expressing, speaking, or engaging with people and life in whatever way we do, has the same ransom or withdrawal effect that has devastating effects on the body and its regard, as well as one’s sense of worth and wellbeing. When there is true body-connection, there is life-connection.
Adele, what an honest post on body expression , your blog shows that to open and love the body is to open and love the world … that it is an ongoing process of relating and deepening that leads to such an enriching life to be love in the world even more.
Beautiful Zofia. Yes.
Yes I agree Gill, Adele’s story gives us a greater understanding of the underlying cause of eating disorders. And also adore Adele’s ending – it feels divine.
Great point, something I can fall for is self criticism, a whisper in the ear, that even an amazing moment could have been more ‘amazing’ I only I had been more this or that. When I do appreciate and I am understanding with myself, I know I am enough, no need to try but Be. These ‘steps’ you describe build a foundation in our lives of knowing we a learning and that we are love.
Self-worth is such a solid foundation on which to stand upon. Amazing you are Adele to now be choosing you, life, self-worth and expression. I could not imagine a world where you were not expressing so I am grateful you have chosen to. You bring such honesty, love and simplicity into this world.
Yes, I definitely second that – without Adele being who she now is the world would not be the same.
It is vital and I am inspired and appreciative of how much you live this appreciation, you shine…this blog shines “It is important to appreciate how far I have come from having constant debilitating and depressive thoughts, to feeling deeply supported through this beautiful vehicle of expression.” It is so important to appreciate ourselves as we evolve and heal, these are amazing moments of love lived and embodied.
“It is important to appreciate how far I have come from having constant debilitating and depressive thoughts, to feeling deeply supported through this beautiful vehicle of expression.” Your appreciation and celebration is jumping off the page Adele!
It has taken some time for me to begin to let go of waiting for someone to say it is ok and acknowledge that I can express what I feel, some how making it real “And when I didn’t get a confirmation from the world that matched the knowing within myself, I rejected life, and lived by constantly protecting myself from feeling hurt that no one saw me for who I truly am.” I have spent a lot of time hiding who I am waiting for some one else to tell me it is ok to shine. I am learning that I can say it is ok myself and so get on with expressing who I am.
‘…what I feel in my body now is the steady warmth of preciousness, power in delicateness, consistency of joy and the solidness of self-worth I have never felt before…’ Adele how beautiful expressed and truly claimed, very inspirational to read your words, not just words but this is what you live.
I can relate to this Adele… Rejecting the world and my self when it hasn’t confirmed me. The changes you describe are powerful. Thank you for sharing it. It seems like you are now doing the opposite of what you used to do in knowing who you are and taking that to the world.
‘Rejecting the world and my self when it hasn’t confirmed me’. Wow. So powerful. simple and direct.
How often it is when particularly as little children we take out our hurt on our body, somehow we compute that from sadness comes a license to abusing our body. Sadly this can for many stick for a long, long time, becoming our go to response whenever it is that these hurts are triggered. Thank you for sharing your story Adele it is quite remarkable to feel the wisdom that today you connect with from the loving relationship you now have with your body.
I remember as a child feeling so devastatingly hurt that I went to my room crying. I sat on my bed and thought about different ways in which I could hurt them back simply to show them how hurt I was. One of my thoughts was to break my arm because ‘that’ll make them stop in their tracks’, ‘that’ll show them’, it will make them feel sorry for me rather than hurt me. At the time this line of thinking, self-harm, did not seem strange… but now it does. Why would I choose to hurt myself to express or stop the hurt I was feeling? It seems crazy to me now, but our bodies are the only thing we really have control over that is only ours, and so I suppose when we are feeling so incredibly powerless we turn to the power we think we have over our bodies as the only place to regain control.
So well described Robyn. It is a landslide-reactive chain that actually makes no true sense and it happens in the moment we give power to situations or the words and actions of others that are not Love. We end up hurting ourselves because they hurt us! Thank heavens we now know not to take this route but to keep re-connecting to our essence and emanating that!.
I love how you refer to your body as the greatest friend in the world Adele, in the past I have often treated my body like a machine to use to be productive, or a this thing to drive around in as I please with no love, care of regard, complaining bitterly when it protests by getting unwell. This is no way to treat your best and greatest friend and ally, our body’s are amazing teachers and show us exactly the sum total of the way in which we live, breathe and express, they are faithful in that they always tell the truth and are never misleading or dishonest. They are also faithful for they are always working hard to bring us health, balance and harmony, no matter how much we disregard and abuse them.
The life that we lead and the choices we make are a direct result of the energy we chose to align ourselves and body’s to. Our movements then magnify our choices. When we punish our body by constantly judging it, dismissing what it is telling us and overriding its wisdom we end up with a body that needs to speak louder in the form or expression of illness, physical or mental, both being our bodies way of getting us to be accountable and responsible for the choices we have made.
“Although my weight has remained at about the same as when I had anorexia, what I feel in my body now is the steady warmth of preciousness, power in delicateness, consistency of joy and the solidness of self-worth I have never felt before – despite the fact that my body image does not fit into the normal standard that the world may be comfortable with.” This should be published in women’s magazine’s around the world as it really sets the bench mark to what huge leaps and bounds are possible when one is prepared to build a solid foundation of self love, self acceptance and consistently make loving choices in their life, thanks to the divine inspiration of Serge Benhayon and all that he lives, and thank you Adele for having the courage to share this with the world.
The honest and truthful way in which you write about and expose your life is very inspiring Adele, thank you, it sets a new bench mark for everyone to see that it’s safe to do this and very healing for all that read your blogs.
“But I did choose, and I chose to withhold my communication; I chose to accept that children had no say in expressing how they felt to their parents in the culture that I grew up in, and when I did not take the responsibility to express myself, I also chose to punish myself as a consequence.” I can very much relate to this Adele, the anger and unfairness I felt as a teenager that I didn’t feel safe to express, I turned inward to punish my self and harm my own body with disregarding and reckless acts. Through my work with the practitioners of Universal Medicine I am learning to feel what’s true in my body and express more and more.
It is interesting that when we want to punish the world we do so by punishing ourselves. It does in turn punish the world as the world misses out on the amazingness that is you, but we create a more intense misery by creating a body that is utterly miserable and we are the ones who have to live in that body. Your blog really highlights that the way we choose to live is what we actually live in. We can choose misery or we can choose love.
So simply divine and super simple Adele, I very much appreciate you pointing this out: ‘My Body is my best friend in the world.’ I am re-discovering the amazingness from with-in my body. It holds all the wonders of the universe and is here to absolutely support me 100%. All I need is to choose to support the depth of quality that is present. Ridiculous how much abuse, mis-use and mis-trust we turn on our-selves. We must be very powerful if we are so afraid of feeling what is with-in.
Absolutely Sandra. The body must be super important in the grand scheme of things if there is so much that comes in to deter us from living a solid committed and connected relationship with it, there must be great power when this dedication and connection is lived.
Adele the acceptance that you have come to, of knowing the Love you are regardless of how the world measures us, is so gorgeous to feel. You have shown how developing a loving relationship with ourselves and our bodies is what makes for a loving life that is lived with far more joy, power and celebration of the preciousness that we naturally are. As the connection that we seek is that of our Love within through which we can then live in the world with loving purpose, knowing who we are.
The ability to make choices is directly related to how committed we are to ourselves; to being present in our body and to lovingly understanding ourselves. Then whatever is before us can be felt clearly and a choice made.
I feel that we all use food to control our experience of life, in one way or another. Until we can see what we are doing and build the loving foundation in our body to be able to hold ourselves in love rather than using compulsive eating behaviours. I experience an incredible freedom now in what and how much I choose to eat, as opposed to feeling restriction. Every day this deepens as I continue to lovingly listen to what my body says about the choices I have made and then I respond accordingly the following day.
I agree Emma, the commitment to ourselves in understanding, acceptance and lots of patience does not come with a picture of perfection, it is simply a deepening. Along the way there may be lots of interference, but the commitment is solid, as it is only through the body that the divine can be brought to earth.
Dear Adele
Thank you for sharing your story and I feel sure that it will be so useful for many.
The age of 15 seems to be a very significant and vulnerable time. I also experienced intensity at that age in making choices, feeling so unsupported by myself, lacking a foundation in my body to deeply value myself. I can equally relate to not feeling like I had a voice or could express what was true. To know our worth and to feel our preciousness is so fundamental and what an incredible gift we have now given ourselves, with the tools and guidance of the magnificent work of Serge Benhayon.
To address the rise of the true dis-ease with women all over the world which is a lack of self worth, we need to go right back to the beginning that is, being raised knowing who we are and we are then better equipped to deal with our issues and patterns of behaviour as they arise as we are not as identified with them. Serge and Natalie Benhayon have been fundamental in bringing this inner knowing back into our lives.
This is an all too familiar story, while I did not have such a huge cultural change as you did, in my late teens I did go through a period of anorexia because I felt I had absolutely no control or say in my life. That I did not count and what my heart felt impulsed to do didn’t count. So something I could control was ….food. I know that both our stories are not the only ones in the world, in fact that are many very similar cases still happening today. What would be really lovely is if both of us wrote a letter to our teenage selves back then. What advise and support would we give ourselves? …. As this could help others now ?
Great idea and I, for one, look forward to reading them.
“I would reject the world by first rejecting myself.” That is such a profound statement that I can relate to in other areas (than stop eating). If there’s something outside of me that feels off or something I don’t want to feel, or if I feel rejected or whatever, isn’t it totally absurd that what I do next is reject myself by a bad choice? It’s like I continue in the wrong energy instead of stopping. We can reject ourselves by so many choices, it can also be eating too much. Or checking out with TV, sports, computer or anything. To me it’s all the same, rejecting myself by not committing to me first and stay connected in all the choices I make. But of course, I have noticed, the more aware I become, the better are the choices ‘all by themselves’.
Thank you for sharing your story, Adele, I absolutely love the way you express yourself, ~ it’s hard to believe that at some point you didn’t.
I agree Fiona, and in my own experience I’ve found that taking responsibility for our choices instead of blaming others is the only true way to be truly free in relationship with ourselves both ourselves and others.
Very true Angela. if we all took a step back and turned our observation towards ourself before we started to blame anybody else the world would become immediately a more harmonious place.
I agree, taking responsibility for our choices instead of blaming others is a key step for developing harmonious and loving relationships.
A very insightful blog Adele. It is a tragedy that anorexia even exists, when in truth it is a totally preventable disease. But in order to get that truth we have to get more honest with the way we treat women and the way we do not honour their innate delicateness. Women are beautiful beyond measure. Girls are beautiful beyond measure, and it is a beauty that extends beyond the physical. It is a beauty that we need to honour so that our women do not continue to grow up in the self loathing that leads to entirely preventable diseases such as anorexia or bulimia.
I love the title of this blog ‘the greatest friend and gift in the world. It says it all but for many the body is not a friend, but something we’ve become disconnected to and routinely dis-honour. Adele’s story confirms that healing is always possible when love and commitment is there.
What you’ve shared here is so game changing Adele – that although your weight may not have dramatically changed, the QUALITY of your body and how you feel has transformed your whole life. This exposes that exterior images mean nothing, and our inner environment and how we look after ourselves are super, super important – they mean everything.
Susie the quality you mention here is key. As I see Adele now – she is delicate as a woman and her body is very fine and slim – but when I see her I do not see anorexia. I do not see a disease that takes over the mind and body and causes one to look given up. I see a woman who is vital and full of joy. It is not the shape – it is the quality she brings. And she is so claimed in this as a woman.
Amazing Hannah! The quality we bring far supersedes our physical body!
And to even let go of the picture of even this body image that we see or are seen to be, we walk into being image-free in a world governed by images, and then we are quality first and foremost.
Absolutely. Our reflection (seen and unseen) is incredibly powerful. We are each role models for each other in the way we choose to live and move in every moment.
Absolutely Susie it is not about outward appearances but about the quality within the body and how we choose to build that by the choices we make.
This is such a powerful, honest, raw and precious piece of writing and sharing of your life. Thank you Adele.
Yes I loved this sentence too. It is humbling to know we are here to express the greatest gift through the greatest friend. And yet it is such an honour, one which means my heart expands way beyond the borders of my body and has no cap. It impossible to contain it or reserve it.
Beautifully expressed Lucy, we are here on earth to express the love that we are through our greatest friend our body, which is in fact one body connected to all other bodies all equally capable of expressing the love we all are and are from, whether the person chooses that or not, that potential is still there. As one expresses the love more and more, it shows others it’s not only possible to live this way, but very joy- full and in fact our natural way of being with one another.
Yes it is such a valuable example to set. These situations don’t hurt any less but knowing that we can feed it with our reactions and inwardly destructive behaviour is actually incredibly freeing. We can revisit those teenage choices and bring understanding to why we did what we did, knowing we could have chosen and now can choose differently when similar situations arise.
