God hath given you one face, and you make yourselves another. ~Hamlet in Hamlet by William Shakespeare

Old age is the verdict of life. ~Amelia Barr

A recent ad on Pinterest reads, “Fast fix for gray hair.” This simple statement implies that gray hair is broken or wrong in some way and needs to be fixed, yet gray hair is natural. In men, it’s often a sign of distinguishment and age, but for women, it’s a problem to be fixed. Why does our society promote this double standard between the sexes? I certainly don’t have the answer, but I know the societal problem is real and extremely widespread.

I got my first gray hair when I was pregnant with my youngest at age 28. I was standing in the master bathroom when I spied it in the mirror. My then-husband walked in the room, and I asked him, “Is that a gray hair?” He looked carefully, and then walked back out of the bathroom without saying a word. That gave me my answer! I talked about it with my midwife and her intern at my next visit. They confirmed for me that yes, it was a gray hair. The midwife asked me when my mother got her first gray hair. I had no idea. I told her that my mother dyed her hair with the awful-smelling toxic ammonia-based hair colors for as long as I could remember. My midwife pointed out that that was my answer as to when she first started going gray.

Twelve years later, I have a lot more than just one gray hair. My photos don’t often show the gray as it still blends well, but in person, there’s no missing it. My chemical sensitivities prevent me from dyeing my hair because even the natural dyes often contain less than tolerable ingredients for the chemical sensitive. I’m sure I’d look ridiculous with henna, too. But the bottom line isn’t that I can’t dye my hair: It’s that I don’t want to. My gray hairs are part of whom I am. They’re a mark of age. They show that I’m human. I’ve earned every one of those gray hairs, and I don’t want to get rid of them even if I could dump chemicals on my head.

Society isn’t as kind about gray hairs. I only have a few friends who don’t think that dyeing their hair is mandatory. They don’t want to look older than they are. These normally green living women aren't willing to face the way they look. They bow to society’s pressure to try to look younger than they really are. In the dating market especially, looking older is not considered a benefit for a middle-aged woman. Even though some of these friends are financially strapped, they still find the money for touch ups every three weeks along with regular coloring sessions. It’s not something they consider optional or a luxury.

I think a lot of the fear behind gray hairs eventually trickles down to a fear of dying. The older we get, we get closer to death at least according to a statistical perspective. For me, worrying about death seems kind of pointless. It’s going to happen whether we want it to or not. Rather than worrying about dying, I’d rather focus on living. Now that I’m almost 41, living with gray hairs doesn’t seem like a bad thing. Instead, it seems to be a privilege, a symbol of survival. One of my most recent past lives ended at the age of 23 or so, though I managed to pack a lot of living into those years. However, given the option, a few gray hairs don’t seem like that high of a price for a longer life!

When our society as a whole stops seeing gray hairs as something to be fixed, a lot will change. We will begin accepting ourselves and each other for who we actually are. Superficial things like hair color will no longer matter as we pick mates or apply for jobs. I'm not sure which will be the cause and which will be the effect in terms of gray hairs being seen normal and greater acceptance at large, but I look forward to a day when our culture has evolved enough to accept people exactly as they are, beautiful in their own ways.

© 2015 Elizabeth Galen, Ph.D., Green Heart Guidance, LLC

When I first entered the online dating world after my separation became official, I was excited by a world of possibility. I thought I’d found a thrilling new adventure. In some ways, I was right. I was fascinated by thewide variety of people who were on the various sites I checked out. I learned all kinds of things that I didn’t realize were true. One of the most shocking for me was discovering that a great number of 40-somethings hadn’t outgrown the lifestyle of going to Sixth Street (Austin’s primary bar district) to get plastered. I erroneously believed that most people outgrew that after college when they got jobs and (for some) their first families. Clearly I was wrong.

For the first month I was on one of the main dating sites, I spent a lot of time surfing profiles. It was only after that first month that I realized what I was actually doing: I was exercising my metaphysical gifts by “reading” these men. I would read a profile on a literal level, and then I would just know, “Hey, this guy has ADHD that he hasn't mentioned.” Then I would read his answers to the multiple choice questions associated with his profile, and lo and behold, I would find where he had declared that he did indeed have ADHD. Over and over again this happened, and what it taught me was that I should trust my instincts about what men weren't declaring in their profiles. My instincts were almost always right to the extent I could prove them.

On a less positive note, I learned that online dating is very much like being back in high school. It’s the skinny, pretty girls who are willing to have sex on one of the first dates who get all the guys’ attention. I stayed away from sites like the one that is superficially based only on someone’s profile picture appearance and instead focused on others which actually allowed me to learn something about the person whose picture I was looking at. Unlike most users, the pictures were the last thing I looked at most of the time. However, most of the people on these sites were still very superficial in their beliefs and behaviors, including the one site for spiritually oriented individuals that I checked out.

I also discovered that fat prejudice is rampant in online dating, moreso than in society at large. When I’m at a restaurant or grocery store, I have no problem getting men to at least talk to me casually about the weather while we wait in line. But online? The rules of the game are very different and very disturbing. Most men have no problem blatantly stating that they find overweight people disgusting and/or they wouldn't consider dating their dream woman if she wasn't a perfect weight.

I am one of those rare women who doesn't have any qualms about messaging guys who looked interesting at least as potential friends and possibly more. Some of the guys on the websites even pleaded for women to message them and promised that they would respond to anyone who sent them a genuine note. The reality was far different than that. I rarely got responses from men. The default acceptable practice in our society has become rudely ignoring messages. When I received a genuine message from a man who wasn't anywhere near what I was looking for, I would send a brief note saying, “I appreciate your message, but I don’t think we have enough in common to start a friendship (or more). Good luck with your search!” However, the vast majority of men just ignored my messages. To me, a comparable reaction would be saying “nice weather” to someone in the line at the grocery store, and the person you were speaking to would make a disgusted face and then turn around so their back was facing you. It’s just plain rude.

All those horror stories and blogs you've read about online dating making women targets for men’s lewd sexual behavior? They’re true, too. Even as one of the less popular women on the sites, I still received messages that were often generic notes sent to any possible woman that the male user could spam. Most of them were pointless one or two word notes that said, “Hey babe.” Others were more sexually explicit. One of my favorites declared, “U r 2 cute.” As a former English teacher and an over-educated woman, I need complete sentences from potential mates. Both one friend and I also thought when we read it, “Too cute for what?” 

Let’s face it: I am a woman who marches to the beat of her own drummer, and I wouldn't have it any other way. I have experienced things in life that most can’t imagine such as being bedbound for two years and homebound for six years. I've given birth to four children and seen one of them die. I graduated from college at 19. I've earned a Ph.D. I talk to dead people for a living. I have a great deal of self-confidence. I don’t wear makeup or subscribe to false societal ideologies about beauty. I am definitely very different, and what I found on dating websites is that different is not good. Rather than making a woman stand out in a positive way, these things scare off most of the men who use these sites.

I've known for quite a while that I wouldn't meet my next major love on a dating site: My spirit guides were quite clear about that. They've given me a general location where I will meet him that could be any one of dozens of places. I remain open to the possibility that might change and I might meet him elsewhere. However, I know that it won’t be on a dating site. Today, I deleted my last account. I am happy to be done with that experimental phase of my life. For a person like me who is very much outside the mainstream in so many ways, online dating is not the way to find emotionally and spiritually healthy men. I’m still perplexed at where all the fabulous middle-aged men are, but I’m certain that one day I will meet my match.

