One day in yoga class my teacher Mark asked, “Is that your bad knee?“   A knowledgeable and compassionate teacher, Mark knew about my injury and wisely asked before correcting my alignment.

I’m surprised by how often people refer to my injured knee as “bad.”  Why do we so quickly label body parts and symptoms as bad?  ”I’ve got a bad tooth…stomach…foot… a bad headache…cold…flu.”

“I don’t have a bad knee” I replied.

I knew that Mark was referring to my injury.  I could have just said “Yes” and let it be.

No Bad Body Parts

But everything in me said, “No.  My body is a good body.  Don’t call my body bad.” I felt like mother sticking up for her child.  “Don’t talk dirt about my knee.  You may be the teacher, but that doesn’t give you permission to talk bad about me!”

Mark corrected himself and said, “Okay.  I mean your challenged knee.”

I said it was and he said, “Okay, then I won’t tell you to straighten it.”

I drew my attention to my leg and mindfully worked the knee a bit straighter, sensing the muscles, ligaments and tendons move into a new position.  It felt good to gently push myself.

I am grateful for Mark’s combination of precision in alignment and gentle correction.  He did for me what I couldn’t do for myself.

Speak Up for Yourself

I am also grateful that I love myself enough to not let anyone speak ill of any part of me—including my knee!  Twenty years ago I might not have done that. While I would have challenged someone calling me a bad person, or speaking ill of my loved one, I might not have challenged that same assignment of meaning to my body.

I did for my knee what it couldn’t do for itself—challenge the negative language so commonly used when speaking about physical challenges and symptoms.

Most often it isn’t someone else we need to confront.   We’re our own worst critics when it comes to our bodies.  How often do you judge your body or assign negative labels to your body?

New Ways of Talking About Your Body

It’s difficult to change long-standing behaviors, but practice creates new patterns. The next time you catch yourself speaking badly about your body, see if you can find a kinder way to talk about your aches, pains and problems.  Descriptive language—“I have a sore tooth…a painful headache…an injured knee”—is a more accurate and loving way to talk about yourself.

Be a good mother to yourself–speak lovingly of your body and challenge yourself or anyone else who doesn’t.

I had the privilege of introducing one of my colleagues to yoga last year.  Since then she’s hired a private yoga teacher who comes to her home twice a week for an hour of gentle yoga. Soon after beginning her new routine she reported:

“I’m just a beginner but I already feel more at peace about my body.”

I recently met  Joanne Spence – an amazing yoga teacher who developed a DVD for beginners: Absolute Beginner Yoga. It’s a great resource.  I’m recommending it to my yoga classes and my health coaching groups.

Joanne’s style is warm, friendly and accessible.  She’s the perfect DVD teacher for anyone who needs to have a positive first date with yoga.

Please check out her website and see for yourself!

http://www.absolutebeginneryoga.com/

And if you order the DVD, please let her know that I recommended her as I want her to know how much I appreciate her work.

In college my friend John, a competitive cyclist, convinced me to use part of a small inheritance to buy a road/racing bike.  He wanted company on his long training rides around Santa Barbara where we attended school.  Back on my bike after a ten year hiatus it was like I’d never been gone.  I loved it all over again.

Today (after fourteen weeks off my bike as I rehabbed my knee–my longest cycling hiatus in memory) I got back on my bike.   As we peddled up the South side of the Rose Bowl loop in Pasadena at a very slow ten miles per hour, my husband noted that this was fifty percent slower than we usually ride this route.  I told him that I didn’t care how fast or far we went, I was just happy to be back on my bike…although I didn’t say it that nicely!

After all my body and I have been through over the years, I am so blessed to be here:  alive (in my eighteenth year post breast cancer), strong (rode nine miles comfortably and without knee problems) and more content in my forty-eight year old body than I’ve been at any other time in my life.

I’ve been far more “fit” at other times in my life.  In fact, if I were to ride with John or his wife Susi (my best female cycling buddy over the years), they’d tell me in no uncertain terms that I’m in lousy cycling shape.  Heck, Susi said that the last time we rode together — and that was before my accident.

But true fitness is not measured by body statistics alone. As the stories of professional athletes’ struggles with addiction, violence and marital infidelity remind us, you can be in top physical shape and still be a psychological mess.

Or as my Aunt Margie recently taught me in the last days of her life, you can be living with cancer, preparing to die, yet more truly alive than much of the population. This is a photo of Margie taken at her “Honoring the Flow of Life Ceremony” held eight days before her death.  Over one hundred friends and family came together to celebrate her almost ninety years of remarkable life.  She is one of my sheroes!

My relationship with my body parallels the relationship I have with my life. In my less content years, I was too busy trying to control my body and achieve results to listen.  I was too busy trying to control my life and achieve results than to listen.  In those days fitness setbacks were a source of discouragement, frustration and anxiety.