That is such a different way Lucy, so refreshingly different to the usual techniques of blaming others or blaming ourselves. Every moment is an opportunity to understand ourselves more deeply, and to appreciate the power of choices.
Life becomes our teacher, not punishing task master.
And taking responsibilities for our choices is very different to blaming ourselves and beating ourselves up for making seemingly poor choices. Taking responsibility means that we do see our part in a situation, and we learn from it and don’t make the same choices over and over.
Well said Sandra
And the next step is learning how to live our responsibility consistently so that others can be inspired to do same.
‘Life becomes our teacher, not punishing task master.’ What a different way of living this brings, life becomes one big learning and stops to be a struggle of getting it right.
I agree, Esther, if we take the learning part lightly life is getting enjoyable.
How important is it that we establish a true relationship with life, free of right and wrong. This relationship is what founds the forever student.
‘Right’ and ‘wrong’ are merely self-created polarities that exist to prevent us living what is true. Lost in the endless oscillation of getting it ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ we can delay even further taking the path back home to our true origins. Indeed, these seeming polarities are the ‘red herring’ sent to lead us astray. The extent to which we engage with this, if at all, is forever our own choice to make. A true student follows what is true as marked by the love in their heart and cannot be enticed by seeming opposites that are really one and the same thing.
It’s that struggle of getting it right that is debilitating and exhausting. When we let go of control, trying to perfect ourselves or others, or even a situation, and allow it all to unfold, life becomes a lot easier and less stressful.
Rachel, I love the last sentence that you wrote about life becoming our teacher and not a punishing taskmaster. Turning the whole of our life into a blessing. A refreshing turn around certainly from what I once thought life was all about.
Yes so true, and to fully embody that is so important, it supports us to get out of the victim role and stepping into responsibility with the understanding, that on some level we choose everything and universally we get shown when that choice is off or on 🙂
I love this Rachel, ‘Every moment is an opportunity to understand ourselves more deeply, and to appreciate the power of choices.’ So true, bringing understanding to everything is transformational and so healing.
Its often not the initial hurt but al the things we do to ourselves after this that often hurt us more.
Beautifull Kristy. So as soon as we are hurt, rejected, jealous, compare … Boom we have a choice and this is the part that is crucial. Not only for ourselves but in supporting others as well.
Yes, Kristy this is beautifully revealed, the stories and complications we create afterwards are more devastating than the initial hurt we are feeling. Staying steady with ourself and not bouncing from reaction to reaction save us a lot of time and tensed relationships.
Well said Kristy, the track we lead ourselves down as we react to our initial hurt takes us way off our path and distracts us, keeping us from understanding what the initial hurt was and how to heal it.
Leaving how we feel in the mercy of what is outside of us is a choice to not remain in our own power, that is not a movement that confirms that we are naturally by birth awesome, and thus empowering ourselves by taking responsibility and appreciating the power we have in responsibility is the game changer to a lack of self-worth.
Yes I remember someone saying to me once, it is not the chocolate cake that does the most damage, it is the hard time we give ourselves about eating the chocolate cake that does the more damage.
Right and wrong is a prison limiting our movement lineally when life is spherically expanisve.
Hurts perpetuate hurts. The choice to stop brings about healing.
I also appreciate when you share… “What I learned also is the responsibility of expression, from acknowledging what has been felt to be true within the body, and taking the further responsibility of expressing this truth outwardly, not in reaction, but with the love that has been built in the body from caring and nurturing myself.” Learning to not hold back what we have to say is vital and learning to do it from a caring and self-nurturing body…well that makes what is being said so much easier to hear.
What a beautiful blog that really honours the growth you have made in your relationship with yourself. It is in appreciating that relationship you have now developed that you can, with complete equality, appreciate the role Serge Benhayon has played in bringing these simple truths to you. You have clearly chosen to live them for yourself and found how precious home is.
“I am so honoured and humbled to express the greatest gift (love), through my greatest friend (the body) in the world.” Once we honour, respect and appreciate our body and trust and respond to its wisdom, life is so full and enhancing.
Thank you Adele, so often we reject the world for not confirming or living up to the picture of what we want it to be. What you have shared is that in fact we reject ourselves first and then world next. What if we let the world in instead of rejecting it? Thank you for expressing your preciousness, delicateness and vulnerability and showing how this is our natural way to be in the world.
There is a second element that I particularly enjoyed, which was the statement at the end of the blog, where rather than judging your success based on an outward measure of weight or what is normal, you assessment is based on how you feel inside… the fullness, the love, and the vitality.
Absolutely, a lovely observation. To appreciate how we feel concerning something that we undertake rather than what we do, is honouring of ourselves and liberating.
Yes, how we feel within is a wonderful place to live from.
What I take away from this blog Adele, is that your body quite clearly felt everything in being sent away, in being lonely and feeling rejected. Yet when we do not express what we are feeling, this then turns in on itself and we start to damage ourselves.
I enjoyed reading your sharing Adele and can really relate to having expression suppressed and the consequences of such. I have read a number of your blogs and you display the power of true expression
The consequences of having our expression suppressed can play out in numerous ways, yet all deeply harming, especially when considering the healing power of true expression, as Adele clearly shows through her amazing and inspiring blogs that remind us of that.
Thank you Adele for sharing the damaging effects of choosing not to express because you felt powerless in the situation you found yourself in. I love how you claim your body as your greatest friend and ‘what I feel in my body now is the steady warmth of preciousness, power in delicateness, consistency of joy and the solidness of self-worth I have never felt before’. This is so inspiring for all who have ever chosen control over love.
Adele,
This writing is deeply confirming for me of what I have come to realise behind my own patterns of disordered eating – that of control and an escape to not feel or commit to what I feel and would like to express out of fear of not being liked (or rejection). You have taken the beautiful step of responsibility to acknowledge that you were in deed rejecting yourself and that coming back to you and your body as a dear best friend is a true path forward. This is deeply inspiring and brings awareness for myself to honour my body more deeply, and that we are able to choose to express what we feel, thank you.
How many of us have come from the old belief’s that children should be seen and not heard. We are forced as an only avenue to voice how we feel, using an old analogy of drinking poison and waiting for them to die. Punishing our self in a cry to be heard. We can be treated like bonsai trees, but if we take the bonsai tree and plant it in the ground it becomes what it has always meant to be.
And what an opportunity to appreciate Steve to be born in a situation where the consequences of choosing to express and not express have been experienced intently in the body, and to break down the images that have governed expression for so many.
Another great example of how we use our bodies to punish others but ultimately we end up punishing ourselves – I am sure this story will resonate with many and not only those who have eating disorders. I personally can relate to choosing to close down and withdraw when I was in a military school in West Germany at around the age of 12, and it took a long time to come out of that choice. It just goes to show how devastating it can be to hold onto what we have to say, and then make choices from there.
In hiding from what we know is true, we choose to be trapped in and perpetuate what we do not want to see.
A great story of stepping out of anorexia and stepping into loving ones body and expressing that love out for the whole world to feel. A powerful example that we are not the choices we make and so no-one has to be cursed by eating disorders but that we all need to feel love for ourselves and live from those feelings. In that regard it is clear that Universal Medicine is a great support to have allowed you to get to this point Adele. Wonderful to read what you now claim for yourself. in terms of the life you lead and the support and inspiration you can offer others who suffer anorexia.
Adele, thank you for your openness and honesty about your experiences as a child and adult, what a turnaround from having ‘constant debilitating and depressive thoughts’ to feeling ‘ the steady warmth of preciousness, power in delicateness, consistency of joy and the solidness of self-worth’, amazing, this shows how very powerful the presentations of Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine are and also the potential that we all have, no matter how lost we become we can always return to love, and to living joyfully.
I love how you share that your greatest friend is your body. Our friend that is with us 24/7, never leaves us and carries all the wisdom of the world, and beyond. It should be our best friend, every single day.
I can relate to your boarding school experience Adele only I had a stutter, which made communication often unbearable. To gain acceptance I played sport and was good at it, which helped with the experience of isolation but was still a survival game of gaining acceptance from the outside world.
Adele this in another amazing, honest and inspiring blog from you, I always value reading what you have to say. Lifting the lid on eating disorders shows us that it is not about food at all, it’s about expression and how we feel about ourselves and our level of agency in the world. It is so important that people like yourself can share your experience and show others that there is another way to be.
So true Gill, the increasing number of teenagers who have eating disorders are screaming out to express their rejection of themselves that they cannot find words for. When they have the understanding that they can choose to take responsibility for the love they are seeking that is already within them and no longer seek it from others they will find a way to heal their self-inflicted hurts by living the love and preciousness of who they already are.
The greatest gift we can ever give ourselves is that of Love. It comes in the form of self-care and it germinates something quite magical in the body. We grow with love and evolve into a person that we always knew existed on the inside, but didn’t quite know how to get there.
That is the greatest revelation in life as you have just described Matthew.
Me too Gill – Adeles’ last sentence really is very beautiful to feel: “I am so honoured and humbled to express the greatest gift (love), through my greatest friend (the body) in the world.”
A beautiful and moving blog Adele, and although I was not sent away as a teenager, I was sent away as a very young child (3), living with strangers for a few years until I was collected again by my grandparents. Later as an older child I lived with the constant threat of being sent away if I did not behave in the way which was expected of me, and therefore I also did not build a secure feeling in myself as I had learnt that nothing is secure and everything can change at the drop of a hat. You Adele stopped eating, and I abused my body in different ways. What really moved me and what I feel is such an awesome realisation and statement from you is: “The Greatest Gift and Friend in the World – is my Body”. That is something I can confirm too – thanks to a lot of inner work over the past 30 years as well as the presentations and teachings by Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine.
So lovely what your share here, thank you. I spent a long time sabotaging my body, but I am coming to appreciate how precious and amazing it is to be aware and caring of myself and my body. When I do so I have this foundation and power that is deeply supportive. Self -care and self nurturing are wonderful to explore and they have given me my life back, I much more present and living life more fully.
This is a brilliant blog Adele. It shows that in the end whatever age we are and whatever our situation is we always have the choice to express or not. That said the world can be really hard and though and without learning from young that we matter and are a very important part in the whole it can be very overwhelming. It is great that you show that you can come back to that whatever happened in the past and that we do not have to hold onto these hurts for the rest of our lives and can choose to make different choices. The love of ourselves is always there and can always be chosen. Truly inspirational.
I know that too Adele, that my body is my greatest friend and is constantly showing me that love is the way for me to be lived in all what I do. As with you that inner connection with my body has not always been with me, but it was through Serge Benhayon who reminded me off this fact and I still glorify the fact that I have found this man on my journey back to my soul as life makes so much more sense to me than how I used to live it before.
I agree Adele the wisdom of the body deserves to be our greatest friend in the world. There is no other person that can be as constantly and continuously truthful with us as our bodies can be when we care to listen.
Adele, thank you for sharing your personal insights from living with anorexia. This blog is inspiring and offers an awareness of the energetic causes of illness and disease which could support many people controlling their lives through anorexia..
Imagine if the world does come to you even when you withhold for a long time. Why would you feel any need to stop withholding?
Truly expressing and communicating to another comes from a deep trust first felt and built in ourselves with the loving choices we make for our bodies.
Such honest and humbling writing and expressing Adele, of you sharing with the whole world how you came back to be reunited with yourself, your body and your soul. Beautiful.
As I read your wonderful blog Adele so much resonated with me but these words spoke louder than all the others and I feel to repeat them. “If the outside world did not confirm me, it was as though I didn’t exist…. mostly, it didn’t. And when I didn’t get a confirmation from the world that matched the knowing within myself, I rejected life, and lived by constantly protecting myself from feeling hurt that no one saw me for who I truly am.” I remember the aching feeling that no one could see me, but then perhaps that wasn’t surprising as I had allowed the true me to be buried deep down under layer upon layer of ideals and beliefs all taken on from those around me. To have now emerged from under those layers as the wonderful woman I am has been like finally returning home
I can so relate to all you have said Ingrid and Adele, and as I was pondering your words I was realising that one of the greatest tools we have is to be willing to feel the rawness of life and of what we are feeling, acknowledge it and know that it is not who we are. Once we have remembered this, instead of disappearing when we are not confirmed, each one of us can bring the Light of the Soul on earth and know that this is our purpose.
Deeply appreciate you sharing so intimately with us Adele. What came up for me when I read “but did not feel I had any say in the matter” was the strong memory of having this feeling as a child. I also remember hearing my sons saying how they hated their time at the (‘lovely little’) local primary school which really shocked me at the time so when I asked them why they didn’t say anything at the time, they replied – they didn’t feel they had a choice. That really shook up a few of my ideals and beliefs on being a good and switched on parent!
I too Adele, wish to deeply acknowledge and appreciate the teachings of Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine for connecting me back to my inner knowing and who I truly am.