© 2015 Elizabeth Galen, Ph.D., Green Heart Guidance, LLC

If you want to know God, enjoy the company of lovers. ~Rumi, translated by Coleman Barks

I have an account with many boards on Pinterest that I use for collecting work related articles and pictures.  Because I have boards about relationships and spirituality, Pinterest will often suggest pins to me that are about traditional Christian marriage values.  While I can see where the algorithm is getting the idea these articles might be of interest to me, it couldn't be further from the truth in pinpointing my beliefs.

Lately I’ve been seeing quite a few pins that are variations on the idea that “True Love Always Waits.”  Someone in the Universe must be encouraging me to do some deep healing because this is a very touchy (no pun intended) issue for me based on my personal history. I was raised Catholic and attended an all-girls' Catholic school from grades 6-12. As is required by Catholic teachings, we learned that sex before marriage was a sin. We also learned that boys who pushed us for sex rather than waiting didn't really love us. As young women, we were not expected to actually want to have sex except under pressure from our dates.  These ideas are wrong on so many levels, and in many cases, they are psychologically damaging.

To start with, I do not believe that sex before marriage is a sin.  In my view, sex is an intimate connection between two people. I believe it is sacred, and I believe that it can bring us closer to God.  However, I also believe it can be a lot of fun and can help bond a couple regardless of their marital status. For many people, marriage is no more than a legal piece of paper. It in no way reflects the commitment and love shared by the couple in most cases.  It’s merely a formality for the sake of society.

The idea that sex belongs in marriage began for two different reasons. The first was a male dominated culture that wanted to ensure that the bride was a virgin who would only bear the fruit of her husband’s loins. The second was an attempt to prevent the spread of STDs.  The first is obviously irrelevant in today’s age of genetic testing. The second is still a legitimate concern, though we now have condoms to help with it.

When I was in high school taking a required love and marriage class in my senior year, the concept of sexual compatibility was not even remotely discussed. Sex was presented as having a magic formula of one man and one woman. With a little foreplay thrown in to satisfy the woman, that’s all that a couple needed to have a successful sexual relationship.  The reality of that couldn't be further from the truth. Sex between two amazing people who love each other can still be truly awful if the chemistry is not there or if their sexual preferences are not in alignment with each other. Getting stuck in an unhappy marriage without sexual compatibility is a realistic situation when one believes that sex should not happen until after marriage.  No amount of love or therapy can fix a situation like this.

Another topic that was very much omitted in high school and in our society in general is the idea of women wanting sex: That’s completely healthy and normal. However, if you pay attention to magazine article titles while standing in the checkout line at the grocery store, you’ll quickly notice that our society functions on a misguided belief that all women have low sex drives and all men have high sex drives.  Women aren't supposed to want sex in the same way men do. That means that for women who do want to have sex but are partnered with a man who wants to wait, they can end up feeling like misfits, sexual freaks of nature or undesirable women.

Another common line is that men only want sex for pleasure's sake but that they don’t really love women if they have sex before marriage.  Men wanting sex absolutely doesn't mean they don’t love the women involved.  It means they are human.  When men are wanting sex alone with no emotional involvement or commitment, women may find that situation to be problematic. However, there are a lot of variations between the two extremes.  Finding that fine line of knowing he loves you and wants you for more than just your body is hard, especially when one is young.  However, it’s entirely possible that a man may want to have sex with a woman before marriage to show his love and develop intimacy.

Then there’s that horrible idiom, “Why buy a cow when you can get milk for free?” This line implies that if a woman gives a man sex before marriage, he’ll never marry her.  Aside from the terrible idea of comparing women to farm animals, this saying denigrates both men and women.  Women are not objects to be bought or sold.  Not all men are unable to control their sexual urges nor are they out to just use women for sex.  Many do have good intentions at heart.

In today’s modern world, marriage is not always a viable or practical option. When my ex and I were dating, we were in high school and college; marrying would have meant that we would have lost our health insurance policies through our parents' employers. I have heard of other situations where elderly widows and widowers can’t afford to remarry because they would lose their late spouse’s pension and therefore would not be able to support themselves even meagerly in retirement.  I know another couple who has chosen not to marry because it would cost them tax benefits on the two homes they own, one under each of their names.  Sadly, finances are an important part of survival in our world.

In my own relationship with my ex-husband, the “true love waits” idea was a huge problem for us.  We both grew up Catholic; my ex was far more strict in his moral beliefs than I was, though.  (Ironically, he’s now an atheist.)  He came from a family where sexuality wasn't ever a topic of discussion except to say how wrong sex was before marriage.  Like most young humans, my ex deeply absorbed those views that were being presented to him.  The problem arose when my ex and I had been dating for far too many years to remain celibate (5+ years before we married). There’s no magic number of how long any couple should or shouldn't wait. However, in our case, not having sex actually became very damaging to our relationship after several years even though all those Catholic tales swore that having sex before marriage was the damaging thing. My ex-husband eventually realized much later that his previous views were damaging to our relationship, and he regretted them. His apology during marriage therapy gave me an amazing amount of relief, though it didn't happen soon enough to prevent a great deal of pain in our relationship twenty years earlier.

So what do I teach my children? I have taught them that sex is intimate and powerful. It can be amazing in the right circumstances but it also can be emotionally painful and damaging if it happens in the wrong circumstances. My general belief is that if you’re not willing to deal with the logical consequences of sex (getting pregnant, a realistic risk since no birth control method aside from complete abstinence is 100% reliable), then you shouldn't be having sex. It’s just basic logic to me. Once you’re in a place in your life where you could support and raise a child, then you should wait to have sex with someone who truly cares about you and respects you. That person should see you as a whole person, not just a body to provide physical pleasure. Sex should be a part of an intimate relationship with your partner, an act that brings you closer together regardless of your marital status.

© 2015 Elizabeth Galen, Ph.D., Green Heart Guidance, LLC

Lately I have been working on doing some groundwork for a singles' Meetup group that I will be starting in a few months; I will post widely when the group is announced.  As a result, I am perusing a bunch of books for the seminars.  In particular, I am looking for short prayers, meditations, and reflections on various topics that we’ll be discussing.  The following are reviews of a few of the books I have read.

The Little Book of Love by Kahlil Gibran and compiled by Suheil Bushrui is quite literally little measuring in at about 4” x 6” and having only 80 pages of content, many of which have abundant white space or dark illustrations.  This book must be aimed at young lovers because the font size is difficult for some of us who have crossed the 40 year age barrier.  Despite those issues, the book has a few beautiful quotes and would make a romantic gift or stocking stuffer for a loved one.  My heart would certainly melt to have a lover give it to me.  However, it seems to fall in the category of a “bathroom book” in my opinion: All of its short entries are easily read in brief sittings.

Quiet Mind: One Minute Mindfulness by David Kundtz offers approximately 180 short reflections for the reader.  This time the font is in a readable size!  Focused around the idea of finding quiet and peace in our crazy lives, the author approaches a wide range of topics from death to road rage to the arts to walking, all in two short pages a piece. The spirituality is non-denominational and refers to many different traditions throughout the book. I found most of the pieces (though not all) to be engaging and worth reading.  It’s an even better bathroom book than The Little Book of Love in my estimation!

