Recently my longtime dear friend and colleague, Dr. Dena Cabrera, and a newer friend of mine, Emily Wierenga, released a much-anticipated new book to help moms who are recovering from an eating disorder. Yay!

“Mom in the Mirror” was released this month by Rowan & Littlefield Publishers. When Dena first mentioned the concept to me a few years ago, right away I was anxious for her to begin work. This is because we have so many members within MentorCONNECT, the eating disorders mentoring nonprofit I founded in 2009, who are moms. So while I am not a mother myself (although I am the proud parront to a most beautiful and intelligent bird named Pearl) I am regularly privy to some of the struggles and strains that cross the minds and hearts of mothers who want to make sure their own eating disordered ways are not passed along to their kids.

While not everyone on MentorCONNECT will necessarily relate to some of the faith-based passages in “Mom in the Mirror” (both co-authors are dedicated Christians and so their faith necessarily infuses their personal journeys and the work they do to support others as well) I personally felt that the book is written in such a way that readers who are not Christians can still find tremendous value in the majority of the material.

In this way, “Mom in the Mirror” really does offer readers the best of all worlds – inspiring personal stories of recovery from the authors and others interwoven with the latest eating disorder research by noted experts in the field and practical tools and tips throughout to help readers strengthen in recovery.

This is a book I will be recommending to moms, regardless of their faith background, and purely for its ability to let each struggling mother know that what they are going through is shared by others, is not odd or unusual and is certainly something they can find the strength to overcome!

To watch the short video book trailer on You Tube click HERE

To learn more and order “Mom in the Mirror” click HERE

Today’s Takeaway: What are some of your favorite inspiring books that have helped you to achieve your goals, overcome challenges and find new strength and inspiration for the future? What about those particular books has made them your favorites?

I so enjoy reading. I also enjoy movies. Often I re-read favorite books and re-watch favorite movies multiple times.

Each time I do this, I find I learn something new. Maybe it’s just a funny line I overlooked in the first 22 viewings, or a well-turned phrase in the first seven readings.

But sometimes, it is profound.

For instance, recently I was re-reading the book that “started it all” (by which I mean the road that led me to found MentorCONNECT, my recovery journey, hope that someday I could not just understand myself but perhaps even like who I am).

The book is Rainer Maria Rilke’s “Letters to a Young Poet,” and this isn’t the first time and won’t be the last time I write about it here and elsewhere.

In this particular reading, I happened upon a passage about what to do when life gets difficult. What is so interesting about this passage – and Rilke’s advice – is that I’ve always been told and instinctively believed that difficulty meant I was going in the wrong direction.

But as it turns out, I wasn’t unpacking that thought fully enough. Of course when things get challenging, taking time to pause and reflect, to wait for inner guidance, is typically the better choice rather than just barreling on through, bumps, bruises and all (or at least it tends to be for me).

Rilke writes to his young mentee, Franz Xaver Kappus, about difficulty. Kappus is concerned that his life is becoming too difficult. Rilke sees it otherwise:

“Most people have (with the help of conventions) turned their solutions toward what is easy and toward the easiest side of the easy; but it is clear that we must trust in what is difficult; everything alive trusts in it, everything in Nature grows and defends itself any way it can and is spontaneously itself, tries to be itself at all costs and against all opposition. We know little, but that we must trust in what is difficult is a certainty that will never abandon us…”

He then goes on to name some difficult good things that can help us grow and evolve into the fullness of who we are – like spending time with ourselves (what Rilke likes to call “solitude”) and love for self and others.

I can’t believe I missed this passage all these years and through all the ensuing readings! To be able to trust in the difficult good – in challenges like starting MentorCONNECT, recovering from an eating disorder (and then anxiety, and then depression), loving myself, loving others, embracing who I am and trying at all costs to be me in spite of all opposition….how lovely! How wonderful! How wise.

Today’s Takeaway: What do you think about the role of difficulty in building trust – in self, in life, in the connection we somehow all share in with this world and each other? I would love to hear your thoughts!

Man entering maze image available from Shutterstock.

In February I traveled to Reno to speak for NEDAwareness Week 2013 by invitation of Center for Hope of the Sierras and the University of Reno.

This trip was significant for too many reasons to easily process. For starters, the last time I was in Reno was 1994-1996, when I was still ungodly sick with anorexia and bulimia, feeling lost and scared every minute of every day and doubting absolutely everything – including whether I would make it to 1997.