Loved what you’ve shared Adele with this line in particular warming my heart ‘I am so honoured and humbled to express the greatest gift (love), through my greatest friend (the body) in the world.’ -what a beautiful relationship to now have with your body, one of love, commitment and friendship.
Thank you for this sharing Adele. Wow it is amazing to read this and really feel the transformation you have gone through, to a woman who now truly takes responsibility for her choices and loves who she is and does not hide. I too had a very negative relationship with food, and I used to think that if I could control food I could control life. It was a downward spiral where I too ended up loathing who I was and trying to blame food for this. But to truly start to appreciate yourself, start with letting go of playing the victim.
“I chose to withhold my communication; I chose to accept that children had no say in expressing how they felt to their parents in the culture that I grew up in, . . .” Adele, this is huge, for it is easy to believe what a culture dictates to us, but once we see that it is we who made the choice we are then free to make a different choice. And from reading your blog it’s obvious that you have now chosen to allow yourself to express and by doing that you will support many others to deal with similar issues in their life.
Beautiful Adele, your story clearly demonstrates how important it is for us to know ourselves as the precious beings we are. It also highlights the futility of looking for love and acceptance outside of ourselves.
Yes and the more we connect to this preciousness the more we build a foundation that to says no to abuse.
Awesome sharing Adele – and very inspiring for others to read and freeing for your body to share.
When we honour our body as being a constant companion we can see this as a way to build support, appreciation and honour as we would any other person. Thank you Adele for sharing your experiences with such honesty.. Truly inspiring.
This is a beautiful sharing Adele with such honesty and realness and brings an understanding to anorexia and other eating disorders which are mere reflections of our own lack of self worth from life and all that so called happens to us from the outside world. The love consistency and true beauty you are shines out in your words of expression and is an inspiration to read and feel so tenderly.
This honest and open sharing from Adele would be such a wonderful support for all young women in the world; a sharing that offers them the opportunity to begin to truly know themselves instead of looking for who they think they should be in magazines and other media that only serve to portray a version of young women that is so far from the truth, leading these beautiful beings away from who they naturally are.
“whenever I felt something was wrong in the world and it felt too overwhelming to express, I would reject the world by first rejecting myself” I was struck by this sentence Adele. I recall as a teenager doing a similar thing. What i know now was that I was in reaction of everything that I was seeing and feeling. What I was seeing and feeling and hearing just didn’t fit or match up. From there I based my life on this reaction and made some life decision from their. The understanding that I now have of life through attending courses and workshops held by Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine has changed this completely for me and I have no doubt that if I were a teenager travelling through life knowing this, I would be much more aware and supported through life and would be less likely to react as I did.
“I am choosing to let down the protection of perfection and/or rejection”. Adele, this is a huge step for by knowing that it is us who are are making the choices we then can take responsibility for what we do and not be a victim of circumstances. The ideal of perfection goes hand in hand with rejection for it sets us up to feel not good enough, and so we struggle to constantly prove ourselves in one way or another, but then undermine ourselves by believing we are rejected and then punishing ourselves in whatever way we choose – e.g. anorexia in your case.
Adele what an amazing turn around in your life, from how you felt about yourself with anorexia as a teenager, to now a beautiful, vibrant and gorgeous women – who honestly sees that within herself and doesn’t seek that recognition for others. You are a true role model for not only young women who struggle with their self-worth and who may have anorexia, but also all women who do not yet see that they too are equally exquisite.
“Express the greatest gift (love), through my greatest friend (the body) “ – this is so beautifully-put, and I can feel how much you are appreciating your renewed commitment to yourself.
It is beautifully put Fumiyo. Love is our greatest gift on earth and our body is our way back to the fullness of it.
Adele, there is so much to discover in your blog, that is very powerful and honest. How when the world rejects the essence of who we are, we turn this around and reject ourselves in ways that are controlling and harming. I also gave up eating at a point in my life when I gave up on life and the people in it. It took a long time to realise that this was control and sel-abuse. Deepening and appreciating the relationship with the body and feeling how truly precious I am goes hand in hand with expressing honestly what I am feeling. Thank you for sharing your inspiring journey.
I know that feeling of desolation where everything around me felt like it was there to crush me, and like you I suffered and rebelled. I did not change the way I ate, but I did definitely made a pact to withdraw from the world. And I now realise not expressing myself and not committing to life was just as abusive as not allowing myself to eat well, as I was starving myself of vital nourishment.
Good point – you might not have been starving yourself of nourishment as in food but by withdrawing and licking your wounds you starved yourself of being a part of life and others of what you and only you can bring to us all.
Yes great point Gabriele and Fumiyo. It can feel like we are punishing the world when we retreat from life but we are starving ourselves in the same way. Expression of ourselves is one vitally important ingredient in having a vibrant and healthy life.
That’s right Lieke – when we punish ourselves we punish the world and when we punish the world we punish ourselves. All around, everyone gets punished and that is no fun at all for anyone. Thank heavens that we have finally learnt that ‘Everything is Energy’.
This is such a gorgeous blog. Thank you so much for sharing Adele. What a huge transformation you have made. It is amazing how we think we can punish the world by punishing ourselves. I can relate to rejecting myself, so I get in before anyone else can reject me. This is a losing game as I don’t get to feel my loveliness and no one else gets the chance either.
So true Fiona. I love how you share that we and others then miss out on our loveliness.
I was just speaking with a friend today about the joy we have in walking backwards – it supports me to be more with my body, feels so playful and opens me to see different views and perspectives (so many times I have turned and there is a butterfly, bird or scenery I had not noticed before). I have noted however that when I am walking in our local street I am hesitant to turn and take some backward steps, even though I feel strongly to do so and my body loves it. And I am much more comfortable with turning to see nature than I am to potentially face another human being! I know I hesitate because I worry what other people may think. And so it can be as simple as this that I reject myself.
My friend shared that what if I didn’t hold back in this situation – for what does it truly matter what another thinks and the possibility that maybe in this choice I may inspire others to free up in the way they walk and be in the world. And gosh I may actually share me with another human being 🙂
When this was presented to me I felt a deep sense of responsibility to express me without reservation. I know I have experienced this with my young nephew – he playfully turns and walks backwards, sideways, whichever way he feels and does so joyfully without any inhibition and with a beautiful openness to connect with anyone around him. This inspires me in a way I know I too am able to be.
It is as though we think the pain will be less if we reject ourselves before giving another a chance to. Yet if we get “rejected” but another when we are full of ourselves, we realise it is not us that i being rejected at all.
Absolutely Fiona, and denying the world your loveliness is a deep disservice, equal to not feeling it yourself. Thank goodness for Serge Benhayon reminding Adele how precious she is and from that now chooses to share that gorgeousness with us all.
Adele thank you for writing about anorexia, it gave me a better understanding of an illness that can affect many peoples lives. To not express what you felt and feel you did not have a say in the matter is a dilemma many young children face, and I can see each has their own way of trying to deal with this in different ways, food, cutting on the body rebelling or as in my case choosing one day to no longer express, choosing to hold back my expression keeping my feelings to myself…..in every part of my life including being a woman.
Brilliant blog Adele!
‘But I did choose, and I chose to withhold my communication; I chose to accept that children had no say in expressing how they felt to their parents in the culture that I grew up in, and when I did not take the responsibility to express myself, I also chose to punish myself as a consequence.’ This is such a vital piece of information to nominate Adele. We so often meet loveless behaviour towards us with an equally loveless reaction. And then we punish ourselves before anyone else can get to us and punish us! The reasoning behind this is that of a madman. Yet we all know it so well. At last now the madness of our thinking, our way of thinking without love and truth, is being revealed left right and centre, and this blog is a wonderful and precious contribution towards bringing us all back to Soul and Soul-full thinking.
Well said Lyndy – we can easily fall into the trap of blaming others for the things which happen in our lives accepting the effect of our own choices is super powerful.
Very powerful indeed Michael. So powerful that miracles can occur, and the upside-down and back-to-front world can come into balance again, and our understanding of life expand exponentially. The power of acceptance!
Absolutely Lyndy. The power of knowing who we are is no match for any impositions, ideals or beliefs that stem from a world of loveless existence.
” for most of my life I have lived life honouring a deep inner knowing” yes Adele it makes me smile when I honour the relationship I have with my body that communicates so clearly, The support I feel from my body is tangible, although not always honoured, if I look back on all the pivotal moments I can remember the decisions I made to resist or I would naturally align and follow my inner knowing. Although now I realise some of those moments were also there to tempt and trick me and have me go down a path that bought identity and isolation, rather than choosing to be engaged in life fully. But this is my lesson I have chosen in this life so there is no wrong, just a choice to undertake a learning. I am forever loving my relationship with my body and Soul and to Serge Benhayon for teaching me the key to a deeper responsibility and understanding so I can bring this livingness to all.
Thanks for lifting the lid on your own very personal experience of anorexia and what lies beneath. It’s a hugely complex area to treat, so your clarity and depth of wisdom on the matter is a true eye-opener. But what shines through is the way you’ve exited from its offering of a form of debilitating control through rebellion and instead have opted for loving the preciousness you are by developing a deeper connection with your body through expression.
A glorious sharing Adele. Thank you for opening up your story to the world and being an inspiration. My heart warmed as I read these words of yours ‘steady warmth of preciousness, power in delicateness, consistency of joy and the solidness of self-worth’
It is amazing that you can feel and say this now especially considering what you felt in your teen years absolutely – all of your confirming steps need to be appreciated for now you bring such an elegance and grace to humanity through your reflection.
I love how you expressed this Johanna – “…all of your confirming steps need to be appreciated for now you bring such an elegance and grace to humanity through your reflection.” Such a gorgeous expression in appreciation of Adele and her journey.
These words stood out for me too. A stark contrast to your past Adele. It is true success you are living in your life.
I couldn’t agree more Johanna, when I saw Adele walk into the room the other day I was absolutely blessed by her exquisite elegance and grace, to know she has overcome such a debilitating disorder to now reflect such solidness and power in her body is truly extraordinary.
I agree Samantha, in expressing herself so fully Adele is a huge inspiration and gift for all.
The link you make between anorexia and the choice to hold back is profound. The amount of control inherent in this choice is mindblowing. Anorexia is just one of the many ways we can cause harm to ourselves and others when we hold back.
So true, holding back our expression is harming not just to ourselves, but to all others too that are not given the opportunity of reflection. The ripple effect is huge…
Its incredible what harm we can do to ourselves.. and its being played out by all of us in one way or another. Adele lifts the lid on control and anorexia but how many other patterns are playing out in all their different forms? As humanity are we really taking responsibility, are we evolving… or are we just trying to manage a difficult situation?
Beautifully, openly and honestly expressed – definitely worth celebrating your willingness to evolve.
I feel that this line sums up so much of what we all feel as we grow up ‘If the outside world did not confirm me, it was as though I didn’t exist…. mostly, it didn’t.’ Growing up with the reflections that do not support us to shine means the choices we make keep us at that level, disturbed by the outside, can often be to dull those feelings, replace them and make us not feel the truth of the world at all.
Exactly, especially when we are so young and look for that confirmation from the world – often in all the wrong places.
The problem with dulling ourselves through our choices to not feel the world is that we also don’t get to feel the enormous beauty we possess which when connected to, as Adele has now found, is as deeply healing as it is gorgeous.
How utterly true Adele! Our body is our greatest friend and ally, showing us the way back home.
And yet so many of us see our bodies as the enemy and loathe them for so many different reasons. There’s no way that our bodies can escort us home if our relationship with them is one of loathing, yes our bodies will and do lead us back to where we began but only as a consequence of being deeply cared for and purified, not purified in a way that most people understand ‘purifying’ the body to mean (detoxing/ cleansing/ purging etc) but ridding it of the energy that is not truthful, namely prana, which needs to be largely eliminated in order to restore our bodies to the energetically pristine condition that they were when we were kids.
Heart-felt thanks Adele for sharing your delicate, and deeply strong story. I can so feel the certainty, power and beauty coming through you words. What an experience to have to leave Hong Kong and your family at 15 and be plunged into the cold of Scotland – a huge change of language, culture and customs, food, climate. All the scenery would have been changed – everything except your essence! It is wonderful that you have used this experience and your reactions to it to re-connect to your essence and be able to share that beauty with us all today.
Lovely expression Lyndy and a beautiful appreciation for Adele and her journey.
That must of been huge, moving to Scotland to attend boarding school when you were 15! When you are that age the pressure to fit in is ENORMOUS!
Yes so true, and the enormity of that we can see all around us when we observe many teenagers making choices just to fit in, choices that are harming and loveless. This blog can go a long way to support people to connect to who they are instead of doing stuff they know inside they don’t really enjoy .
Adele the return you have shared is amazing and I can feel the celebration jumping off the page, your appreciation of life and people is felt. Thank God for Serge Benhayon for being there to light our path of return.