Guided Meditation Scripts for Beginners by Amy Meyers and Sharon Whisler is a short e-book available in Kindle format for $2.99.  The book is great in some ways and disappointing in others.  The meditations are repetitive:  The four breathwork meditations are actually all the same foundation with a little more added on each time.  The chakra meditations don’t feel powerful enough to me to actually realign one’s chakras: They seem more suitable to simply bring attention to each chakra.  Many of the love meditations feel more like writing prompts than guided meditations, though one could argue that journaling can be a form of meditation.  However, several of the meditations will be perfect for me to use with my group.  For the small investment, I feel like I likely got my money’s worth.  It’s just not a book I would generally recommend to others looking to find guided meditation scripts.

The Celtic Spirit: Daily Meditations for the Turning Year by Caitlin Matthews is a compilation of 365 daily readings.  While the title asserts they are meditations, I think reflections or mini-history lessons are the more apt descriptions in many cases.  Some of the reflections are excellent; others are very weak, meandering through topics Matthews seems to have forced together in a way that doesn't feel natural.  Many of the readings were not engaging or thought provoking for me.  The topics also began to feel repetitious by the end of the year with multiple days focusing on topics such as trees and the grail.  The suggested “meditations” at the end of each reading are often actions, and some of those actions would take days or even months to complete.  While I appreciate those readings that were excellent, I felt overall the book was a weak effort.

Like many others, I am a fan of the poetry of Rumi.  There are many collections out there, so when I ordered The Book of Love: Poems of Ecstasy and Longing by Rumi and Coleman Banks, I had the expectation that this would be a book focused primarily on love.  In reality, only part of the book focuses on love.  Other sections focus on topics such as drunkenness and animals.  While I appreciated the academic tone of this book with helpful prefaces and footnotes, it simply wasn't what I was looking for. (The cover on the edition I received is also nowhere near as beautiful despite this being the promised edition.  It's a plain orange jacket.)

In contrast, Rumi: A Spiritual Treasury by Juliet Mabey was exactly on the mark.  A physically smaller book, the poetry contained in it is more accessible to the general population.  I loved the contents which actually focused on excerpts of spiritual poetry by Rumi.  The book is divided into various chapters on different aspects of the human relationship with God.  While the book is written in a traditional male perspective of God that doesn't fit with my personal beliefs, I was still able to enjoy its contents.

Finally, I thoroughly enjoyed Life Prayers from Around the World: 365 Prayers, Blessings, and Affirmations to Celebrate the Human Journey by Elizabeth Roberts.  The collection is grouped by topic rather than daily prayers as one might expect from the “365” in the title.  While it includes prayers and thoughts from many traditions, earth based spirituality is prevalent throughout.  The collection has many thought-provoking poems as part of these prayers.  Topics covered include all parts of the life cycle, moments of grace, justice, crisis and more.  I was captivated by most of the included works from start to finish.

I will be posting more meditation and prayer book reviews in April as I've got a stack of several more on my coffee table that I am working my way through!

© 2015 Elizabeth Galen, Ph.D., Green Heart Guidance, LLC

When children are young, they have no sense of shame about their bodies until older humans teach them that their bodies are something to hide.  Modesty is not a trait that we are born with.  Any parent of a toddler or young child can affirm that.  When my kids were little, we used to call my youngest “the gingerbread man” after a Joe Scruggs song by the same name from a musical calledNot Afraid of the Dark.  In that song, a young child has gotten out of the tub and begins his/her/hir nightly streaking routine:

"Bathtime's over; I’m almost a prune.
Get your pajamas on ‘cause it’s bedtime soon.
Mom dries me off; she holds my pjs out
But I run past her and then I shout
Singing, 'Run, Run as fast as you can.
You can’t catch me; I’m the gingerbread man.'
Mom’s chasing me, my pajamas in her hand
She can't catch me; I'm the gingerbread man.
I run past Dad. He says I look cute
Running by in my birthday suit.
Mom's getting tired; she hands my pjs to dad.
And this is the most fun that I've ever had."

Young children love being naked.  It’s their natural state.  Yet we as adults try to hide nudity from our children.  We consider it taboo for children to see naked bodies.  This is more a reflection of our own fears rather than a need to protect them from something that is completely unnatural and dangerous:  The human body in its most natural state is nothing to be ashamed of or to fear.

However, most of us grow up, and we become conditioned by society to hide our bodies.  Even more problematically, we become ashamed of our bodies, too.  We learn from the media, from movies, and from others around us that if our body is anything less than perfect, we should not show or share it.  While most of our society doesn't endorse burqas, we do have ideals about what a “bikini body” is and who is entitled to wear a bikini.

Here's a shocker, though:  Most bodies don’t look like Photoshopped models.  We come in all shapes and sizes.  Many years ago, I stumbled upon The Shape of a Mother when I was looking for photos of twin skin to explain it to someone.  (Twin skin is the abnormally stretched and baggy abdominal skin that many mothers of multiples end up with after their pregnancies are over.)  I was thrilled to see someone trying to normalize what women's bodies look like after pregnancy.  More projects like this one such as Expose Photoshoot by Liora K Photography serve to help normalize women’s bodies as beautiful no matter what shape, size, or color they are.  Books like This is Who I Am: Our Bodies in All Shapes and Sizes by Roseanne Olson further the cause of accepting our bodies as they are.  Women don’t have to be skinny and smooth to be beautiful:  They are already perfect in their own right just by being themselves.

As I have reentered the dating world, I've found a very bizarre dominant idea that many middle-aged heterosexual men want women to have “perfect” bodies.  The men want the women to be skinny, fit, and for lack of a better term, future trophy wives.  The men who are willing to accept women who don’t live up to society's ideals of a perfect body are few and far between.  It seems that most men have absorbed the idea that women should look like models even if the men themselves aren't in the greatest shape.  I've heard from male friends that it’s true on the other side of the fence as well:  Most women want men who are athletic or at least slender in build.  It's a sad commentary on our society when looks are valued far more than personalities, talents, and abilities. 

So how do we go about changing these false ideals?  Projects such as the above ones help to breakdown the distorted notions of beauty that have been created in our society.  Boycotting dating sites such as Tinder which place an emphasis on looks over anything is a way to help squelch such practices.  Most importantly, we need to be teaching our children that they are so much more than the shape of their bodies.  We need to teach them not to be ashamed of their bodies.  They are amazing people no matter what they look like.  If we teach them to accept themselves just as they are, then perhaps future generations will be able to change our distorted ideals which use specific physical standards to judge beauty rather than looking at the whole person.

© 2015 Elizabeth Galen, Ph.D., Green Heart Guidance, LLC

For my entire life, I have sworn that I will never move to California.  I have been absolutely certain that half the state is about to fall into the ocean due to earthquakes.  When my ex-husband graduated from grad school, we had two options of where he could work given his specialty: Silicon Valley in California or Austin, Texas.  Given the cost of living in California and my prejudices against the whole state, we stayed in Austin.

Fast-forward 20 years, and I was watching the original Superman movie starring Christopher Reeve with my kids.  Suddenly I realized my childhood viewing of this movie was the origins of my prejudice in California:  The whole premise of that movie is that Lex Luthor is planning to create an earthquake that will drop half the state into the ocean in order to create new ocean front property so he can make a hefty profit.  I sat there in amazement and horror as I watched the film.  Had one movie really influenced my thought patterns that much for the majority of my life?