I came back a changed girl. Woman, really (technically I suppose that is what we are supposed to call ourselves when we reach age 42). But sometimes I still feel like a girl – my eating disorder blocked out so many otherwise high quality years of my life, years when I just wasn’t there because I was so gridlocked in my own inner battles.

I also came back and discovered I was booked at the exact same hotel where I used to stay in the 90′s! Then called the Reno Hilton (and costing $20 per night) today rooms go for over $100 and the large white landmark is much more grandly named the Grand Sierra Resort and Casino.

Best of all, I came back to spend time with some incredible folks, including my sweet hostess, Melissa from Center for Hope of the Sierras. We were talking after the Beauty Undressed program ended, and we got on the subject of self-love. Specifically, we were brainstorming about how we know we do or don’t love ourselves.

My contribution was this: I know I love myself when I treat myself with the same patience, respect, open-mindedness and open-heartedness as I would a different person (friend, family member, pet, et al) whom I know I truly love.

For instance, if my best friend came to me and told me she had said or done something awful that she was quite prepared to hate herself for. I wouldn’t jump in there and pile on more hate. I would sit with her, ask her what about it makes her feel so awful, ask her to please forgive herself because I know she has such a good heart and then we can figure out how she can make it right.

I went through this exact same scenario last week, only instead of my best friend and me talking, it was me and me talking. And this is exactly how I handled it.

And that is how – today – I know I love myself. This doesn’t mean (and I’ve found this to be an important distinction to make for myself) that I always like myself. Far from it. Liking how I am acting, what I am thinking or how I am feeling is one thing. Loving myself is quite another.

Today, I know I can and do love myself because I can and do separate liking from loving.

That was my answer. At least for today.

Today’s Takeaway: I would love to hear your thoughts about how you know you do/don’t love yourself too…and also what has worked well for you to develop a healthy, overall loving relationship with YOU.

Heart on an easel photo available from Shutterstock

Every spring and fall I travel. A lot.

Some months I might be in and out three, four, even five times. Occasionally I drive but mostly I am flying. When I fly I am juggling logistics, connections, weather watches (the worst)….plus changing time zones, ever-varying food offerings and more.

To say I can get anxious at times is like saying my folks’ bottomless pit of a dachshund, JP Morgan, is sometimes hungry. When it comes to travel, just add me and anxiety is inevitable.

But looking back at my spring travel season this year as it winds down, I can see how over the years I have learned to do everything I reasonably can to make the anxious part of traveling as manageable as possible. It is also to see how I do this – by establishing routines.

My routines start the moment a trip is confirmed. First, I set two alarms to make sure I am up in time to arrive at the airport as close to precisely two hours ahead of my flight as I can. Next, on the way to the airport, I listen to the same CD and use the drive time to visualize smooth travels. As well, I always take the same route to the airport and get off at the same exit. And when I arrive at the airport I always use the same shuttle parking lot.

As far as food and logistics, I try to have a selection of basic foods that I always bring with me in my computer carry-on bag (which always contains the same items in the same places within its depths).

Finally, I print out everything in a little sheaf of papers I can grasp and hold (which of course makes me stand out like a flashing recycling-resistant neon bulb in the midst of all those other savvy travelers swiping and scanning on their smart phones….)

And I use the travel time to either do absorbing work or (more realistically) meditate and nap. Queasy by nature, I have even trained myself to survive turbulence by visualizing my body as bigger than the plane (weird but entirely true).

These routines have become lifesavers to me – when I look back and recall how once I actually missed a flight because I had so much trouble choosing which shuttle bus lot to park in!

I just thought I would share this in case there are any other anxious travelers who happen across this blog….we nervous adventurers have to stick together.

Today’s Takeaway: What works for you to deal with the situations in life that make you anxious? Have you found routines to be helpful the way I have? If there is something that makes you repeatedly anxious, is there perhaps something you can do to make it easier on yourself to have to deal with that thing?

Anxious traveler photo available from Shutterstock

In my life, there is a never-ending stream of highly insecure visitors who are always eager to hang out with me.