Yes Merrilee to all that. There is no doubt that living in connection to the Love we are and of us all is our true and natural way to return to live together in Brotherhood. I also thank God for Serge Benhayon lighting the way for us all to know that each and every one of us can choose to walk the path of Love as Adele also powerful has.
Thank you for sharing your story Adele, from seeing you now it is so super clear of the amazing choices you now make and the love you live.
I could not accept what was happening around me also, and to gain back some control (or so I thought) I controlled my body with an iron fist. I used bulimia to do this; at the time believing that it was one thing that was just mine and I could do whatever I wanted to my body. Looking back, I was abusing my self no different to the abuse around me that I did not speak about. Love on the other hand knows that indeed this body is mine to express and reflect love through, and is simple when I listen, nurture and support it. This highlights how there is always energy at play, its either love or not, and the end result is from what energy we are aligned to.
You just nailed it Aimee. “Looking back, I was abusing my self no different to the abuse around me that I did not speak about.” With abusing our bodies we think we are in control as we are free to choose this, right? But in the end it is just adding up and joining in with the lovelessness that is there in our current society we are trying to rebel towards.
Such a great revelation!
It is Lieke, and when we choose to continue the abuse of ourself it also confirms to others more of the same.
What if we grew up understanding that life is perfectly constellated, arranged and designed in the most divine way? What if we were taught to appreciate every development and change and know that within is something important we are here to learn? What if we spoke and shared with others from this place? Well then like you Adele, I feel we would all come to see that control is a serious form of abuse, and a great misunderstanding of the true beauty of all that unfolds.
Love this Joseph… quite clearly understanding our situation, the why, the what is the point, and being open to the fact that everything is happening for a reason totally transforms any experience.
So true Simon rather than fighting against what is not working for us in life, through understanding and appreciating ourselves more deeply it is amazing what can be transformed.
Yes Simon I agree and I like to add – it makes live also so much simpler . . .
Beautifully said Joseph, and as we each come to realise abuse in all its forms need not be accepted as our way, the love we are can rightfully guide us to be in our every step.
Absolutely Joseph, control just gets in the way, running interference to the truth we all know within. To surrender to what is already known is paramount and something that I am working with at the moment.
Yes Joseph, living as a student of ourselves opens us up to evolve, develop and grow.
There can be beauty and love even when what is happening looks quite ugly on the surface.
I so agree Christoph. I have felt a deep beauty and expansion that has come as a result of my broken foot. A powerful experience.
What I feel after reading your expression here Adele is the deep understanding that you now have of yourself, which reflects your equally deep relationship with yourself. It is inspirational and I would love to see this blog out there for all to read. I’m off to post it on to social media!
Awesome idea Bernadette, I will do the same, thank you for the impulse.
This is a beautifully insightful article, Adele, showing us many aspects of life that impact on us until we realize that we do have control by taking responsibility for the choices we make and honouring our body which as you say is our ‘greatest gift and friend in the world’. This is the one and only place we can place our trust in to reveal the truth through what we feel is energetically going on in the world and with us. Thank you.
So true Susan. Our connection to our Light, and our bodies is the best guide we have to live in a world that is constantly challenging us to disregard the truth of our brilliant and Divine way.
True Susan; and it makes sense that we sever the connection with our body when we do not want to remain feeling the truth of what is going on around us in the world.
“I am so honoured and humbled to express the greatest gift of all (love), through my greatest friend (the Body) in the world”. And Adele, being a wonderful gift to humanity by shining your light for us all to feel and be inspired by. Thank-you.
Those words are incredibly beautiful.
The union of our light and our physicality, what a truly beautiful learning for us all.
Thank you for sharing Adele, vulnerable and intimate. Isn’t is so beautiful that when we allow ourselves to feel we open up to feeling all people and the love we are naturally from. What a light you shine.
Adele, your honesty and reclaimed truth is very precious to read and I feel it is a gift in itself to share this with the world. As you have healed here so too can others be inspired to truly heal themselves too.
So beautiful Adele, to read how you have come from self rejection of the body, to deeply loving and caring for your body. “I am so honoured and humbled to express the greatest gift (love), through my greatest friend (the body) in the world. “
It has been the same for a lot of us Adele. When the world has been mean to us we sulk in resentment and punish our bodies. It is indeed crazy because it makes a bad situation worse. The only way that works is to love yourself and love your body, take responsibility and value yourself. thank you for sharing how beautiful life can be.
Yes how crazy is it that we tend to punish our body with all kinds of things when we don’t feel the love within that we truly are… One would think we would go deeply into self nurturing to reconnect, yet instead often we do the opposite…
It’s either a vicious cycle or a virtuous one. I once went into the vicious kind when things were not going well and it only confirmed more of the same. Nowadays, thanks to Universal Medicine and Serge Benhayon I have built my selfworth up enough so that when things aren’t going well or I am faced with something challenging, I go into self nurturing to reconnect.
Yes it’s crazy we tend to do everything but that which will support us to attain what we all desire so deeply…. a deep love of ourselves.
I agree Bernard. Instead of feeling our hurts, being honest about them, then taking responsibility for our part of the situation AND committing to make changes to the way we live to develop more understanding and less expectations, we often ‘sulk in resentment and punish our bodies’. This cycle keeps many, many people in constant overwhelm about what they observe in the world, as they have no foundation of observation and understanding – instead they absorb everything that goes on and their bodies become tired, bloated, sick and so forth.
Beautiful point Bernard! “love yourself, love your body, take responsibility and value yourself” there is a lot of power in doing this and it helps others to realise that this is actually OKAY. If there isn’t one person doing it then who will start?
By moving and expressing aligned to love it is love that is expressed through us.
Absolutely Adele, when we move and express from our love, we confirm ourselves as Divine.
Adele whilst I didn’t develop the problem of anorexia there is much in your blog that deeply resonates. Up to this point I have never understood why I am so hard on myself, but with your words, ‘when I did not take the responsibility to express myself, I also chose to punish myself as a consequence.’ an ah ha moment clicked…a light bulb moment of understanding. I realise I have done what I have done because I haven’t expressed myself fully and have held back enormously. Adele thank you for the awareness your sharing has brought, you have done it so openly and honestly. I feel the deep blessing of it.
Yes Rachel, that sentence clicked for me too, – “when I did not take the responsibility to express myself, I also chose to punish myself as a consequence” – thank you for highlighting it again in your expression. I am learning to express more and more and am acutely aware if there are things I have not brought up and spoken about, my body tells me in many varied little ways …
I agree Rachel that there is a deep blessing in Adele’s sharing for all those who have chosen not to take responsibility for expressing themselves with all the consequent harm to our bodies. Holding back has been deeply damaging for me and I feel truly touched by Adele’s willingness to share her experience and bodily wisdom.
Absolutely Rachel, there is no doubt that expression is incredibly important and this is such a great reminder of the harm that can come from holding back, let alone the amazingness we deny the world from experiencing in full when we play small.
Adele, I can relate to your boarding school experience and the feelings you had. I also developed anorexia at boarding school and although i externally recovered quite quickly I felt the threads of self lovelessness for many many years. Like you, I now feel a deeper sense of love and appreciation for my body. Thank you for sharing.
I can imagine that for many boarding school would be as Adele has described. At such a vulnerable age to be left feeling unsupported must be quite a challenge.
You have given such a clear understanding of what is going on in something like anorexia, the same could be said for body dysmorphia where men are constantly thinking that they are not muscular enough. It is a desire to control the one thing that we feel we have control over when everything else seems to have betrayed us: our body. It is so great that you have come to appreciate yourself and see your body for the great friend that it is.
Well expressed Naren, I fully concur. Awesome blog and beautiful appreciation.
True Naren. It is incredible what ideals and images we give ourselves over to; and therefore try to shape and re-shape our bodies. However the image will never support us to en-house our Soul; and so no matter what our body looks like from this image – it is far from supporting us to be in our true power or essence.
Any focus or seeking to fulfil a picture of an outer appearance in disregard to how we are feeling is separation, this disconnection reinforces the momentum of individualism, so no matter how we look on the outside, it would never fulfill the unity that we come from.
One more thing Adele, the way you write your short bio is so gorgeous and a huge inspiration for me as I allow myself to deepen my own relationship with my soul, and the joy that is here now to be lived.
‘I Am allowing my body to again make its own choices, to be okay with making mistakes, as that is how I will learn to take responsibility’. I love this line, turning around mistake making as an opportunity to self judge or berate, which really exposes the perfection we can strive for, but rather a learning opportunity and as you say an opportunity to choose to be more responsible.
I love that line too Anna, it speaks deeply to me and is so very confirming in all we say and do.
It is our responsibility that is everything, and not an unrealistic pursuit of perfection which is only seeking another image, and not responsible at all.
There is room to appreciate in every situation in life, and would it not be wise to especially see the appreciation in areas which judgement feels habitual, and then to appreciate how truly awesome we are in being aware of this and in committing to changing the movements that have imprisoned our lives? That is the learning we are given.
I so agree with you Adele. I knew this to be true for a long time but noticed lately because my body constantly felt quite tense, that I was not living this appreciation, especially not in situations where I would judge myself constantly. Just considering the fact of maybe being to hard on myself made me see so many areas where I would be judging myself for the smallest simplest everyday things that did not quite go as expected. To now learning to in those moments let this judgement go and then feel the loveliness I am and appreciate that is absolutely gorgeous and it feels amazing in my body, much more warmth and space.
There is so much love Lieke in what life reflects back to us, every opportunity that we feel tension in our bodies is an opportunity to re-imprint it with love, until it simply becomes once again our most naturally expressed movement and momentum.
Hi Adele, I loved this blog and it was just what was needed for me this morning, that gentle reminder that my body and soul are my own best friends when I treat them so. I particularly loved how you expressed ‘I began to understand how truly precious I am, and that I do matter’. I too have been reminded of this by Serge Benhayon, and although I still sometimes need that reminder to myself whenever things seem tough, or old negative thought patterns arise, it is in truth less and less, as I allow myself to accept this truth more all of the time.
Your sharing is so valuable to read Adele. The humbleness of your writing touches a very delicate string (feeling) within my body. Our life can be so fixed on what we need to do, how we need to become and always looking abroad and outside. It is beautiful, that by your sharing, it actually emphasizes on the importance of who we are from the inside, and the value we have deep down inside that we need to confirm. As no other recognition and approval would settle the story, as what comes from within always needs to be recognized. By ourselves for ever.
Truly beautiful story Adele, it is incredible what a strain we can put on our bodies, punishing ourself for what we do or don’t do..
Adele it is lovely that you share so openly about your anorexia and it is so worth celebrating that sure, maybe in the past you chose not to express but today you are expressing how you feel and through that you are also inspiring others to do the same.
I agree. Her openness is beautiful. Her story made me realise that girls with anorexia needed to feel self worth and their inner beauty in order to truly heal and then be able to accept supportive eating habits back into their life. It makes sense why so many relapse if they are just forcing food into a body that feels so not worthy to be here.
Adele it is amazing to read about the issues of control that were behind the anorexia, this is a powerful insight into a condition that impacting so many people.
A huge insight but also one that gave me understanding. Adele’s experience and isolation would have felt full on and I can see how some use the controlling of food intake as a behaviour when they feel completely like they have no control of their life. This brings in the importance of us as adults to support children to feel open to express and to reiterate to them to never give up in themselves.
Johanna08.smith, it is super important for parents or teachers to support children to feel the trust to their own love and feel safe to express again. That is great responsibility a child can learn, and an even greater responsibility a parent or teacher has to first live.
It is wonderful to read that anorexia is nothing to do with food or weight. It is a reaction to the world and an inability/unwillingness to express how you feel. It is one of the many ways we have to deal with the negation of our true selves and worth that we can experience as kids.
For me, personally, I choose to believe I wasn’t enough when I too felt misunderstood and unloved. I used food to support this belief, by eating to comfort and to numb myself. When all is considered, l have use food for many things. Yet what I am coming to know is that food is a support for our bodies. How and what I eat can either support me to feel clear and open my understanding of what I am feeling, or not.
This rang an old bell Leigh! I can relate totally to what you say here about being misunderstood and using food to support this belief. No wonder I felt so discombobulated and alien in my body. Numbing out this way actually kept feeding the negative thoughts about myself – a totally vicious cycle to bind myself into further self doubt and lack of self worth! Yikes! what a tangled web we weave when we don’t choose to remember we are always love in our essence.
“I choose to believe I wasn’t enough when I too felt misunderstood and unloved. I used food to support this belief, by eating to comfort and to numb myself..”
Yes I am learning this too Leigh. I use the words ‘eat to nourish’ as a little reminder to keep me in check with my food choices and amounts.
I love that and will use that too – thank you Johanna 🙂
Thank you for that great little reminder Johanna ‘eat to nourish’ which, of course, makes perfect sense!