More recently, Fifty Shades of Grey is a movie that is having a much larger impact on our society.  When the book by E.L. James first became popular, friends of mine who are active in the local BDSM community came out strongly against the book.  Many of these people are highly educated, and their first critique was always about how terribly written the books in the series are.  Several told me not to bother reading the series because the writing errors would make the English teacher in me crazy.  I trusted the friends enough to believe them, so I have never even perused the books.  I don’t feel like I’m missing too much.

The next critique from my openly kinky friends was that the books are not representative of a healthy BDSM lifestyle. As many reviews, blogs, and articles have noted, the book (and its subsequent movie) does not reflect the ideals of safe, sane and consensual sexuality. Rather, Fifty Shades of Grey promotes a damaged relationship based on abuse.  This is not the healthy ideal of a sexual relationship nonetheless a healthy kinky relationship.

So how does this play out in its influence on our greater American culture?  On one hand, by being an antithesis of positive sexual relationships, Fifty Shades of Grey has certainly promoted many enlightening discussions about what healthy romantic and sexual relationships look like. It has also brought attention to the abuse suffered by many women.  The more that these issues are discussed, the more opportunities there are for people to learn and grow.

On the other hand, there has been an increase of Christian Grey wanna bes on dating websites.  In some cases, these men are harmless:  They’ve been inspired by the movie to explore their kinky sexual sides.  More power to them for wanting to find out more about themselves.  However, in many other cases, it’s clear that something much more sinister is at work. There has also been an uptick in angry sadistic men looking to vent their violent emotions on women as they mimic Christian Grey.  In one profile I viewed recently, a very bitter man began his profile with a profanity laden tirade about how horrible all women are, but then he ironically wanted to find women who would submit sexually to his desires.  His profile picture was a teddy bear whose face had been eviscerated leaving Polyfil stuffing falling out.  I can only hope that any woman who reads his profile will recognize as clearly as I did that this man has serious issues and likely needs professional help, not a whipping girl.  This is the negative side of Fifty Shades of Grey:  People who feel validated in their anger and abusive actions against the opposite sex.  

Movies have a greater power to shape mass and individual consciousness than many of us realize.  Most people are well aware of the potential impact of violent video games upon children teens, but the impact of movies upon our consciousness is not as well recognized. Entertainment is not just fun:  It shapes our culture, our ideas, our desires, and our prejudices. The titillating nature of Fifty Shades of Grey propelled it to the forefront of our discussions, but let’s hope that it also creates a positive impact in the long run by shining light on the issue of abuse in our society. 

As for my part, I am now aware of the roots of my California prejudice.  Recognizing the basis of that fear of mine has liberated me.  I hope to travel to California in the next few years, and I've actually opened my mind to the possibility of even moving to northern California once my kids are grown!  

© 2015 Elizabeth Galen, Ph.D., Green Heart Guidance, LLC

(I was given a free advance copy of this book in return for an honest review by the publisher via NetGalley.  The opinions in this review are mine and mine alone.)

If I were a character in a novel, undoubtedly my fatal flaw would be anger.  For me, the struggle is in finding ways to healthily release my anger.  Thus, I take a great deal of interest in exploring new books on anger as I’m always happy to learn more about working with one of my greater challenges in life.

It’s an amusing paradox that a book about anger could create a level of frustration, almost anger, in its readers, yet that was my experience while reading Freedom from Anger: Understanding It, Overcoming It, and Finding Joy by Venerable Alubomulle Sumanasara.  While I read the first 15% of the work, I assumed this was a self-published book by a young twenty-something atheist Buddhist who was certain he foolishly knew all the answers to the world’s problems. His condescending and omniscient tone was a huge turn off for me.  Imagine my surprise upon Googling the author and finding his Japanese Wikipedia page.  He’s a 70 year old Buddhist monk whose works have sold over 100 million copies if the awkward translation is correct.  To say I was surprised is an understatement.

I had to quickly come to terms with the fact that Sumanasara and I have very different belief systems around anger.  He presents his system with a moral certitude of being right, yet certainty about being right is something he addresses within the work as an underlying cause of anger.  As I continued reading, I was able to think of countless examples where his belief system did not hold up to real world challenges.  For example, the author contends that anger and love are opposing emotions.  He strongly argues that anger is a choice and that we can refrain from it.  However, I have found that love is not a choice.  We can fall in love unintentionally (also known as unrequited love), sometimes even in situations where we don’t want to such as with an unavailable person.  If love and anger are opposites, then it would stand to reason that anger is not a choice.  Just as love is an emotion that we can choose to deal with in different ways, some appropriate and healthy and others far less so, anger is also an emotion that can be both used and misused.

The author seems as though he lives in a world of moral absolutes. He believes that everything is worth being happy about in life, and therefore there is no justification for anger.  However, I can very easily think of evidence to the contrary. For example, a young child killed in a drive by shooting while innocently walking down the street is not something to be happy about.  In Sumanasara’s system, the only other emotion is anger.  Is this not a situation when anger instead of happiness is justified?  In my belief system and those of many others, anger is not wrong, especially when it brings about positive change. Anger is a natural human emotion that we are meant to feel.  In this case, if the anger about the child’s death brings about gun control legislation or increased mental health support in the community, then the anger has served a purpose to motivate and bring positive change. However, if the anger served to fuel revenge and more violence, it would not have created that positive change and the anger would have been problematic.

Despite his graduate studies in Buddhism, Sumanasara seems to be lacking in knowledge of basic psychology regarding anger. Sumanasara gives an example about a person getting extremely angry after experiencing failure when making a new recipe.  Most American therapists would take that example and offer the suggestion that the anger about the recipe was actually misplaced.  When many of us get overly upset about something rather trivial such as a new recipe that is a failure, it’s usually a sign of other repressed emotional issues underneath which we are manifesting in anger when we can no longer repress our frustration.  Such an idea seems foreign to Sumanasara.  

The author also contends that we get angry because we believe we are right.  While there are times when this is true, I believe that overall, this concept oversimplifies anger far too much.  I believe many of us become angry because we've been raised in a society that models anger and angry behavior.  We simply don’t know how to work through our frustrations in other ways.  Not all examples of anger can be traced back to a desire to be right.
 
As I read the book, I began thinking of it as Vulcan Buddhism.  Perhaps I have been watching too much Star Trek with my kids lately, but Sumanasara seems to function under a belief system where emotions are illogical:  He believes that anger can be controlled by logic.  However, we are humans, and we are not fully logical.   We are also emotional.  Our emotions, both positive and negative, are an integral part of our being.  Sumanasara thinks that if one takes the position of not having emotions, then one won’t have anger.  Yet I read through this work, I kept wondering how many unresolved psychological traumas Sumanasara must be repressing in order to live what he is preaching.  Repressing anger only creates toxicity in the body. Even if we don’t want to, oftentimes we need to feel our feelings so that we can process them.

Sumanasara also harps on the idea that other people’s anger destroys our happiness.  Using his arguments, however, if we were strong individuals who had control of our emotions, then this wouldn't be an issue.  We would not let anyone else's anger create anger in us.  From my viewpoint, this is statement from someone making himself a victim because he states that he can't be happy when someone else around him is angry.  This is not a statement of someone who feels responsible for his own emotions or has them under control as he asserts is fully possible.  Once again, I believe the beliefs that Sumanasara is functioning under are contradictory and unhealthy.

While translation issues could be at work, I also felt much of the book contained demeaning insults against those whose behavior displeases Sumanasara.  He throws out covert attacks as well such as  when he proclaims that wise people have no desire to govern.  Sumanasara's views come across as blindly fundamentalist beliefs at times.