For instance, fear. Or, I should say, fears. Plural. Very, very plural. Here is just one example. I am a speaker with a decade-long track record of delivering successful events. But every time I get on another plane to go speak I am afraid this is the time I will tank, that “that thing” that always happens when I get up in front of people (namely, not sucking) will not work and I will go down in flames in front of 1,000 college students who are all busily uploading my public display of suckiness straight to YouTube.

Another common visitor is anger. I feel angry and I judge myself harshly for it. Even if it is totally justified, even if the anger is so primal – like my limbic system takes over and spews out anger from the cave-woman me whose fight-or-flight is screaming “Saber tooth tiger! Strike now or die!” – I still judge myself for feeling angry. If I don’t remember to judge myself in the precise angry moment, there is always plenty of time later. Endless amounts of time.

Yet another common visitor is sadness. Maybe we could call it depression. Or loneliness. Or apathy. Or boredom. It takes on various shades and forms, but after more than two decades battling mental illness (eating disorder, depression, anxiety and the like) those grooves are still pristinely paved and waiting in my emotional psyche. While I feel like I am growing more positive and peaceful day by day, I can still count on daily hopeful visits from the sadness squad, who figure this might be the day they  get lucky and I finally decide to join back in.

All of these visitors can add up to mighty insecurity mighty quickly – if I let them. The key to not letting them, I have found, is repeating one simple phrase: “This is normal – you are a human being and all human beings feel these things sometimes. It is Oh-kay.”

There is so much compassion in this statement. There is also an instantaneous lessening of the terror factor inherent in yet another repeat visit from fear, anger, sadness and their kin. After two continuous decades of feeling bad pretty much all the time, I quite naturally don’t want to feel bad ever again. But being a human being, being willing to wake up for yet another day, means accepting that I might feel bad sometimes. I might have to course-correct sometimes. I might have to tackle a new fear, battle an old anger, heal and breathe through another course of sadness.

I am okay with this. Or at least I am okay with this when I remember I am okay with this. Remembering….for me at least…is the key to putting the insecurity hit squad in its purely functional place within the bigger positive picture of my overall daily life.

Today’s Takeaway: How do you deal with yet another visit from your personal insecurity hit squad? Do you arm for battle and fight it off by whatever means necessary? To you roll out the welcome mat? Turn and run? Some combination thereof? Another approach?

Insecure woman photo available from Shutterstock

I learned to love myself the way I learned to recover from my eating disorder. I just set my mind to it, chose to believe in it, and never EVER gave up. I still haven’t given up.

I know what you’re thinking.

I like to bring books to my hair appointments. This serves two purposes. It relieves my friend and stylist Carol from having to entertain me for three solid hours, and it also allows me to actually get some reading done.

I particularly like to bring books I have a hard time comprehending, since I can read a few lines, relocate from the styling chair to the dryer, read a few more lines, relocate again from the dryer to the rinse station, etc….this way some of the material has a prayer of actually sinking in.

As Carol (and any frequent reader of this blog) knows, don Miguel Ruiz books are a favorite for my hair appointments. In fact, his latest book (latest for me, not for him) is the best yet in my opinion. To me, “The Mastery of Love” is so simple it is almost complicated. As usual.

At this month’s hair appointment, I was reading more in the chapter called “The Magic Kitchen.” In this chapter, Ruiz writes,

What makes you happy is love coming out of you. And if you are generous with your love, everyone is going to love you. You are never going to be alone if you are generous.

Of course as I’m reading, I thinking, “No way did he just say what I think he just said.”

So I read it again. And again. And again. All of these years I have been so worried about if I am “doing things” right. Am I wearing the right clothes? Do I say the right things? Do I talk about myself too much? How are my listening skills? Do I seem too needy? Too aloof? Will I be lonely later in life? Will anyone notice when I die? Will anyone care?…..and there’s plenty more where those worries came from.

But all that time, all I needed to do was offer my love.

So simple. So very, unbelievably simple. All those fears about being lonely, being forgotten, being unwelcome – solved by a simple switch of perspective from focusing on what I need to focusing on what we all need.

Now, as usual, Ruiz also offers a couple of pointers for how to ensure that what we are offering is love and not neediness, selfishness, codependency, manipulation, desperation, or a whole host of other less-desirable love substitutes.

First, he says that the key to know that what we are offering to others is real love is to heal our self-rejection. When we reject ourselves, we cannot offer genuine love because who we are is not worth offering, so our love isn’t worth offering either. So that is the first simple but not easy issue to take care of.