Yes Johanna, “eat to nourish” is a way of being with food that so needs to be understood and embraced our world over.
A great reminder Johanna – thank you – I feel inspired to have this as a beautifully decorated picture on my kitchen wall ‘eat to nourish’ for all to enjoy.
Yes Leigh that was my way entirely – sweet food, ‘heavy’, and later alcohol were my ways. And even when I chose ‘good’ food, I would go for the seconding helping or the dessert afterwards making sure my body always felt heavy. Now I know the difference and I have a choice to support my body that what in turn support all of me or indulge in the numbing behaviour.
Agree Leigh, same for me, i was always aware of my relationship with food mostly from a weight perspective i.e. not eating too much fatty foods like takeaways etc., and in this how i related to myself in life but more so only on a surface or very superficial level…I certainly never ate to truly respect or nourish the body, but in recent years the shift towards this has been illuminating – to eat with responsibility knowing the effect that it has on oneself and because of this how we will effect or relate to another, is integrity in eating.
Dear Zofia,
I can remember when I ate food, from the consideration of my weight only that self criticism was my constant companion. My thought and then action would be, Just one plate of crisps, they don’t hold too many calories, yet inside I could feel the judgment of self for doing this. Using food that way was very destructive and I found I still put on weight. I am now so much more aware of my body and what foods that it needs for support. And know deeply from past experience that if for whatever reason I don’t follow my body’s impulses these days, that great love and tenderness is required for myself to unravel the energy/thought I let take me away from what I know my body needs.
Leigh, the picture is the same—that we believe we are not worthy of our own love. Whether it was played out with not eating and do not deserve to take up space or over eating and dimming our light, it still originated from the same picture.
We live to a picture of what we think we ‘should look like’ in order to bring us happiness. However, living to that picture is no longer living us, and so of course we end up feeling completely empty, regardless of whether we come close to the picture or not. The behaviours and thoughts we use to attain that image is so far from natural to us that we end up living as if we are another person entirely.
Holding onto any picture is already a choice in emptiness, as when we move with ourselves every moment, we are sensing every single moment without the need to hold onto anything.
Well said Kylie. I recon we have all struggled at one time or another accepting the fact that we are each unique and that we discover more and more of the unique way we naturally express our love.
Absolutely Leigh, ‘How and what I eat can either support me to feel clear and open my understanding of what I am feeling, or not’. Food is such an easy method we use to dull ourselves and stop us from feeling what’s going on in the world, and I’ve always found that if I overeat or feel bloated from the way that I’ve eaten it means that my attention can’t go any further than my stomach! Thus I don’t have to observe my surroundings.
I think your experience with boarding school is that of many children, and also the use of anorexia as a form of control. There seems to me in my experience a lack of support for kids as they enter the teenage years, almost like they are seem as old enough to care for themselves, where grades and life choices are more important than love and care. But that you are sharing is that no matter what, every person has a choice to express themselves and seek support and talk about what they are feeling, or not.
beautiful point Rebecca. The is definitely a lack of support for people when they are in their teen years, and it is like the potential to live love and care (in your teen years) is completely wiped.
Rebecca, people of my Generation feel robbed because of exactly what you have shared. Teenagers are craving love, attention and support but even the support that is offered is about giving them solutions, effectively saying ‘harden up’ and not getting to the root of the problem.
I agree Harrison, the things we are coming up with are just band aids over an issue that is far deeper. It can seem like an overwhelming problem that is too big to tackle, but each one of us can make a difference by choosing to be more loving with ourselves. By simply being in the world, we can offer a reflection that shows others there is another way.
And so perpetuates the alienation we can form from ourselves and therefore with everyone.
Great point Giselle. From that alienation or disconnection from ourselves and others we are lost, living a life that is without any true meaning. We often hear this referred to as being ‘asleep’ – living a life without awareness of the bigger picture.
Harrison, as teenagers, or just human beings in general, we are all looking for true connection which is a depth that offering solutions cannot reach. We just want to feel the trust back towards our own love and there is a lot of rebellion when we do not see that reflected. Even when we do see it reflected, we may be owned by certain images and we require a lot of space to come back to feeling the preciousness of ourselves. A steady and constant reflection of truth and of love allowing the space for teenagers to feel is true support. I am learning this every day with a pre-teen child.
When we think of every child in every school and also every boarding school and then all the feelings they must each be feeling then it is quite huge. For me this further highlights the nurturing and support that teachers need to take the responsibility for also sharing with students. Actually it highlights the community responsibility of every adult to support every child in growing up to feel cherished and free to express what they feel.
You nailed it Johanna – “… it highlights the community responsibility of every adult to support every child in growing up to feel cherished and free to express what they feel.” Quite a task at hand yet totally achievable as long as we stay connected to our love within and bring that out in all interactions.
Johanna this is well said. I have seen a pattern of low self-worth in some young people who are put into boarding schools from a primary school age, and given very little family care most of their life. However the academic expectations of the family and the well intentioned investment into their education is crippling for some, especially if what they study is not their preferred choice.
Rebecca, I completely agree. I am involved with my local high school, where there are over 800 kids. We are lucky if 5 people come to the monthly meetings for parents and carers. I have talked with teachers about this and they see an increasing abdication of responsibility and parenting to the teachers. What a lot of pressure to place on the teachers! It feels like we put a lots of ‘effort’ in when our kids are in primary school but then as you say think they are old enough to look after themselves as teenagers. I feel this is a time when they need us to be more steady, clear and supportive as they face the many issues of this period in their lives.
Yes Rebecca, I so agree ‘every person has a choice to express themselves and seek support and talk about what they are feeling, or not.’ whether they are a small child, teenager or adult our expression is everything.
Absolutely Rebecca, expression is everything, this quote by Serge Benhayon sums it all up. Expressing back to the grandness that we are is not only a birthright, but a responsibility.
Adele,
Eating disorders affect so many people, what you share here sheds light on the cause of eating disorders. This is gold and along with the work of Serge Benhayon, that supports is to remember the love we are actually comes from within, platinum. There are many the world over who will benifit from what you have written.
I agree Leigh, there’s a lot out there about anorexia but very little about the true cause. Not wanting to literally figure in this world because of not feeling good enough, self-worth being so low is what causes someone to want to starve themselves to disappear. We need more honest stories such as this one from Adele that people can read and start to connect to WHY would a woman so beautiful and precious do this to herself. Only then will we start to see the numbers of eating disorders drop instead of rise as they are doing today.
Agree Katerina, understanding the root cause leads to true or whole healing, and at the very basis of this is how we hold ourselves in life, with a love, self-worth and value that’s true, or the opposite, for this is the way we hold everything and everyone else too.
Well said Zofia. Talking amongst ourselves about how we hold ourselves in life, with a love, self-worth and value that is true or the opposite, would bring the awareness that is needed to understand and truly heal what’s underneath any illness or disease.
Beautiful story.
Adele, I agree that our greatest friend is our body and realising the fact that I am not always so loving with my body raises the question why would I ever harm to choose such a great, loyal and wise friend?
So well said and asked Jane.
Jane176 such a great point and reminder that our body is our greatest and dearest friend, who when treated with the deepest love and care will guide us to know who we are. But when we are ruled by our thoughts, we will always be lead astray.
I agree Jennifer, by coming back to our bodies and making loving choices in line with what is needed, allows us to return back to who we truly are.
It is great to be reminded that ‘our body is our greatest and dearest friend, who when treated with the deepest love and care will guide us to know who we are.’ I hadn’t considered my body as a friend before, but in reality it is a very loving friend.
It’s a delightful shift in attitude to consider your body your best friend – and it really is! It very patiently and consistently guides me to know truth, to know the fullness of who I am and not be limited by the stories of the mind. I used to completely abuse my body, expecting it to put up with whatever I asked of it. If we did start to appreciate our body as our friend, we would never abuse it. And the way I treat my body now tells me that I am worthy, valuable and precious. This is a win for my body and being.
Yes Jane, the body is with us wherever we go and it is always informing us of what is needed – but do we listen? It’s only once we realise that our body is a vehicle for expression that we understand the responsibility we have as to the kind of expression we allow to come through us. It is our choice whether we choose harm or to be of true service by bringing love, joy and harmony to the world.
Great question as we would never do that to another person that is our loyal and dear dear friend would we? So how come we treat our selves sometimes as our worst ‘enemy’ so to speak??
So what do we do with that question…. therein lies a very simple way forward for anyone in any situation to slowly but surely turn their life around.
Yes indeed. The body just offers us the best conversations…as does a best friend. So honour and respect it, slowly but steadily is the only way to make lasting decisions.
Unfortunately we give away this relationship with our best friend (our body); to have whatever it is we desire – success in one form or another. We hand our bodies over to the consequence of seeking something that can never truly fulfil us – conveniently choosing to forget that our only true contentment and connection comes from being at one with our body.
Hear hear Kylie.
There are many who do not have this relationship with their bodies, some are desperately seeking to find this connection some are running away not wanting this relationship, but the fact is the one truest relationship we already have in life, the foundation of all relationships, that we have with our bodies, is one which most of us do not know. Our relationship with life itself is based on this foundational relationship we have with ourselves. So before we ask why the world is how it is today, have we asked ourselves how is the relationship we have with ourselves?
To think of the body as our greatest friend is a complete sea change. Often we can get frustrated at its’ weakness, poor performance and its restrictions, but in the knowing that our body is that way because of our lived choices changes everything. When the body shows signs of weariness, or lack luster this is its beauty in showing us where more loving choices need to be made.
Great point Rachel. We expect the body to perform, we criticize it when it breaks down, we indulge in a sense of failure and frustration when it is not in its optimal shape, which is living testimony to the quality of thoughts that run through us when we do not take responsibility to honor and appreciate the body as our greatest friend.
Great question jane176, but more alarming is why would we not feel the extent of this abuse to ourselves? What picture have we instead chosen to uphold when we can harm our own bodies in such destructing ways?
It doesn’t make any sense when put so clearly. It’s like we treat our bodies as though they are a possession with which we can do with as we will, and yet we do not own our bodies, we ARE our bodies. When we see or think of them as being a separate part of us – separate from our mind, that’s when we can treat them with such disregard. But when we realise that our body is the greatest form of intelligence we have access to, we start to unite mind with body and become whole again.
Nothing makes true sense when we separate our bodies with our minds, as true intelligence works as one with body and mind.
Jane you ask a great question, it is bonkers that we can treat our bodies so badly almost without care and still expect them to remain the loyal friend. Your comment is a great reminder to appreciate just how loyal they are.
It is astounding how much strain eating disorders place on ones body. Reading this blog I could feel how anorexia is a 24/7 commitment where you were constantly planning how to get away with not eating. Sadly I know this disease is quite common and engulfs much time that could have been spent enjoying ones development into adulthood.
Yes Abby, the planning, dedication and commitment required to maintain an eating disorder is amazing. It is great that it can be talked about openly because it breaks the isolation that many people feel.
Yes it is so good to have a place to share this with others in safety, knowing there is no judgement just a holding and an end to the secrecy of it all.
Yes Bernard this blog is a powerful example of Adele’s honesty. Bringing her back to live who she truly is through this debilitating disorder and showing that there is a choice in all of us to live another way.
You make a great point Abby, the strain eating disorders have on the body is massive, and for myself I feel that some of my digestive issues now are as a result of the punishing way I treated my body when I was younger.
We are always expressing, so to push that down or hold it back (which is impossible by being alive) requires a force so great to control, that we can do the most horrendous things to our selves. Learning to allow and accept mine and others expression, even when it feels awkward or gushes out, is an opportunity to heal.
absolutely Abby! There are many such things which Teens obsess over and which consumes all their time, they miss out on themselves growing up!
Speaking from my own experience Harrison the holding back of expression retards our development on many levels. I played the game of always playing small and hiding in the shadows. The price I paid for this was not having a foundation built on self-worth. It’s only since I have started honouring and nurturing myself and building self-worth that I am able to bring more expression into my work, my day to day interactions and to my family.
I could also feel the constant tension and uptightness of living with this need to control over food and to get away with the pretense of eating to appease others. It is like the body has to be on constant alert and vigilance, which in the end has to be draining and affect ones heath. It is gorgeous how Adele has shared that this doesn’t need to be a permanent state of being. To let go of all that was driving this behaviour is to allow all the loveliness we naturally are to be felt and expressed.
Yes my experience of over-eating is the same- you are always in each moment considering where you can get your next ‘fill’. Its similar to a drug or internet addiction- the constant drive to not feel and to numb yourself.
I imagine we are going to see more and more extreme behaviours and psychological disorders in the future based not the current way of life we have come to accept.
Not only planning your next meal before you’ve finished this one but also finding secret ways to eat more without being seen, because of the ‘shame’ of knowing what we were doing and the potential criticism from others. Food has definitely been my ‘friend’ as every mouthful helped to numb what I was feeling but in truth, it never worked, I was constantly miserable and ’empty’ to the extent that I never ever experienced true hunger, just thought that was what I was feeling.