But when I meet the physical changes and challenges of my embodied life with respect and a willingness to listen, every accident, illness, rosacea outbreak, new creek in my joints, mysterious symptom or discomfort becomes an opportunity to deepen my connection to my good body, to my self,  just as I am.

So, whether I ride my bike one hundred miles over steep hills and in unfriendly weather (as I did six years ago in the Solvang Century ride) or nine miles on the flats in perfect Southern California Memorial Day weather, I’m grateful to be alive, healthy, and growing through the changes and challenges each day offers.

With that starting point, we spent a remarkable weekend journeying through Edwina Gately’s Soul Sister’s version of the story of the woman caught in adultery.  The religious leaders wanted to stone her to death.  They were filled with accusation and judgment.

We each came with our own versions of being “accused” of not measuring up to someone’s standard for who we should be, how we should look, act, behave.

On Saturday morning we took our stories–the good and the bad–experiences of love, goodness and power,  of accusations we’d absorbed from others’ and of stones we’ve thrown at ourselves– and put them into a community painting.

We splattered, sponged and smeared paint across the canvas.  Some spoke, some cried, some yelled, some silent.

The final piece revealed power, love, pain, humiliation, anger, resentment, joy, beauty–all mingled together.  One artist’s bright blue splatter proclaiming her goodness holding a sister’’s red blotch of anger at years of addiction and abuse. The celebratory curvy purple feminine figure now the container for the pain felt by another for her own voluptuousness.

Our canvas revealed the reality of our lives: beauty amidst tears, light in darkness, creativity out of chaos.  We discovered that the fruit of God’s great love expressed in Jesus’ words to the woman–”neither do I condemn you”–comes to us in much the same way that Jesus was born–in the muck, stench and mire of the stable.

We are a community of women living with the perfectly imperfect parts of ourselves and each other as we abide in this great love of God revealed in Jesus.  His encounter with the woman caught in adultery became our story too.  We threw the stones thrown at us, the stones we throw at ourselves and each other, into the ocean on Saturday night.  And then went out for Gelato!

There’s more to the story.  You can read it at my retreat partner Kristin’s “post retreat thoughts” on her website, a beautiful mess. Kristin is a remarkable young woman with a passion to empower other women in authentic living and self-care.  Be sure to check out her many excellent suggestions for self-care and recovery from perfectionism while you are there.

Join us for our next retreat: The Soul & Sexuality: moving from shame to grace.  October 8-10, 2010 at Casa de Maria in Montecito.

(Photos by Megan Lundgren  and Kristin Ritzau)

If your reaction is “So what?” then you can be my teacher for this piece of the journey.  Somewhere in your life you learned to accept illness as an indicator that you need to stop activity, rest and recover.

I didn’t even begin to learn that lesson until my breast cancer diagnosis at age thirty.  It was a loud wake up call that sounded an alarm about the dangers of  my increasingly busy lifestyle.

Listen to Symptoms

After eighteen years of trail and error attempts to discern the difference between “stay at home” and “keep going” symptoms, I now understand that symptoms indicate an imbalance in my body’s self-regulating system.  My body wants to be well.  It cries out for help through symptoms.

Some symptoms–rosacea on my cheeks, constipation, tension in my neck–are quiet whimpers that don’t demand I stop.  But they do invite me to pay attention to what I’m eating and drinking, my sleep and exercise patterns, and a host of other basic physical needs.  Oftentimes a simple adjustment in one of these areas eliminates the problem.

The fatigue I felt two days ago, the sore throat and mild head and body aches that appeared the next morning, and the cough that showed up last night, are louder cries.   They tell me that stopping just might be a good idea.

Create a Health Supporting Lifestyle

I made a decision after my bout with breast cancer to make my health a priority.  I created a lifestyle that allows me to take time off when my body needs it and to allot a percentage of my income for products that support my body’s efforts to be well in spite of all the challenges I’m up against living in of one of the most populous cities in the world.

I’ve had seasons of both success and struggle with maintaining a health supporting lifestyle.  My inner compulsion to prove my self worth through productivity (how many people I help, how many presentations I give, how much money I make) coupled with external support for all the activity (happy clients and students, happy community groups, happy bank account) reinforce my often too busy lifestyle.

There’s Always A Reason Not To Stay Home

Reasons to not stay home when sick abound:

1. I can’t afford it.
2. I’m out of sick days.
3. I have a deadline to meet.
4. I’ll miss an important meeting.
5. They (fill in the blank) are counting on me.

The truth is–nobody is better off when you or I show up as expected but cough, sneeze and spread our germs around.  I don’t care if Dr. Oz or the Surgeon General supports the frequently touted line “I don’t think I’m contagious anymore”– it’s just not a loving way to show up in our lives.

That’s my take on staying home when I’m sick.  If you have something to say about that, I’d love to hear your take on it!