When Sumanasara began discussing using the silent treatment as punishment, he lost my respect completely.  First of all, most therapists and life coaches would argue that people need discipline, not punishment.  While we all make mistakes, we need to be taught how to change those behaviors or actions that cause ourselves or others harm.  Discipline conveys teaching whereas punishment conveys an attitude of humans being inherently evil.  Given the negative self-judgment that Samanasara encourages throughout the book with people labeling themselves stupid or failures, this attitude should not be a surprise to me.  However, I believe this is far from a healthy system for working with emotions.  Second, the silent treatment in itself is an awful way of trying to teach someone.  What that person will learn from being given the silent treatment is that the silencing person doesn't care enough about him/her/hir to work together to make a change.  The silent treatment is not a good way to make positive change in the world.  Once again, Sumanasara is taking a position of ignoring those things which cause him emotional discomfort rather than actually confronting the issues and working through them.

Some books that one does not agree with can still teach important lessons; they may contain small bits of useful wisdom. While I tried to view Freedom from Anger as an opportunity to learn from someone with a different viewpoint, I was less than successful.  The most positive thing I can say about this book is that it helped me to understand many of the young, arrogant, self-centered atheist Buddhists whom I have encountered on dating websites.  I have often questioned how they can hold the views they do while claiming to be Buddhists.  Sumanasara’s work gave me insight into the mental workings of these men.

After reading Sumanasara’s opinion on using the silent treatment as punishment 45% of the way through the text, I quit reading the book.  I was not learning anything useful from the book, and I was becoming more and more disheartened with each passing page.  If I hadn't been reviewing the book, I would have stopped long beforehand.  Freedom from Anger is definitely not a book that is in line with my healing philosophies nor would I recommend it to a client.

© 2015 Elizabeth Galen, Ph.D., Green Heart Guidance, LLC

Update 10/25/2019: It's been brought to my attention that Gary Chapman is homophobic and sees LGBTQ+ people as living a "lifestyle" choice. Please know that I in no way endorse those views. I believe all genders and all sexes are natural manifestations of humanity. Despite these horrific views of Chapman, there is validity in his theory of love languages, and love languages can be used and applied in same-sex or other queer relationships.

​**

When my now ex-husband and I were in marriage counseling trying to save our relationship, one of the very useful concepts our therapist introduced us to was The 5 Love Languages:  The Secret to Love That Lasts by Gary Chapman.  At that time, I did not read the book because one does not need to actually read the book to take advantage of the basic concepts of the five love languages.  However, because the concepts had been so important to understanding what had gone wrong in my former marriage, I felt as though I should read the book; I also wanted to use it for a spiritual singles group I am starting in a few months.

Through his years of work as a counselor, Chapman has devised a system of five "love languages" which he has found to be common to all humans regardless of culture.  While the dialects that individuals speak may vary within cultures, the five languages remain the same.  These five languages are (in the order presented in the book) words of affirmation, quality time, receiving gifts, acts of service, and physical touch.  Most of us speak one of these love languages as our primary love language, though occasionally some people are bilingual.  The love language we speak is the main way in which we feel loved, or in Chapman's words, it is how we fill our "love tank."  Unless we are getting our basic needs for love met, we will not be happy in a relationship.  To facilitate the process of discovering our love languages, Chapman provides surveys and other means for readers to determine both their own love languages and the love languages of their partners.

For those whose language is words of affirmation, they have a need to hear their partner verbally express praise, love, and desire.  Those who desire quality time want their partners to spend free time together talking or doing activities of mutual interest.  They want their partners to be truly there for them, disposing of digital devices while they are together in order to focus on each other.  Those who speak the language of receiving gifts want their partners to demonstrate love through presents: They may be expensive gifts or homemade cards depending on the individual and the financial situation.  For those who desire acts of service, doing chores such as sewing buttons on shirts or vacuuming the house are ways to communicate love.  And finally, for those who desire physical touch, they want to feel their partners' hands and bodies touching their own.  How they want to be touched will vary widely by each person's individual dialect.

With regards to my own relationship, we quickly realized that my then-husband was an acts of service person.  He felt that because he was doing the dishes and taking out the trash, he was telling me that he loved me.  I had never remotely viewed those acts as ones of love.  Instead, I viewed them as getting necessary chores done.  For my part, I speak the languages of physical touch and words of affirmation.  I felt that by telling my then-husband how I felt about him and by touching him I was showing him love.  He did not see it that way.  Thus, in the case of my marriage, since I was all but bedbound and no longer able to do acts of service for my husband, he had taken this to mean that I no longer loved him.  Since my husband was rarely touching me or talking to me, I had decided he no longer wanted to be near me or love me.  Clearly our linguistic differences created a huge hiccup in our relationship. 

Chapman correctly points out that we often try to meet our lovers' needs through the language we speak and not the language they speak.  This is where most relationships falter in his opinion.  Instead, what we need to be doing is making a conscious effort to do things for our partners that are spoken in their love languages.  In many relationships, rectifying the differences and working to meet our partners' needs in their languages can resolve the problems the couples are facing.  However, in the case of my ex-husband and me, there were too many other issues outside of the five love languages also contributing to the issues in our relationship.  Just speaking each other’s love languages was not going to solve our issues despite Chapman's belief that solving this crucial issue would help unravel many other problems a couple faces.

One of the largest problems with Chapman's theory is that it will not work for relationships involving narcissists.  Narcissists are individuals whose own needs far outweigh those of their partners (or so they think).  Narcissists only want to make their partners happy if their partners can be happy in ways that primarily meet the narcissists' needs and desires. For example, narcissistic individuals might be willing to take romantic partners to the movie if they express interest in doing so, but the narcissists will only be willing to see movies that they enjoy.  The concept of seeing a movie that their partners enjoy and would make their partners happy is incomprehensible to narcissists.  This extends far beyond seemingly minor things like movie viewing habits:  Narcissists will dictate meal choices, sexual activities, employment decisions, lifestyles, and more. 

Thus, Chapman's idea that if you give more to your partner, then your partner will then get his/her/hir love tank filled and give more in return is ultimately flawed when it comes to narcissists.  In narcissists' worlds, their views and needs are the only ones that matter.  The more that a non-narcissistic partner gives to a narcissist, the more the narcissist will demand.  Narcissists will make their partners' wishes and desires seem unimportant.  In the long run, the only one who will benefit from a system of giving is the narcissist since the narcissist will suck a partner dry long before ever contemplating truly meeting the partner's needs. 

I also felt a great deal of concern in the chapter towards the end of the book where Chapman helps a devout Christian woman to stay in an abusive relationship (quite possibly with a narcissist) using Biblical injunctions since he felt that was the only way to reach this particular woman.  Chapman believes this chapter proves that even an abusive situation can be turned around if the abuser's love tank is full.  I feel that it likely demonstrated that an abused person can be brainwashed into believing that having certain needs met justifies the abuse.

Despite these major holes in Chapman's book and theory, I still feel that The 5 Love Languages is an excellent book that should be recommended premarital reading for all couples; perhaps its contents should even be taught in high schools so that we begin learning from our earliest romantic relationships that it is important to get our own needs met in a relationship while simultaneously meeting the needs of our partners.  Learning the five love languages certainly has changed my view of how I understand relationships, and I believe it can do the same for many others as well.