Abby, the time and effort spent on running away from evolution is absolutely draining and exhausting, that is the real detriment to ourselves and everyone in the world when we abuse our bodies in any way.
Having experienced this myself, I know first hand what it is like to be owned by this disease – for every aspect of your movements, thoughts and life to revolve around becoming thinner. It is a prison sentence in which the only way out is to return to the body.
This is another important blog to be shared Kylie
What an amazing insight Kylie and it just goes to show that the body truly is our best friend.
‘If the outside world did not confirm me, it was as though I didn’t exist…. mostly, it didn’t.’ Wow Adele, I certainly relate to this sentence. I too spent much of my life allowing the outside to dictate my worth – I felt like I was never on solid ground, but up in the air and constantly being billowed about by others opinion of me based on how I looked or what I had achieved. It was exhausting and anxiety ridden. Meeting Serge Benhayon has been my turning point too, a turning point towards feeling strong in my body, feet firmly on the ground. I am buiding a steadiness that does not look to the outside for worth as I am forever deepening connection to the love that I am.
Yes, this sentence resonated deeply with me too Jane. For a vast part of my life, being confirmed from the outside was the only thing that made me feel any sense of being in the world, although there was always a feeling of emptiness, disconnection from people and something missing.
Since attending Serge Benhayon’s presentations I have been inspired to re-build an inner foundation of love and deal with the self punishment by knowing there is always another choice and another way to live
It is so true jane176 that we allow the outside world to tell us who we are and decide if we are worthy or not. This has such devastating effects on all of us well into adulthood. Learning to trust my body and treat it with respect has been an amazing journey that is ongoing, and I can now understand why Adele calls her body her best friend. When your self worth comes from within, you discover there is very little that can rock you, and the steadiness you talk of is something I can relate to.
It’s crazy how we let the outside world ‘tell us who we are’, when who better knows us than ourselves?! It makes little sense to trust the opinions and beliefs of others when we are the ones living in our bodies day in and day out.
It is crazy indeed Suzy, but the sad reality for most at present. I am so grateful to have been able to attend Serge Benhayon’s workshops and courses and so put a stop to this old entrapping way. I now have an ever deepening foundation of love and value deep within.
The lengths we go through in struggle and abuse to our bodies just to prove that we exist as individuals, is absolutely anti-evolutionary. When we begin to nuruture our bodies again, slowly and steadily we are making the choice to no longer delay evolution.
Well said Adele.
I feel there is much truth in this Adele.
I can relate to what you have said here jane176, especially the part ‘being billowed about by others opinion of me based on how I looked or what I had achieved’ – I can now see that everyones opinion mattered more to me than my own, and this is something I am working with. In fact speaking up and writing on blog sites like this has helped enormously.
The fact that your body has not changed it’s shape, but the way you are with it has, shows that we can never judge another or know what another person is going through if we rely solely on what we see. Feeling the quality of and in everything is how we really know what is going on.
What a great point Simone. It is all about the quality – and our inner knowing will always let us know that quality, if we so choose to listen.
Yes, our eyes can be fooled comprehensively. What we feel is much harder to fool.
So true Christoph – we can so often only see what we want to see.
Our eyes can be fooled but our feelings can’t. Thank you Christoph, pretty much breaks apart the saying “to see is to believe” we could now say “to feel is to know”
Oh I love this – it so hits the spot – “to feel is to know”! Excellent way of expressing this truth, provided we discern true feeling from just an emotion…
True Simone, when we are quick to assume or judge a situation without feeling what is beneath first impressions, we miss out on truly connecting with the truth available to us.
Judgement is a result of the way we move. When we move with the quality and depth of ourselves, judgements simply do not exist.
Very true Simone, images affect what we perceive. The way we move with our bodies determine what images come through and we then create what image we reflect back to the world, one which is of truth and love, or not.
How important then is the way we choose to hold, carry and move our bodies.
Very important Kylie and equally responsible. We can not blame anyone else for the state of our lives if we are unprepared first to take these simple steps.
Very important indeed, to really practise this awareness how we hold and move our body so that we can truly read underneath what is presented on the surface.
Great point Simone, children are masters of this, I work as a swim teacher and every day is a confirmation of a child’s ability to develop trust through the quality of what they feel.
Wow Lucinda, a child’s ability to build trust is based on their ability to feel. How important then is it for us to honour what a child feels and hence super important we honour our own feelings, otherwise we will be unable to honour theirs.
Super important indeed, to honour what a child feels so the trust in their feeling and knowing can develop and strengthen/ How often do children get put down with expressions of what they feel and what will that teach them… no trust in them selves and their knowing and therefore no trust in others either…
Good point Simone, humanity has placed so much on only what we see, and we only see what we choose to see, through pictures and images we can easily deceive ourselves and be deceived. Only through connecting to our bodies and feeling can we know the truth of all things.
Great point Simone. It is when we rely on our eyes, void of our deeper sense that we judge and separate life, rather than reading and understanding it in its entirety.
Very true Simone, another confirmation that we need to let go of any picture or ideal we hold when observing the world and people.
Adele, thank you for writing this. I felt like you could have been writing my story. Although I didn’t stop eating, the energy I have been in at certain times in my life has been the same: when things have got too overwhelming to feel or express, I’ve shut myself down and withdrawn from the world, rejecting myself and everyone around me. It’s a form of protection against being hurt and not being met or confirmed by the rest of the world. But it never worked. All it did was make me feel more isolated and alone. I too have felt that true, lasting change in how I am with myself, having a foundation of solid self worth, can only be built through making choices to deeply care and nurture my body. When I first came across universal medicine I rejected it because from where I was at the time, self nurturing sounded so self indulgent. But what I’ve learned, felt in my body, and become more aware of since then is that really looking after ourselves- committing as much as possible to being aware of how our choices affect our bodies- is a responsibility that actually connects us to others. When I’m more committed to me, I’m more committed to life, work, other people. And expressing from that place of solidness feels so amazing, that it matters less how others react or respond: the need for them to validate me and my choices has slowly faded into the background, because I validate and accept myself.
It is beautiful to read the awakening of your true worth Bryony – very powerful and lasting is the realisation that my relationship with me comes first and my commitment to myself is the relationship that will be reflected in all others and as you say, in everything we do. Thank you.
Committing to ourselves is the base of how much we can commit to others and that is a lot indeed.
So true Christoph – when we have actually made that decision to commit to ourselves we are given so many opportunities to follow through and the body talks so much to help us; all this in turn then supports us in supporting others too and everyone wins, just awesome.
‘the need for them to validate me and my choices has slowly faded into the background, because I validate and accept myself.’ Wonderful Bryony. I too never believed I could attain a worth and value of myself as I do now. To spend a lifetime seeking recognition to now live today walking my own truth and essence, with little need of other’s acceptance, is to be deeply appreciated and celebrated. It feels like a miracle.
I love the way you connect self nurturing with meeting others, committing to life and being much less dependent on what others think about you – a great recipe for a far more joyful and fulfilling life.
And how awesome is it that that recipe is being shared for all to read and have a go too 🙂
Reading this I can feel an appreciation of how I have changed over the last couple of years. Holding myself in protection used to be the only way I perceived I could get through life, now it just feels uncomfortable and lonely and I feel a sense that this is having a wider impact on the world around me. Having this awareness has come from a love within me, that knows and keeps reminding me that separation is not worth it and that connection to my body and to others is what truly heals any hurt I have experienced. Thank you Bryony.
“really looking after ourselves- committing as much as possible to being aware of how our choices affect our bodies- is a responsibility that actually connects us to others.” The concept of self love being selfish is a mighty beast Bryony but to come out the other side and see that it actually builds greater self appreciation and hence appreciation for all is an absolute game changer. Interesting that Jesus said “love thy neighbour as thy self” yet the version I remember is “love thy neighbour” could this be a deliberate detour from self responsibility?
I never knew that Jesus has said that Lucinda, without self love and dedication to caring deeply for our bodies, taking full responsibility for our choices in life, it’s not possible to truly love and care for others. If our body is not a vehicle of expression of love in all that we do, then where is the love supposed to come from, it’s not something that can just be switched on.
Thank you Bryony for sharing your experience, I have felt the more I appreciate deeply and accept who I am, I gradually become more who I really am, and not all the roles I was playing to seek love, approval and recognition from others, it feels for the first time in my life I am getting to know the real me, without all the protections and false masks I have worn.
Nothing and no one can confirm us like the love we know and feel in our bodies.
There is nothing on the outer that is greater than what is held in the inner.
Both gems Adele and Kyle and both worth repeating. “Nothing and no one can confirm us like the love we know and feel in our bodies.” and “There is nothing on the outer that is greater than what is held in the inner.” Talk about cease the external search for love and surrender to the knowing that it was within the whole time. These comments are game changes, if truly understood.
So agree Laura, Adele and Kylie – just two very powerful statements that we all can reflect on and start to embrace.
Beautifully expressed Adele. Thank you so much for your continued commitment and responsibility to share all that you feel and see. The honesty and openness in your blogs is so powerful.
So true Adele
I loved reading your comment Bryony. So beautiful to feel your honesty and self-appreciation.
It is beautiful how by committing and connecting to ourselves first we open doors to connections with others.
It is so clear that it has to start with our selves first before anything can start in truth with others. So this commitment to self is such a loving thing to get onto as it will then spread to others too and the connections that are then possible are just awesome.
There are lots of gems in what you and Adele have written Bryony. I especially noted where you talked about how our connection to others is strengthened through our commitment to caring for ourselves. It’s a great reminder for me today that my own level of self acceptance and care will be reflected back to me constantly and to welcome it in it’s entirety without withdrawing or holding back.
Bryony how Awesome is this … pretty Awesome. By you feeling, seeing and healing all of this you are saying to another or sending out a ripple to others who are going through a similar thing that is okay, that there is another way and we can change this. Beautifull ?
Yes, so true Vicky, there is much gold here in this sharing and it allows others to go there to feel what is needed to be felt and to heal.
Great Bryony that you now value, accept and validate yourself and as you say from here we do not need people’s approval or recognition, we are free to express.
I love the way you refer to your body as your greatest friend in the world, Adele. in our world, so many see the body as an appendage in servitude and yet it is such an exquisite vehicle and reflects all all of our choices so faithfully, it surely deserves to be widely acclaimed as our greatest friend.
This is something we should teach children as young people. Letting them know that our body is here to support us for do many years and can share great insights with us – we have the responsibility to care for it as best as possible.
So true Johanna, it is a very important teaching and in truth it can only be taught by example. So it is vital for the parents and carers to get these teachings too so that they in turn can support the young people as well as themselves and the older generations too, no one is really exempt…
Now that would be truly amazing and what a huge difference it would make in the world.
To make our body our primary source…the reference point we turn to before any book, or expert!
Before a child sets foot in any library, before they open a book, let them know their body first – the greatest barometer of truth.
Now that would allow children to steer a wondrous, true path in life.
The wisdom the body imparts in all our movements in life opens us to the intelligence that the mind has been seeking for all this time. In this simple, yet truly intelligent way to learn there is no memorising, staying up late to study, just the responsibility to allow our bodies to move in a way for this wisdom to come through every moment, there is no perfection but a forever deepening.
Isn’t this the complete opposite that most of us have come to learn from school. Learning that the quality of movements determines the true intelligence we can access immediately says to all of us ‘you are equal’, and that no one is better or ‘more’ intelligent than the next because they have learnt how to memorise and repeat words. Instead it says to us, if you take responsibility for the quality of your movements you too will be able to access the vast intelligence of our universe. Now that is inspiring.
Then our learning becomes a true asset to humanity – not a shield of superiority, or the source of solutions that never touch the heart of the matter.
We are so smart but so lacking in wisdom.
No training can deliver that lack.
Only the body. Only the lived life.
Yes knowing this changes your world and way of living. When it was first all about achieving and getting high grades, for me it is now about the quality I live every day. If my body does not feel lovely and free there is no true joy to be experienced in studying anyway.
Yes Rachel, the intelligence of the body is a great marker of truth
Rachel this would be true education indeed! What a foundation for life this would set!
Yes Rachel the body is our primary source and reference for what is going on and it makes utter sense to me now that this is the thing we must attend to first – otherwise the quality of all else that follows is shoddy, not healing and so all for nought.
Beautifully expressed Coleen. I have felt so very separated from my body for a very long time which has allowed me to treat it not so well at times. But to now be in relationship with my body as my best friend, is a feeling of deep warmth, tenderness, and coming home. And in this true relationship I am supported to deeply honour and cherish my body, my best friend.