Next, Ruiz says we must offer love to ourselves. Self-love is very pure and accepting. It is the same gift we want from others, and the same gift others crave from us. Ruiz says that when we love ourselves more and more, our inner reservoir of love grows more and more, and then we have more and more love to offer to others too.

So here the relationship between self-love and loneliness appears to be inverse. The more love we offer ourselves, the more our loneliness begins to recede.

Ruiz states that healing self-rejection and increasing self-love are the two keys because together, they can eradicate selfishness, which is at the root of all of love’s impure substitutes (codependency, greed, desperation, manipulation, etc.) When we love ourselves we do not NEED from others. We welcome and accept the gift of their love, but that acceptance and gratitude comes from a place of inner fullness, not inner emptiness.

We are also continually filled with love to give to others. Not only is there an endless supply of love coming to us from us, but now we have more and more love flowing back to us in gratitude for the continual streams of love flowing from us.

I wish I could expound in greater detail on this subject, but I am just beginning to grasp its significance myself. All I know right now is that giving love is the recipe to end loneliness.

For more information, please consult don Miguel Ruiz.

Today’s Takeaway: Are you – like me – worried about loneliness? Do you – like me – find Ruiz’s words in “The Mastery of Love” resonating within you? I would love to hear your thoughts on what works best for you to ease loneliness for yourself and those you care about!

Little girl with dandelions photo available from Shutterstock

As I mentioned in my last blog post, I’ve been really enjoying reading my new don Miguel Ruiz book “The Mastery of Love”….so much so that (way contrary to my typical style) instead of speed-reading I’ve been reading extra-slow to be sure I don’t miss anything.

In the book, Ruiz states that love has several attributes. In the presence of these attributes we can know we are also in the presence of love. In their absence, well….basically, we’re not likely to find love in those places.

The attributes are as follows:

• Love has no obligations.
• Love has no expectations.
• Love is based on respect.
• Love is ruthless (as in compassionate not pitying).
• Love is completely responsible.
• Love is always kind.
• Love is just (if you make a mistake you only pay for it once).
• Love is unconditional.
• Love gives more than it takes (without ever allowing itself to be taken advantage of).

It feels a bit anticlimactic writing it all down now, but as I was reading about each attribute I could feel something not unlike a noose untying itself from around my own neck.

In particular, I love this quote, “To master a relationship is all about you. The first step is to become aware, to know that everyone dreams his own dream. Once you know this, you can be responsible for your half of the relationship, which is you. If you know that you are only responsible for half the relationship, you can easily control your half. It is not up to us to control the other half. If we respect, we know that our partner, or friend, or son, or mother, is completely responsible for his or her own half. If we respect the other half, there is always going to be peace in that relationship.”

Reading this passage was like finding out my birthday present this year is getting one million dollars daily for 365 straight days (in other words, a gift with five-star awesomeness!):-)

I thought to myself, “Now THIS I can do.” All those other things I often worry about in love-based connections, like whether I am reading the other person’s signals right or acting independent enough or adjusting my expectations according to the “stage” we are in (this has often been a big one for me – blech)…all that worry disappears when I read Ruiz’s statements about love.

According to Ruiz, love takes care of its part, and shows enough respect to let the other participant take care of their half – however well or poorly they choose to do that. And I can do that. I can definitely do that.

Today’s Takeaway: What do you take from reading Ruiz’s words on the characteristics and behaviors of love? Do you find it reassuring? Disturbing? Enlightening? Something else? How might Ruiz’s wisdom impact relationships where you feel more struggle to simply let them flow?

Heart in hands photo available from Shutterstock

Yup. I said it. I’m afraid of love.

Specifically, I’m afraid of being loved. Loving others. And loving myself. If there is any form or exchange of love I have left out, just for the record I’m probably afraid of that too.

Over the years as I’ve studied different faith paths and philosophies, I have often been interested to hear saints and great beings speak of the intensity of the love experience. Jesus scared his disciples so bad when he let his inner love out (commonly called the “Transfiguration”) that their fear paralyzed them and they fell over.

I can only imagine I’d react the same way….or worse.

In another recent post I shared how much I enjoy the writings of don Miguel Ruiz, who, incidentally, is not afraid of love. Thank goodness.

While I don’t always understand what Ruiz is talking about in his books, I am always very receptive to understanding it. Recently I ordered Ruiz’ “The Mastery of Love: A Practical Guide to the Art of Relationship.” I was very excited when it arrived.