(I've attached a very detailed list of questions I developed from this book that are meant to be used for a group discussion or for personal journaling.  Feel free to adapt them for your group's needs.)

© 2015 Elizabeth Galen, Ph.D., Green Heart Guidance, LLC

(I received a complimentary copy of this work from Hay House via NetGalley.  The opinions here are my own and are not influenced by anyone.)

I’m a fan of many of the Hay House authors, so seeing that publishing house associated with a new book induces me to try an author I might not have read otherwise.  In most cases, I’m pleased with the selections I read from Hay House.  This was not one of those cases.

In Love Never Dies: How to Reconnect and Make Peace with the Deceased, Jamie Turndorf, Ph.D., explores her newfound connection to the spirit world after the death of her husband, former Jesuit priest Emile Jean Pin.  As a former atheist, this new world of spirituality is an adventure for Turndorf, one she approaches with the blind enthusiasm of a young child after she conquers her initial misgivings.  After her husband’s unexpected death from a reaction to a bee string, Turndorf is surprised to discover her connection to her beloved Jean continues through their deep spiritual love for each other.  She writes that together they have a ministry to help others in processing death and connecting to those in the afterlife so that all involved may continue to grow and heal.

Love Never Dies does have a few good qualities.  It is simply written making it accessible to the popular masses.  The book also has the potential to comfort many in the first and last sections where Turndorf describes her experiences and the experiences of her clients as they reconnect with their deceased love ones.  The book brings up an incredibly large number of questions for a book group to discuss around life, love, healing and death.

From there, however, the book simply falls apart.  It’s repetitive and poorly edited starting with the weak rhyming poetry at the beginning of each chapter.  Turndorf proudly declares that she hadn’t checked out the “competition” before writing her book making it an all original work.  While there are merits to an untainted narrative, those merits are outweighed by the negatives in this book.  Turndorf’s lack of vocabulary to discuss concepts such as synchronicity weakens her arguments and presentation immensely.  The result is a book that feels like an amateur falsely pretending to be a professional.

Turndorf also is blinded by her own narrow experiences regarding the metaphysical world.  She only sees what she wants to see and doesn’t consider that there are possibilities beyond the definitive answers she purports to reach.  For example, Turndorf declares that demons or negative spirit entities might exist though she’s doubtful about it.  She thinks that if negative spiritual beings do exist, Jean protects her from them always.  Any experienced psychic, intuitive or medium who has worked extensively with the metaphysical will cringe at this naïve view:  In his Hay House publication Infinite Quest: Develop Your Psychic Intuition to Take Charge of Your Life, John Edward speaks extensively on the importance of spiritual protection when one is working with the other side.  Turndorf’s inexperience becomes dangerous as she guides readers into murky waters without life jackets.

Furthermore, Turndorf blindly believes that all the departed are willing to work on their faults and help their living loved ones heal.  This, too, is a declaration of an inexperienced practitioner who is, in my words, blinded by the white light.  Other gifted mediums such as me are able to encounter spirits in all their essence, seeing their soul level faults which do not miraculously heal upon entry to the afterlife.  Many souls choose not to work on their own healing in the afterlife, no differently than their course here on earth.  In those cases, Turndorf’s advice risks connecting hurting individuals with souls who will continue to emotionally and spiritual abuse them from the other side.  This is not only ignorant, but it’s dangerous and is the last thing a psychologist should want for clients.

Even on a much simpler and less dangerous level, Turndoff offers bad advice to those wanting to begin meditation as a means to connecting with departed souls.  Setting up beginners with the task of meditating for many hours is going to defeat many people before they even get out of the starting gate.  It’s far better for beginners to slowly introduce themselves to meditation to reduce the risk of perceived failure and to encourage successful future experiences which may eventually be longer.

Turndorf’s faulty logic is so convoluted at times that it is difficult to follow.  Throughout Love Never Dies, she contradicts herself on larger philosophical issues.  Turndorf presents the concept that things that happen more than three times are a scientifically valid result. Unfortunately, she fails to recognize that even if something occurs three times, it’s still possible to misinterpret information about those results.  Throughout the book, I feel she often misinterprets her experiences because of her lack of experience and narrow-minded views.  For example, Turndorf declares many times that we avoid loving fully because losing a loved one is so painful.  However, there are other possibilities for why we might restrain our love that she never even considers.  It’s possible that we don’t love fully because we don’t know how to.  It’s also possible that we don’t love fully because we don’t believe we deserve love.

This narrow perspective continues as Turndorf obsesses over her theories that she is metaphysically gifted because of her premature birth and three month NICU stay away from her mother.  She writes about high fevers and illness predisposing people to being able to being open to spiritual contact, yet she fails to examine the role of her own experiences with Lyme Disease in regards to her metaphysical experiences.  As a practitioner who has had Lyme and who works with many others who have Lyme, I would argue that the vast majority of people who deal with chronic or late disseminated Lyme Disease are those who are metaphysically gifted.  A little research outside of her own bubble would help Turndorf to see these other possibilities. 

As the book progresses, I found Turndorf’s words to her clients and to her readers to be cruel and potentially damaging.  I cringed as Turndorf relates how she said to a newly bereaved parent that “she could view this recent loss as a gift from the spirit.”  While this lesson is true on some levels, the way she phrased this to a parent who has recently lost a baby is heartless at best. 

Furthermore, comparing our pain to others’ is not beneficial.  Telling ourselves “it could be worse” demeans the pain we are experiencing.  Turndorf writes, “When we see someone in pain, we’re being invited to stop feeling sorry for ourselves and give thanks for the problems we have that pale in comparison.  Another person’s difficulty reminds us that we could have it so much worse.”  What she fails to contemplate is that some of her readers (including me in my not so distant past) will fall into that category of having things “so much worse.”  Having been told many times by others that they could look at my life and realize how good they actually have it, I can speak from experience that such an attitude does not help the person undergoing the trials.  The heartless response simply makes their pain increase.

If all of these issues aren’t enough, I found Turndorf’s basic psychological advice to be weak at best.  After 30 years’ experience in practice, she is not a novice.  She earned her Ph.D. in clinical psychology from California Coast University in 1994.  She is a nationally known psychologist using the pseudonym “Dr. Love.”  However, her personal relationship with Jean raised many flags for me as a reader and life coach, beginning with the fact that she was 21 and he was 58 when it began.  Turndorf claims that she and Jean had a perfect spiritual love, yet the aspects of their relationship she shares demonstrate a couple that struggled to love each other in their earthly forms.  She asserts that Jean was “one of the world’s true mystics” but he didn’t know he could be so close to her in spirit form.  This doesn’t build his credibility or hers.  Even Googling her late husband (who died in 2006, after the advent of the internet) does not turn up the abundance of hits one would expect from a man whom she claims was a one of the 50 most holy people to have lived in the eyes of the Dalai Lama.  As she describes their relationship after he “left his body,” Turndorf sees her late husband’s love as fulfilling her and becoming her own love.  Almost all psychologists would argue that seeking to use another’s love as a replacement for self-love is not a healthy approach in the long term.

Finally, in one of the experiences at the end of the book, she details of a client named “Mo.”  Turndorf uses guilt to trick Mo into working with her deceased husband.  This woman clearly has spent a lifetime being manipulated by others who prey on her overactive sense of guilt.  A healthier treatment option might have been to work with Mo to recognize her issues around guilt until she regained the self-esteem necessary to work on herself out of self-love.  The ends did not justify the means in this treatment.