I too am learning what a great reliable friend my body is. I was in something this morning where I thought I was right and avidly wanted to defend something. However, what I noticed was my body was super tense and hard and no matter whether I was right or wrong, it didn’t matter, where I had gone too and the hardening in my body wasn’t worth it. My body showed me that the fight mode was not the way.
Thank you MW this is a great example of our reactions and how they feel in your body, once recognized, harmony can be restored.
With the love built up in the body, any movement that takes us away from this feeling as you have said MW, is simply not worth it. Yet so many of us would override this feeling, or we do not yet have this feeling built up in the body as the marker to come back to, so the simplicity of it all is to start caring and nurturing the body and appreciating how deeply expressive of truth it is every moment, which is absolutely amazing and worthlessness gets thrown out of the window.
I was in something a while back where I believed I was right and had been wronged, and as you say MW it felt terrible in my body. There seemed to be no resolution, talking and bringing understanding had failed, so my options were to stay in this which felt terrible or to let go of being right and let the situation go which is what I chose. My body certainly thanked me for this choice,
True, our body is an amazing vehicle that we can either abuse or cherish and care for and how we care for it then effects what kind of energy that can come through it and that then has an effect on everyone around us.
Beautifully written Rosie, ‘our body is an amazing vehicle that we can either abuse or cherish and care for and how we care for it then effects what kind of energy that can come through it’, I love the simplicity with which you have written this, it shows how important caring for our bodies is.
Seeing the body as a best friend stopped me in my tracks. I started appreciating my body for many years now and stopped seeing it as an annoying appendage that demanded my attention, but I had not made the leap to seeing as my friend … until now. It is an amazing tailor made instrument and yes, it is my friend who is very responsive to the loving attention (or neglect) I give it.
And so does it shows us that it is a matter of choice if we choose to disengage from our bodies or choose to be more aware of it and all it is telling us. With awareness it starts.
Spot on Coleen and Adele. Our body is such a great friend and yet the world around us has been designed to keep us apart from our bodies and a truly loving relationship with it. When asking my body it has never been judgemental, or critical as the mind can be. It is simple and shows us the truth of our choices. How we work together or not is what determines the quality of our health.
Well said Leigh, it is quite absurd really that we can believe somehow that our body is inferior to what we think, and held as a slave to our thoughts. In learning that in fact a harmonious relationship with our body not only serves us but serves all, we get on with what it is we are here to bring to the world, Love – all that we are.
Yes , as we disregard our body we instantly disregard the rest, and so we need to be clever and understand that our choices are influencing everything in our lives.
I think it is no mistake that when we have eating disorders we are attacking our bodies the one thing where truth is held and the vessel of our expression as divinity.
When we do so in any such way to attack our body, we know how important the body truly is, for without a lovingly prepared vehicle of expression, divinity simply cannot be expressed through us. We are simply an instrument, and responsibility is the word.
Well said Coleen, it is refreshing to have the body described as ‘the greatest gift and friend in the world’, when so many people today believe it to be the enemy! I’ve certainly disliked my body on and off for many years, and can feel the difference that appreciating vs. ‘hating’ it has had on my life.
That is an amazing testimony. How powerful to read so many comments of how big the effects are when we start to listen to our bodies and appreciate the woman and or man within – instead of attacking our own bodies by disliking it and not loving it. How beautiful that there is another way to break this pattern of hate- and replace it for love.
We honor our thoughts much more than our bodies, but where do thoughts even come from? If our mind is being heralded as all mighty and the rest and the whole being is being disregarded, are we not reducing ourselves to living just a small fraction of ourselves? And if thoughts come from our bodies and our bodies are not honored, what quality of thoughts would we actually be having? And how intelligent are we then to be led by what we think when we do not respect how the body feels?
It’s very interesting how we choose to hold our own bodies as far less than our friends or family for example.
There is no way many of us would abuse others the way we do our own bodies.
So true Kylie, so when does this start and why – it makes no sense at all.
I agree Kylie and Karina, it makes no sense. Babies are born so untouched by the outside world and living totally from their senses and have very simple basic needs, and are simply being who they naturally are and expressing what they feel from inside them, so what makes us start turning on ourselves and others, if it’s not natural?
I love this too Colleen. Our body is our greatest friend in the world and deserves all the care, attention and love we can give it.
So true, Colleen. To truly love and appreciate our body is food for the soul.
It makes me feel so awesome when I truly love and look after my body, I enjoy how i now talk with it as in the past I didn’t have supportive things to say about . Talking to my body these days often just makes me smile …
So true Colleen, self care and appreciation of my body allows room for the soul to speak through me.
Yes how beautiful to claim our body as our greatest friend. It is true that we can often see how our body ‘restricts’ us and caring for it is considered burdensome, but it is so patient with us, always communicating and knowing everything including what it needs.
How beautiful indeed Annie as we can be so disregarding and unloving with how we move and use our bodies, but even then, it never ceases to support and be there for us with its deep wisdom just waiting for us to connect to.
It most certainly is our lifelong friend. A friend that will be honest and truthful no matter what.
No doubt about that and don’t we all know how loudly our friend the body can communicate when we don’t honour its’ divinity.
We all ask for a true friend in life, and we have always had one, but how many of us truly treasure this relationship? This is a true relationship that the other would impart spaciousness and never impose or have attachment on us, there is only constant and consistent love, there is so much to appreciate and yet do we?
There is so much to appreciate and yet do we? Thank-you for posing this question Adele, as I am asking myself this very question now.
I would also ask why do we not appreciate this stupendous gift, our body, the vehicle of expression for divinity to come through? When we deeply appreciate and accept ourselves, there is the responsibility of being aware and to move accordingly with awareness–so the answer is we are fighting evolution.
Our body is our lifelong friend, and so do we accept this stupendous gift of learning which is freely given to us?
Absolutely Coleen, this is the game changing mirror offered by Universal Medicine, a mirror that rebinds us to the might of everything we already are and choices and responsibility that lead us back there.
I agree Coleen, we often see the bodies need for sleep and the way it breaks down as somehow an inconvenience, and yet in reality the body knows exactly when it has done enough and what is right for it or not.
It’s all in the acceptance of it isn’t it… to hear what it says and follow through with appropriate action that honours and nurtures our friend (the body) deeply.
Yes Rebecca, our bodies know it all but when we choose to override what they truly need, by making choices that don’t lovingly support then our bodies have no option other than to heal in the best way it can.
Agree the body is our vehicle here on earth and it is quite shocking that often people love and take more care of their car than their body. It can be the car or any other material asset, like the house, clothes, etc. We would never expose our delicate cashmere sweater to a hot washing cycle or feed our dog ice cream, but we “normally” do so with our bodies. We abuse our body consistently and then wonder when it breaks down and stops serving us for what it was made.
Our bodies are always there, always communicating (if we are prepared to listen) and hold all the wisdom we need, yet we can treat them with so much disrespect. I feel seeing my body as my best friend will support me to respect it more and listen more carefully to what it is saying.
That struck me too Coleen, Adele referring to her body as her greatest friend. And of course it is – no matter how smart our mind may consider itself to be, it needs a body, and it is our body that tells us exactly what is going on.
Haha yes sometimes I am not so grateful to this friend when it is showing me choices I am making that I don’t want to see.
Yes and how good is our friend and showing us, all we have to do is listen and adapt to what is needed.
Many times we are not grateful for the true face of love because love is always asking us to move deeper in responsibility impulsed by the natural movement of evolution.
This is profound Adele. I am at the moment going through a number of things that on the surface are quite difficult and I have seen my propensity to look at these circumstances as ‘blows’. However a deeper place in me knows that these things are actually the ‘true face of love’ helping me to ‘move deeper in responsibility impulsed by the natural movement of evolution’ as you so beautifully say. The law and the love of God is precise and most healing.
Yes, this is most beautifully to hear, declaring love for their own body and not in the sense of the right to abuse but with the love to honour and cherish it for the true and honest friend it is.
I love this Esther – ” … cherish it for the true and honest friend it is.” Sounds and feels beautiful and the more we do this the easier it gets and the more joyful we start to feel, just awesome.
The tender heart of a claimed woman shining forth from this blog for me is like taking a silky bath in cream. I feel so full and nurtured just by reading these words. It’s the magic of Sacred Esoteric Healing. You live it – and it will heal all through your expression.
Yes Felix, a claimed woman indeed! What powerful self expression, fully embodied!
Great point I hadn’t considered this but can feel when we do choose to move beyond our hurts it supports us to step into the woman or man and stop running in the patterns we created as teenagers.
Although I would not use the same analogy, Felix, I have the same feeling of being nurtured by reading this blog.
Beautifully expressed Felix and it’s exactly what i felt reading tis blog. It’s your tenderness and preciousness Adele, what you have claimed and now live, and that inspires any woman — and man — to love themselves the way that you have chosen to do.
I was recently able to feel this tenderness and preciousness of Adele this week and it was beautiful to feel. She has this flow and rhythm and you can feel she has claimed herself as a women. She is definitely an inspiration to us all.
I love that expression – ‘a claimed woman’ – it sounds and feels divine, and is so fitting for the experience here shared.
That is so beautiful Felix “You live it – and it will heal all through your expression.” What power we have when we truly honour our feelings (rather than our emotions) and deeply care for, nourish and express our love. The healing we experience can never be contained to just ourselves, it will always encompass everyone because that is the true nature and purpose of our inherent love.
This is beautiful Adele, thank you for sharing this experience. I too can relate to having made the choice to feel that I can’t express how I feel and lately this has really been in my face. But the amazing part is that now with the support of Universal Medicine and from listening to my body I can feel how much pressure and pain believing that I can’t express creates. There is nothing wrong with expressing how I feel in fact when I do the pressure drops and I feel freer, the behaviours of rejecting my expression and not accepting the world and not accepting what I feel has shown itself in ill health, but again with support this has been a real blessing to learn more and re-discover who I am underneath all the tension and rejection which is not a part of who I truly am.
One of the biggest hindrances seems to be the fact that we have an attachment to an outcome and thus, we think that expression is only valid when there is the possibility of a positive outcome. It is only when we start expressing how things truly feel that we then realise that it is about expression itself and nothing else at that moment – the outcome is secondary and at times of no consequence even because the feeling in the body is grand and nothing like the clamped down state from before.
I so get what you mean Gabriele, it really doesn’t matter about the outcome, what matters most is that you spoke up, you had your say rather than kept quiet or bottled everything up.
Your are right Gabriele, we are so attached to the outcome bending to our favour that we close up and repress speaking out in case we say the wrong thing. But the expression itself is everything regardless of the outcome. When we allow this our bodies confirm that feeling by remaining open, vibrant and sweet; even if their is reaction from another, or a decision is made contra to the one we were seeking.
Wow Gabriele truly wise. Expression for no outcome, simply for the fact that it is there to express. How truly freeing, we get so caught up in needing outcomes that we lose the simplicity of simply expressing.
Exactly Gabriele, ‘It is only when we start expressing how things truly feel that we then realise that it is about expression itself and nothing else at that moment – the outcome is secondary and at times of no consequence even because the feeling in the body is grand and nothing like the clamped down state from before.’
Beautiful wise words Gabriele, it is not about the attachment to the outcome but, about the expression. Expressing what needs to be said in the moment and nothing else.
That is a great point Gabrielle, expressing what I feel and how I feel without needing an outcome is very liberating. No longer searching for a confirmation of what I express from outside of me brings simplicity back to my life, the only confirmation I need is the warm and relaxing feeling I get in my body when I express what’s true for me.
We only have to express what feels true and lovingly, that is the purpose of expression. Expression having an investment in the outcome comes with need, and therefore, it is not love.
I can feel how I have held onto wanting my expression to be seen or experienced rather than feeling what there is to express and appreciating the ripple effects that such truth can bring regardless of what happens in the outcome. For example the picture that expressing my truth should free me of all aches and pains, but what if expressing my truth brought up MORE aches and pains as the energy I have used previously to hold back is now coming up and out? Evolution is not pain free and this I can see I have held onto for some time, but as everything is energy which is never static then if there is a perception of it still hanging around that is because I have chosen it again and again and in this I have the power not to chose to live by that image. Thank you Gabriele.
Many times in expressing Leigh, my voice shakes and there is nothing to perfect or judge but simply to keep expressing as that is the most natural movement to follow and the body celebrates this movement.
I have experienced this in Universal Medicine events when I take the mic – my heart pounds like in cartoons. I have grown a fair bit since coming out of hiding, I learn and reflect on much afterwards and do feel more at ease in speaking up but that doesn’t seem to stop my heart pounding when I do!
This is so true what you say here Gabriele, when we express, ‘we have an attachment to an outcome and thus, we think that expression is only valid when there is the possibility of a positive outcome.’Such a trap that can stop us expressing, when in reality it is just about expressing the truth with no attachment to the outcome.
Beautiful Leigh. How bizarre is it to consider that we reject ourselves long before anyone else does? I cannot imagine telling my little self that I would do that to her and yet I did, for many years.
