The body of desire. The memoirs of an eating disorder.

From birth we were taught that this body we have is responsible for anything and everything. Born as an empty canvas everyone around us painted their deepest fears, desires, clinging, need for validation, anger, hate, sorrow, deepest sexual desires on it. All these in the end form our bodies. Its shape. Its ability to perform. Its power. Its weakness. Its fragility.

We were taught that the body is the main object of desire that can offer us many things or no things. That can take us everywhere or no where.

We, with our projections gave it this illusory life, fragile, weak, that we point our finger toward each time everything goes wrong and even when it goes right.

We age our bodies due to what we think we know, due to what we were taught, we age from hate, we age from desire, we age from lust and from suffering, from gluttony, we age due to fear of aging.

Our bodies are here simply as a protecting shell, meant to carry us around. Simply that. It has no life nor mind of its own. It is simply a machine. Lifeless, senseless. It only becomes alive when we breath life into it. Logically.

The idea is that we either empower it with healthy food, detaching from the desires absorbed from the karma of the world, regarding consumption, or we make it old and fragile due to validation and from seeking pleasure in gluttony, sex, drugs and alcohol.

In the end who am I to discuss knowledge when it comes to physical looks.

I have not treated my body right.

From the looks of it there might be a contradiction here. Yes I fed it healthy foods. Too healthy many times. Never stepped on the side because I was a failure in my eyes if I ever dared. It is true I have projected many of my fear and all of my failures on it. Absolutely all of them. Because my focus was never on how my mind performs. It was always on whether this body satisfied my eye. Not the eye of another. But mine. The cruelest judge and the most harsh master there is. My eye.

Strange how I see beauty in every being around me and love every soul I lay eyes on. And sometimes shed a tear when I witness the beauty of humans and animals. And I do not look at shape, color, gender, and none of that. I see the soul. And I wonder. Is mine missing?

When did I start seeing this body as a punishment, instead of a joy to have and to cherish. A joy that it is so strong and capable of so many wonderful things?

Did it start when my cousin, who is a beautiful, smart and ambitious women, one of the strongest i have ever laid eyes on, was 5 and everyone was concern about her having some extra pounds. It became a family problem. So we decided at that age, she was 5, I was 7 to diet and exercise so she can lose weight and be “normal”.

Did it start when my mother was dieting to be pretty for my father?

Did it start when I was bullied and told that my butt was too large. I was 11 though. Or when I lost too much weight and everyone was concerned? Or when I gained it back and everyone was commenting how I gained weight?

Was it ever enough? Is it ever enough? I still wonder sometimes.

I have never been the regular type who shows her eating disorder. I have never reached an alarming weight neither too skinny nor too fat. I am good at hiding it. I know the theory. I know what I am dealing with. It is not a mystery. I have never denied it. To myself only, and that was only in the latest hours of the night, when the world was asleep and it could not hear my thoughts. Because as soon as dawn settled, back I was to my regular schedule of becoming my so called perfect self.

But even when you know. Even when you feel the pain and struggle in it you still cannot comfort your mind and body. What is there to do?

I believe each woman on this planet is dealing with more or less an eating disorder. It’s no shame in it.

Having body disphormia is pretty hard. I cannot see myself. But then again what am I to see. Form. A illusion, a congregation of karmas, a form stuck in this process that either is taking you through conscious awakening, either drowning you deeper in samsara.

I am often asked how come I teach meditation and practice and I am not yet happy and completely blissful. Well, I haven’t reached Buddha-hood yet to be as such. There are countless of karmas and clinging that one is dealing with. Not only with their own, but with the entire karma of the world. I mean what are we made of. A bundle of energy, projections, desires and so forth of countless other beings.

So when I am struggling to understand, it means I am moving forward. I do not abide in this swamp of pity. Why would I? If something makes you uncomfortable, unhappy or creates any kind of negative reaction or action, do something about it.

I did do something about my eating disorder. I tried to handle it. I started eating healthier and healthier, without starving myself. Or maybe not work out at least a bit one day, because I might lose my muscle mass. You see it is all still veiled by fear, it is still fear behind it. And where there is fear there is loss. Because this has stole away my focus for other matters more important. For a very long time.

It’s hard to try to fit your life in when you have a eating disorder

I am surprised sometimes of how the human body can undergo years of stress and low caloric diet, over exercising, working, studying, writing, teaching and other essential daily activities without falling apart.

My passion for testing the limits of the human body completed, empowered this eating disorder.

In 1 month I went from 2 minutes of running in one place on my toes to 60 minutes, adding lifting, fight training and yoga to it all. Yoga was the only thing that was letting my body relax for an instant. But my body gave up. And it broke but only according to my standards. I could still work, study and do all my tasks, but I could not work out anymore. Such a tragedy it was. I felt so useless so incomplete. But my business was moving forward, my work was advancing. You see I had time to focus on what I always truly wanted, my mind and how I perform with it.

It is true the human body is a miracle, and I tested its limits in many ways.

But my body is sad. My body feels unloved, unwanted, not good enough, not pretty enough, not fit enough, not muscular enough, not skinny enough. Or at least it did. Step by step I am accepting it as it is. I am asking for forgiveness, to it, to my mind and to my life. For all the stress I put myself go through, for all the moments I panicked when I ate a bit more than I should, for all those horrible moments.

There are so many girls out there that are afraid to speak up regarding this subject. Because the issues as mine is not so dramatic, we did not end up in a hospital with anorexia. But our heart and minds have been there for far too long.

My body — Never alive but never dead. Somewhere in between my wicked desires of what it should look like, be like, feel like.

An object of desire, made merely to satisfy my so called needs.

I am healing now.

Healing is a very painful process. When you awake from these dark dreams of desire you see all your wrong and all you faults .

What you lost and what you could have achieved and what you could have avoided, if you simply loved yourself .

But it is never too late. Your body is not an object of desire. It is here to carry you around, to show you the way. It is here to serve, but not to be a slave.

Fed it healthy, exercise moderately for health, allow it to indulge but with joy not guilt. Meditate and find yourself. It takes time, much time, but it is all worth it.

I stand here writing instead of working out. I must admit with shame that the guilt is upon me like a dark cloud. But it is simply a cloud.

A cloud is not a shelter. Never make it be your shelter.