Unfortunately, I found it to be so profound that after having it in my possession for three days, I am still on page two of chapter one. On this page, Ruiz writes, “You have the power to create. Your power is so strong that whatever you believe comes true. You create yourself, whatever you believe you are.”

On the next page he goes on to write, “You have practiced all of your life to be what you are, and you do it so well that you master what you believe you are. You master your own personality, your own beliefs; you master every action, every reaction. You practice for years and years, and you achieve the level of mastery to be what you believe you are. Once we can see that all of us are masters, we can see what kind of mastery we have.”

Here I can see clearly that I have mastered the art of fearing love.

Oops.

But then on the next page Ruiz writes something even more exciting. “To become masters of love, we have to practice love.”

Of course, to my love-fearing ears this sounds like Ruiz just instructed me to practice handling snakes (I am also quite afraid of snakes). But on the plus side, he didn’t say I have to handle actual snakes (technically, “love” is more like a virtual snake with virtual fangs). So I decided I’d give it a go.

That was about three hours ago, and I’m still doing okay. The thing is, I do have lots of love in my life. I have lots of relationships in my life. I have my family. My friends. My mentors. My colleagues. My community (MentorCONNECT). My bird Pearl. Myself. Some of those relationships overlap and of course some are deeper or closer than others.

The point I’m trying to make (to myself and to you if you are still reading) is that I already possess clear proof that I have survived the ravages of love thus far with most of me still mostly intact.

So I have decided that for now I will continue to “practice love” as Ruiz suggests.

Whenever I am trying to learn something new, or unlearn something old, my mentor always likes to remind me that awareness is the first step towards progress. I really like this, and it is very applicable here because until about a week ago I wasn’t aware that I was afraid of love. Now I am. So now that I have that knowledge about myself, I can do something about my fear.

Hopefully (best case scenario here) I might even be able to pull off what all the great masters seem to like to recommend – which is to transform my fear into, well, love.

Today’s Takeaway: What is your relationship with love itself? Do you love it? Like it? Hate it? Dislike it? Fear it? All of the above? Or something else? What works for you to create a more trusting, connected relationship with love itself, with yourself and with the people you love and those who love you?

Fearful woman photo available from Shutterstock

Sometimes friends send me articles.

I always like getting them even if the content of the articles makes it clear that I am probably not doing something I probably should be doing in order to achieve something I have told them I want to achieve.

More rarely, articles arrive that appear to point out when I am already doing something I should be doing.

This of course is very cool.

Recently a friend sent me an article called “Secret Ingredient for Success.” Originally published by The New York Times, the article described two types of learning: “single loop” and “double loop.”

As defined by Harvard business professor Chris Argyris, “single loop” learning is “an insular mental process in which we consider possible external or technical reasons for obstacles.”

In other words, with this type of learning we don’t really learn anything, except how good we are getting at blaming other people and external circumstances for our failure.

Contrast this with “double loop” learning, where according to Argyris we “question every aspect of our approach, including our methodology, biases and deeply held assumptions.”

About “double loop” learning, article co-authors Camille Sweeney and Josh Gosfield write, “This more psychologically nuanced self-examination requires that we honestly challenge our beliefs and summon the courage to act on that information, which may lead to fresh ways of thinking about our lives and our goals.”

Clearly, this second type of learning comes highly recommended.

More importantly, however, I was excited to realize while reading that I am already a “double loop learner” (if such a term exists). I was also excited to realize there was terminology to describe the sometimes brutal process of self-inquiry I put myself through with the help of mentors, coaches and trusted friends, and that I am not the only one who does this, and that doing this is actually a good thing.

Most of all, I was excited to read that double loop learning works – for celebrities including tennis star Martina Navratilova, Brit pop band OK Go, restauranteur David Chang and (I would assume) Harvard business professor Chris Argyris and article co-authors Sweeney and Gosfield, among others.

Today’s Takeaway: Do you see yourself in either of these two learning styles – or a bit of both? If I am being honest, I probably still have some elements of each, but I can see I lean heavily towards the latter today (as opposed to during the earlier years of my life). I am very grateful for this shift. Double loop learning may not be easy or fun, but it sure is helpful to me! Would you agree?

Colorful knot photo available from Shutterstock