Turndorf seems to think grieving is the only reason people need to connect to Spirit and those on the other side.  As she presents the issues in Love Never Dies, she fails to see how other tragedies can be more devastating and more impactful that grief.  Her narrow-minded and uneducated views result in a book that will help facilitate discussion about important topics but which ultimately may give some very bad advice to vulnerable readers.

(Attached below is a PDF of questions that could be used for book group discussions.  Feel free to alter or edit these questions for your own personal use in a group discussion or journaling.)

© 2015 Elizabeth Galen, Ph.D., Green Heart Guidance, LLC

The news media likes to pop up stories of craziness that come off of dating websites such as the story of this woman who got stuck in a chimney trying to break into the home of someone she met on a dating site.  Then there was the infamous Romeo Rose (legally known as Larramie Busby) of Austin who created a national 15 minute stir with his racist and sexist views.  He very much seems to have mental health issues, though he has vehemently denied that in his interviews.  He periodically shows up on one of the dating sites with a new profile, having invented a completely new fantasy about whom he is and why he is there.  He’s always wearing the same unique clothes in his pictures, though he does update the photos with new ones in most of his profiles.

In my experience, this craziness is not that far-fetched from reality.  So how can one keep oneself safe within the craziness that really does exist in internet dating?  There’s the practical and abundant advice that one can find on many other sites about making sure you drive yourself, meeting in a public place, not giving out your real name or phone number until you know the person, and making sure a friend knows where you are and checks on you during a date.  In my opinion, though, one of the first and most important things you should do is listen to your gut.  If something feels “off,” then it probably is. 

Regardless of whether something feels off or not, it’s a practical thing to check out someone on the internet before you go on a date with them.  It may not be romantic, but it’s a matter of safety in some cases.  The first thing you can do with any profile is to do a Google image search or TinEye search on the person’s photos.  I find that GIS is usually more successful than TinEye, though TinEye does occasionally show some things that GIS does not.  By installing the free plugins for these sites, all it takes is a right mouse click (with a PC-- I have no idea about Macs) to find any other recent copies of that photo on the web.  This often leads to business pages, Facebook profiles, Meetup profiles, and more.  Once you have a person’s name or preferred user ID, you can find out much more about them through a Google search on those specific details.

So is there really a point to doing that?  My experience says yes.  At one point when I was on a dating site, a local guy indicated that he was interested in me.  I checked out his profile since we were a similar age and had a few common interests, but something felt wrong about his profile, like part of his past was missing.  So I did a GIS on his profile photo.  It led me straight to this guy’s Facebook page.  As I read through all of his public posts there (including information about a previous relationship of his), my gut kept screaming that something was wrong.  He was a part-owner a business that was one that I don’t personally support, and so I was wondering if I was just being judgmental based on that. 

Armed with his name, I then did a Google search on that.  The first thing that popped up?  His sex offender record.  The person in the pictures was definitely the same—no chance of mistaken identity.  Suddenly all those gut feelings made sense.  I realize that there are occasions when an innocent person gets convicted for a he said-she said date rape scenario, but I believe that’s the exception to the rule.  I decided it was time to hide this guy’s profile on the dating website.

While the greater Austin area has almost two million residents, it still has an amazingly small town feel at times.  I swear that everyone in Austin has only two degrees of separation between them.  As a result, this sex offender went to the same high school as one of my closer friends which I discovered when I was decompressing with her about it.  Not only was she able to give me the details on his sex offender charges, she was able to list other alleged offenses of his that only made the picture worse.  He was definitely not the victim of a one time he said-she said situation.

Through this process, I learned that Facebook technically does not allow registered sex offenders to use its site, but someone has to report them first before they are kicked off.  This policy also presumes sex offenders are using their real name.  Some of the dating sites online screen for sex offenders; others do not.  Armed with the confirmation from my friend, I reported this offender to that particular dating site that he was on, and to their credit, they immediately removed his profile.  Of course, a few days later he had used a different email address but the same picture to set up a new profile. 

Your intuition can be one of your best defenses in protecting yourself.  The dating world is a scary enough place, but using the internet to help you can be a wise idea.  If your gut tells you something is wrong, then no matter how desperate you are feeling to go on a date, listen to that gut feeling and keep yourself safe.

© 2015 Green Heart Guidance

Recently while perusing profiles on a popular dating site, I came across a younger man who decided to list his best and worst qualities in his introductory section.  This isn’t an uncommon technique, but it’s not one I’d recommend because it makes such a weak first impression.  I'm definitely not advising that we lie about ourselves even though we all have flaws.  However, when introducing ourselves to new people in person, we don’t usually walk up and say, “Hi.  I’m Jenny.  I failed three classes in college and have had two traffic accidents in the past year that were my fault.  I bite my nails, too.”  Instead, we usually try to put our best foot forward.  First impressions count a lot.

In the case of this man, he actually lists some positive qualities among those he sees as negative things about himself.  He sees being introverted as one of his weaknesses.  Introversion is usually not a weakness or a defect.  It’s a personality type, and one that affects a significant portion of the population (including me).  It simply means you are fond of staying in rather than going out partying frequently.  For other introverts, that’s definitely a positive trait.

The man on the dating site also seemingly judged himself for having “little patience with frivolity.”  Depending on how he means that, I could see that as an attractive quality.  One could easily rephrase that as, “I prefer people who are well-grounded in life.”  I’m a woman who finds ditzy types a turn off, and I’ve long ago outgrown the giggly superficial adolescent stage that many females get stuck in.  So a man who sees this quality as a strength, not a weakness, would be attractive to me.

This issue of strengths and weaknesses came up often in job interviews earlier in my life.  I found myself answering the question, “What is your greatest strength?” usually immediately followed by, “And what is your greatest weakness?”  For me, they are one and the same depending on how they are used.  At that point in my life, I usually answered that my greatest strengths were my determination and my willpower, but if not kept under control, they became my greatest weakness of becoming stubborn in cases when it would have been better to become more flexible. 

I suspect for many others this is true as well:  Our strengths and weaknesses are opposite sides of the same coin.  Our challenge in life is to find a way to accentuate those strengths and grow beyond our weaknesses.  We all have our weaknesses, and we all need to work on them, but that doesn’t mean we have to brand those weaknesses on our foreheads.  Instead, we all need to focus on what amazing people we are, especially when we are trying to convince others of just that.

© 2014 Green Heart Guidance

So much of our society is prejudiced against obesity.  There are many false assumptions about those who are obese:  They are lazy, they are couch potatoes, they have poor diets, they are emotional eaters, they have no interest in health, and more.  Sometimes a mercy judgment of poor genetics also gets thrown in.  The repeating day-to-day encounters I have with this judgment throughout our society amaze me.  As a woman who has been both proportionately slender and fat as an adult, I really can notice a difference in how people treat those who are obese.

This post was partially inspired by an inspirational meme from Facebook. It quotes a Dr. Gould as saying, “Emotional eating triggers are usually based on a need to soothe emotional pain.  Perhaps, then, the next time we see someone overweight, or don’t like what we see in the mirror, instead of saying, ‘There’s a person who eats too much,’ we might say, ‘There’s a person who’s hurting too much.’”  When I first read that, I became livid.  I counted to a lot more than ten before posting a response similar to this:  “Obesity can be caused by a variety of issues, not just emotional pain.  Judging others in any way is not a healthy attitude.  Perhaps instead of focusing on an individual’s weight, we could focus on the beautiful person they are inside and out.”