At the top of a short mogul run there was a sign: Experts Only!   I am not an expert skier.  I can ski groomed advanced runs, but I’m not “advanced” on the moguls.  But my only alternatives were to attempt the run or  to take off my skis and hike back up the twenty feet I’d just skied down.

I didn’t honor my own limitations by checking in with my body or my history.  If I had, I would have heard: “Don’t do it.  You haven’t skied moguls at all this season.  Go back the way you came.”

And, I didn’t heed the wisdom of those who knew the hill and placed the warning sign there.

At the moment I felt strong and enthusiastic.  Even though I’d not skied moguls this season, I fantasized that my previous experience combined with  watching the techniques of the Olympic mogul’s athletes the night before would get me down the hill.   I also didn’t want to do the hard psychological work of admitting defeat and hiking back up the hill.

I neglected to pause long enough to fully assess the situation.  I went with my initial impulse, launched myself down the run, and almost immediately crashed.  And, because that wasn’t enough evidence to convince me of my limitations, I got up and tried again.

Not a good idea.

I crashed.  This time I felt a hot sensation in the outer back edge of of my right knee and significant strain.  I tumbled down the hill, my skis came off and I landed about ten feet from where I’d begun.

At that point, I decided to honor my obvious limitations.  I gathered up my skis and poles and slowly hiked off the mogul run, through a thirty foot wide expanse of thick ungroomed powder, and over to a groomed run I’d been skiing all morning.

I assessed my knee: no pain,  just mild discomfort.  I took a few minutes to bend it various ways and place weight on it.  It felt solid, so I decided to put on my skis and venture down the hill.

I skied a few more runs, but felt discomfort and mild pain from the weight of my boots and skis pulling on my knee while riding the chair lift.  I decided that I’d pushed my limits far enough and called it quits.

The knee swelled up and I’ve spent the past six days in recovery mode.  An MRI revealed significant internal damage to the soft tissue and bone bruising, but no structural damage.

The doctor said I’m a tough cookie and that I used up one of my nine lives.  He said that if it had been him, he’d have been carried down the hill in a stretcher.  He recommended physical therapy with a follow-up visit in six weeks.

Optimal enjoyment of skiing–and life–comes from paying attention to the instruction of others and to self-knowledge about my personal strengths, limitations and history.    Impulsive choices that don’t honor the wisdom of general experience  or personal awareness increase the risk of injury.

Similarly, optimal health comes from using the knowledge of doctors, nutritionists, physical therapists and others in alignment with self-awareness.  Whether it is on the ski slopes or in nutritional choices, personal responsibility for my health includes both.

Through reflecting on my accident with what the Irish Poet Jon O’ Donohue calls “gracious awareness”, I am finding the lessons to be learned.  It isn’t what I signed up for when I went to Mammoth.  But I’m grateful to be alive, walking, and still have a few of those nine lives left so I can get back on the slopes next year!

If you are like a lot of women, you may be giving too much of your good energy to others while neglecting yourself–especially your need for energizing food throughout the day.  Physical deprivation at the end of the day is a major contributor to nighttime binging and grazing.

You can reduce the likelihood of emotional eating in the afternoon and evening by eating more during the day.  And, if you’ve spent too many years not listening to the real needs of your body, you may need to eat more than you think to properly fuel your body during the day.  Instead of  eating “diet” portions during the day, experiment with eating more heartily during the day and see how that impacts your relationship with food at night.

Simple shifts to eliminate deprivation include:

Eat breakfast and lunch.
Eat more fruits and vegetables.
Eat energizing snacks.
Eat nutritious food when hungry.

Take loving action on your own behalf by saying “yes” to other basic needs too:

Forgive yourself when you fail.
Enjoy time with people you love.
Go to bed early enough to get a solid eight hours of sleep.

Loving yourself  isn’t complicated. You already know how to help others thrive—now it is your turn!  If you aren’t sound of body, mind and spirit, then nobody gets your best self.  And that is a huge loss for everyone!

Writing teacher Brenda Ueland learned through years of experience that “everyone is talented, original and has something important to say” (If You Want to Write).

I do have something to say.  My students and mentees have important things to say.  And you have something important to say.

Sometimes what we say is profound.  Sometimes it’s ordinary.

I prefer to be profound. But my experience tells me that the ordinary is just as helpful and necessary as the profound.

This is a space where I share insights gained on the journey to loving and enjoying my body, just as I am.  Some of it is profound—like how God used a mastectomy at age thirty to heal years of shame and disconnection from my body.  Some of it is ordinary—like how drinking caffeine after 3 p.m. can disrupt my sleep.

I want to hear the important things you have to say about loving and enjoying your body.  I hope you will be bold, access your profound or ordinary voice, and share what you have to say too.

And, if you have something to say about that, I’d love to hear it.