Very powerful Lucy and Leigh, we reject ourselves before anyone else does. So true if we hadn’t rejected ourselves it would be impossible for another to reject us. Without the separation in ourselves first we would be able to see that for another to reject another, they must first be in their own rejection and hence there is no rejection just separation from self.
Beautiful Leigh. Love how you express this. Thank you for the reminder that the lack of expression, the tension and rejection is not who we are.
Leigh there is a picture that I have held onto and that is being a woman speaking out and speaking forth from what I am feeling is not acceptable. This is a picture I have accepted as being a woman as well as of being a chinese woman, but every single choice which then comes from this image is then generated from the pool of then what is not true. Since meeting Universal Medicine I am learning to choose to express from truth again, or more accurately, build, prepare and nurture the instrument of expression for God, my body, to simply have truth expressed through me, it is natural and actually a responsibility to reflect this truth to the world.
Ah Adele, you keep deepening the healing here by understanding the images and beliefs you have held around expressing yourself as a woman, very inspirational.
Very beautifully expressed Adele
What a glorious journey we are on Adele, with realising these images we have been carrying as women. These images have been shaping us, denting us, bruising us, and binding us from the expressing the true power and sacredness of a woman! I woke up from a dream the other night with a strong message resonating in my ears saying, ‘you are carrying the image of the abandoned woman with you’. And for quite a while too, I added! So I am very aware of any thought that comes in that could try to confirm that false image. Thank you for your deeply beautiful blog Adele.
Lyndy, who would have guessed that being a true woman is simply letting go of all the images of what is not true of a woman accumulated throughout our lives? We cannot say we let go and then do so, as we have all done that and it has never worked. But the process of not being controlled by images is to move and walk connected to our hearts and the impulses that come from there.
Your choice to express from truth instead of the picture you carried of what was acceptable for a woman, is very very powerful Adele.
We can prepare ourselves for work so that we are on time, have all our equipment sorted etc and ready to start when the time comes to us to start. But reading this comment has confirmed my feelings this morning of the fact that this can go deeper and that how I live can set me up to be prepared for the love that I am to be expressed as and when required. And just like a new (although this is a role we are returning to) job we practice our expression and then evolve it over time. Just like if we were in the same role with no change for years we feel restricted – what if the quality of how we live is no different?
I wonder how many women will have had this belief or picture, and maybe still do have it, ‘being a woman speaking out and speaking forth from what I am feeling is not acceptable’. How great that many of us are now choosing to express what feels true.
You have opened up something very profound Leigh – the relationship between expression and health. We place our bodies under a tremendous load when we compress, restrain and judge our expression. This might sound odd but I can’t help but use the analogy of a car with a speed limiter constraining it and something wedged in the exhaust pipe. The engine, treated this way would fail, and in a devastating way…we would never do such a thing to our car, yet we do it to ourselves and consider it normal.
Expression plays a crucial part in our well-being, how many illness and diseases are rooted from a lack of true expression? When we express in truth and not in emotion or reaction, the power of this is immense. I have felt deep tension within dissipate and also see it dissipate in others, life flows and a deep surrender happens.
Thank you for sharing this Adele – I can really feel your sensitivity through your expression. I also felt that decisions were made for me as a child and as I grew up however I have come to realise that even these were actually based on my own decisions; how else could I have come to be in these situations in the first place?
Yeah so right Michael, somehow it’s all about choice, conscious or unconscious, and often there are learnings to be had and experiences to be felt, even though we may not understand them at the time.
Yes, even from a very young age we can choose certain things, our choices may be limited but we always have the choice to listen to our bodies or not.
I love it Karina, life is a constant learning made up of billions of choices, how truly empowering.
Karina it is about choice, we can say it’s subconscious or conscious choice, but we do make it. When we were young our choices possibly all came from a hurt as we could not feel that if we spoke out truth we would be heard. So to just fit in we made choices. They possible where not ones that we wanted as most of them possibly were influenced by what our parents and society wanted us to do. I know this was my experience for some time, but there did come a point in me, when I started to say no to certain tradition and started to breakaway and make some choices for myself, not necessary the true choices.
Same here Amita. First comes the recognition of the choices, the conscious ones are obviously easier to ping, and the unconscious ones take a bit more to get hold of. Once done though, we can discern the then and now and decide all anew again. Even more awesome when we truly let go of any blame, for self or others, and just step up into responsibility and discernment in all new choices.
I relate to this Michael. It is a big pill to swallow how we create our situations through our choices. But a lovely gift that we can start to make different choices.
Michael this is gold what you have shared. That on some level we make all the decisions in our lives; and it has just helped me loads in seeing how I have been holding onto something that was not true in that I didn’t have a choice! The choice was long ago I chose comfort and didn’t want to step outside my comfort zone. Thank you.
It blows victimhood out of the water.
Very true Michael. The situations we ‘find ourselves in’ are most surely a reflection of some kind or another and are energetically precise and scientific. We gravitate to the milieu which is our working ground, or working point, and from which we can gradually arise back into the glorious beings that we are. Such a loving plan of God!
Life is simply constellations of love for us to return to choosing that for ourselves.
You are right Michael as there are no accidents, and yes choices are made for us when we are younger but as we get older we are ultimately responsible for what happens to us.
I agree too Michael, there are no accidents and when we get older we are ultimately responsible for what happens to us, that is true too Julie. When we were children, we may not have necessarily had a choice in situations, but we always had a choice to hold true to how we felt within from that gorgeous natural knowing we all held and surround ourselves with our own love as it was right there.
Which is why Michael that we cannot but be in deep reverence and appreciation for our lives, every constellation is an opportunity given to us to return deeper to love.
I loved the line where you acknowledge having lived for most of your life honouring your inner knowing; I feel that I have too, I just don’t appreciate that about myself often enough, and so your blog brings that out into the open for me. Thank you for baring yourself for all the world to learn from, Adele.
Like you Suzanne, I can relate to what Adele shares about most of her life honouring that inner knowing as I too held certain principles or choices for myself that I would not sway from because of the love that I obviously had built or held for myself From a younger age. So thank-you Adele for reminding me of this choice and the beauty of you that is so palpable through this whole amazing blog.
Indeed Suzanne; Adele’s blog is a pure celebration and opportunity of appreciating we have lived most of our lives honouring our inner knowing. It is the appreciation we grow truly powerful.
Absolutely well described Gina, and absolute beauty of a blog that describes how vast life can be , but that a change of love and nuture in our life can shift all things around, now that to me is powerful!
Back to that very important part in our daily rhythms Suzanne – appreciation – I agree I can also do more on that one as well.
How much more can I deepen in my appreciation of myself and others? It is certainly seems endless but feels like it is currently developing as a cherishing quality to it, which is very beholding and confirming.
When I connect to the energy that I am already full, I am enough, I am the Son of God, appreciation pours out of every cell in my body.
And so we only have to confirm exactly this and nothing else .
It sure does Donna, for me too. We are already love, the more we accept and appreciate this the less drive we will have.
Great comment Donna and great reminder. When we connect to the knowing that we are enough, our appreciation flows out in bucket loads
It is lovely to remind ourselves or to confirm, that I am enough, I am already full as the son go God that I am, from here appreciation flows.
I love what you have expressed here Jenny and fully agree with what you have said about a cherishing quality to the appreciation and love that we feel .
I agree Jenny. Appreciation of self and others is an ever deepening and developing practice, and something that brings with it a beautiful quality that is indeed very confirming and beholding. It is something that I too am working on for myself, and can feel how it allows me to retain a steadiness in my body that has been unfamiliar in recent years.
That has been my experience recently, of appreciation developing as a cherishing quality, which feels beautiful and in itself is confirming.
Yes Karina, I feel that appreciation is something that we are constantly developing and deepening – there is no end point.
Appreciation brings about a harmony in life that just keeps flowing.
That’s really beautiful Adele, Appreciation brings about a harmony in life that just keeps flowing. So glad I read it, it just makes me want to appreciate more to see what takes place.
I love this Adele, and it is so true. ‘Appreciation brings about a harmony in life that just keeps flowing’. When we start to deeply appreciate oursleves for who we are, and what we feel, it is amazing what opens up before us. There is such beauty and wisdom in this sentence, it simply has to be lived to be experienced.
Gorgeous Adele, to start my day with.
Appreciation is massive and something I know I do not do enough of. We all seem to be the 1st ones to criticise ourselves or self bash but very few of us are actually any good at truly appreciating ourselves and what we bring. The more I appreciate myself the less I look outside for answers and so the less I get caught up in the spin of the world. It is amazing how such a simple small act of appreciation can have such vast knock on effects for my day and life.
I agree James, appreciation is massive and something I know I need to develop far more. Appreciation has a huge impact on myself and those around me.
Well said, James. And appreciation is the antidote for self-criticism or self-judgement. Whenever I give myself a hard time, all I need to do is look back and consider where I am today, which for me is a great place.
I agree Suzanne, I also have felt I have lived all my life knowing my inner-being but have held it back which in turn has caused a chronic lower back issue. I am worth not having a lower back issue to not hold back what is there to be expressed.
It’s so interesting to be honest about the fact that when we are not being our true selves and hold back on our expression, that our body is there to tell us!
Yes Angela , every step of the way, from the physical twinges to that unsettling contracting feeling inside. Our body is amazing.
Oh yes! And it is appreciation in every step of the way, no matter what is felt, as the deep sensitivity from our bodies is something to deeply appreciate.
Yes Angela. The honesty is key as is the choice to reconnect when we know we are not being ourselves.
We do know, and vastly more than we even acknowledge to ourselves. And what you have pointed out Suzanne, is that we do not appreciate this deeply enough. To hold our inner truth in a world that does not value its quality is something special…to be celebrated.
It is equally important to acknowledge the point in which the appreciation actually comes from.
To appreciate the gift of being me in the world is truly something that can be eternally appreciated. The moment of appreciation seals the door to evil.
Beautifully said Felix!
Being able to be myself in a world that reflects little if any any care or appreciation for that which I hold dear, is the biggest gift I could ever give myself. Thank you Serge Benhayon for shining the light on The Way.
Hear, hear Jenny and yes, thank you Serge Benhayon for shining the light where it is most needed.
Hear hear – I can only fully concur.
In fact, to hold our inner truth in a world that does not value its quality is so awesome that most people do not know what to make of it, and when this is deeply appreciated by ourselves, more and more people will start to realize this truth about themselves too.
Who we are in-truth, is not who we thought ourselves to be. Our task here on Earth is to live the love that we are so that others realise that they are also of this grand love – one and the same.
The moment we realize life is nothing we think it is, is the moment we begin to truly live with one and all.
Beautifully said Liane…our soul purpose “is to live the love that we are so that others realise that they are also of this grand love” equally so.
I love this Liane and Paula – to live the love that we are that others can connect to and live the love that they are too. Ripple effects are just awesome!
I take great solace in this because when I am having unpleasant thoughts about myself, I know that it is not who I am. Even when its really strong I known now its not true.
Our purpose on earth is very simple when put like this Liane, ‘to live the love that we are so that others realise that they are also of this grand love.’
There have been and are so many pictures, expectations and issues we create to cover up or create the illusion that there is a barrier between us and holding and expressing that inner truth in a world that has all of the above mentioned within it. But it’s all a lie and that inner truth never leaves us. If it weren’t for Serge Benhayon I would not be able to write this in this life time and yet equally at the same time, if it weren’t for me choosing to feel this I would not be able to write this today. The truth that lives within us is only a choice away from feeling and we have so many moments in the day to choose and make choices.
Rachel I totally agree it is something very special – to be able to connect, feel and be this Love that is so tender, sweet and delicate in a world that is hard, driven and complicated is a living miracle. Such a simple choice but one worth seriously celebrating with ourselves and all.
When we’re so used to withholding our expression it can be difficult to start to express again. But the more we appreciate what we can feel, simply by acknowledging what’s there instead of overriding or shutting it down, the easier it becomes, and expression starts to flow again.
I agree Suzanne, I loved that line too and can feel the truth for my life. It is very confirming to myself to claim the inner knowing I have lived for most of my life. Like I give myself the space and grace to be myself.
Suzzane i can completely relate to that line too. Just reading this blog I can feel the deep appreciation flowing through, which I have not often appreciated. The beauty is we all do know deep inside, but because of ideals and beliefs we have been taught and brought up in, has dampen what we know already. Hence our behaviours to numb our selves from what we feel and unable to speak our truth. Adele’s blog beautifully shares her journey, we all have our journeys to share too.
I was intrigued by that line too Suzanne. I’m not sure I have that same surety of knowing I have lived most of my life honouring my inner knowing but I can say there was something in me that held solid despite my most determined wanderings away from my inner-most. Thank goodness for the miracle of that small mercy, and for Universal Medicine for showing me how to re-connect the dots.