Even as an obese woman who has herself pretty together emotionally, I’ve still faced many health practitioners who automatically assume that I binge eat or eat for emotional reasons.  For some of them, this is because they have emotional eating issues that they are projecting onto me.  For others, it’s just plain prejudice based on bad assumptions.  Once they discuss diet with me, they realize I eat amazingly well; my weight issues are due to Lyme, not food-based emotional outlets.

Likewise, this attitude against obesity is the pervasive one on dating sites.  One direct quote from a man on a dating site states, “If you are obese, chances are you are unhealthy. I want to be with someone who chooses to be healthy.”  While this statement does leave a little wiggle room, it’s still based in false ideology.  Just because someone is obese doesn’t mean they are mentally or physically unhealthy or that they choose their current body weight.  I have several clients who are obese but can run five miles or bike twenty.  They eat diets that range from moderately good to excellent.  They are healthy, physically or mentally.  But for some reason, their body won’t let go of that extra fat.

Another man on a dating site falsely presumes, “I'm cool with a little extra here and there, but for the most part I'm looking for someone that takes care of themselves--especially if it took them awhile to get into shape like I did.”  Being obese doesn’t mean that one doesn’t take care of one’s self.  It means one has extra body fat that may be there for any number of reasons.  Yet another dating site quote, which I regret not copying directly, generally stated, “If you are obese, we are poorly matched because of `life style differences.’”  This man is right, but for the wrong reasons.  He and I are not well-matched, but it’s because he is prejudiced, not because we have lifestyle differences.

Too few people in our culture are willing to look beyond a person’s physical attributes.  I firmly believe that we are souls with bodies, not bodies with souls.  What is within a person is far more important than what is without, and I’m not talking about gut flora, either!  When discussing good-looking men with female friends, I’m almost always baffled by some of their selections.  Because I am able to read a person’s energy as well as look at their appearance, I find myself far more influenced by their energy.  Men like Mel Gibson, Robert Downey, Jr. or Charlie Sheen who are considered good-looking by some are very unattractive to me.  Their energy is just not healthy.

Western medicine does not help with this judgment.  So many doctors presume that obesity is due to any of the causes listed at the beginning of this post.  However, this TEDex talk by Dr. Peter Attia is right on the money.  He’s realized though his own personal battle with health problems and incredibly rapid weight gain that obesity is often the symptom of the health problems, not the cause.  It would be great if more doctors and the media at large could realize this so that our society’s views on obesity can start to change.  Even though this TEDex talk isn’t short, I highly recommend watching it.  You may end up crying at the end as I and many others in the audience did!

© 2014 Green Heart Guidance

Two of my grandparents were alcoholics.  One recovered; the other died young due to cirrhosis from drinking too much.  Amongst their children, there were several heavy smokers and several very heavy social drinkers; at least one was an alcoholic.  And playing into traditional stereotypes, yes, they were of good Irish stock.

In the Catholic Church, if one accepts the communion cup, one is able to start drinking at age 8 or 9 in most cases.  It’s only a small sip of wine each Sunday, but it is exposure to alcohol.  By the time I was in high school at age 14, I started craving the alcohol in an insane way.  I knew my family history, and I realized that what was happening was not healthy.  I also knew that whenever I was stressed out, I turned to soda.  I felt like I was very clearly getting signs that my genetic predisposition to alcoholism was going to manifest if I didn’t make careful choices.  As a result, I began abstaining at that point.  Twenty-six years later, I still get cravings for wine based only off of communion cup exposure.  I also only tasted beer once in my life when a friend’s mom gave me a sip at the ballgame when I was 11.  I hated the taste of the beer yet I will still get cravings for it, too.

For me, it was the mature and responsible decision not to ever start drinking socially.  In retrospect with the knowledge of my health problems which have greatly impacted my liver, it was the best thing I could have done for myself.  I’m also grateful I didn’t have to give alcohol up when I started battling health problems; that is a struggle for many individuals.  Even if I wanted to drink now, my body wouldn’t let me without severe repercussions.

I do partake of supplements that are alcohol based tinctures, and most of them are filled with herbs that are so potent and unappetizing that there’s not much attraction to them.  I have to work consciously to fight the cravings from flower essences that are preserved in alcohol (usually brandy).  This is one of the many reasons I love Green Hope Farm flower essences:  They are alcohol free.

As an adult, it’s been interesting being a non-drinker.  It’s definitely influenced my social life.  I’ve never seen the point of going down to Sixth Street: The smell of urine, sweat, and vomit is just not my thing.  I also found it hard to socialize with many of my fellow grad students because they went out to (then smoky) pubs after classes late at night when I just wanted to go to bed. 

Several years ago, I went to a mini-golf party with my kids with some of their classmates and their parents.  The park allows BYOB as long as it’s not in glass containers.  While I was sitting there drinking my water and everyone else over 21 was drinking boxed wine, the parental group began complaining about people who don’t drink and how boring they are.  I was amazed.  As I relayed this to a friend (who does drink) the next day, he looked at me with a funny face and said, “Are we still in high school?”  That was definitely how it felt to me.

Even on dating websites, I am amazed at how many men “red flag” women who don’t drink at all.  It’s seen as a problem, even if it’s a decision made by choice for health reasons.  Quite a few men argue that life is not worth living if you can’t have a glass of wine or champagne with your partner frequently or even each night.  Everyone gets to make their own decisions around alcohol, though I wish others didn’t see the decision not to drink alcohol as a major problem.  It just means that I find other ways to unwind and to enjoy life while being sober. 

© 2014 Green Heart Guidance

One of the quickest turnoffs on a dating website is encountering a highly negative profile.  A guy who starts off his profile by saying, “I don’t date women who have blond hair.  I don't like women who are tall.  Fat women aren’t healthy, and I don’t like them.  Don’t live with your mother either if you message me,” is presenting a very negative vibration to prospective women.  Men aren’t alone in this negativity; many women do it, too.  While most of us do have preferences in what we are looking for in a potential partner, this negative presentation of ideals is likely to drive most candidates away.

There are many who believe that what we think is what we manifest.  If that is true, then it’s best to keep our thoughts as positive as possible.  Even if it’s not true, the expression of positive thoughts can shift our personal views of life by placing an emphasis on what is right rather than what is wrong.  It’s seeing the glass as half full rather than half empty.

An easy example is stating, “I don’t like broccoli.”  Instead, one could state, “I really prefer spinach to broccoli.”  It gives even more information and keeps the sentiment in a positive light.  Rather than saying, “I hate bicycling,” you could suggest, “How about we consider canoeing instead?”

Another school of thought argues that the Universe doesn’t hear the word “no” or “not.” So if you put on your dating profile, “I don’t want to be with anyone who has kids,” you’ll actually end up attracting a lot of people who have children.  Instead, try phrasing your request in a more positive light and without negatives:  “I’d prefer to date people who are childless.”  Instead of saying, “I don’t like conservatives,” you can state, “I find people with a liberal mindset incredibly attractive.”

While these seem like little things, all the little things add up when trying to make one’s life experience more positive.  This is something that is free to do, and it takes very little effort to do once you get in the swing of things. 

© 2014 Green Heart Guidance

Like many folks, I was immediately sucked into the catchy tune of “All About That Bass” the first time I heard it, but the longer I listened to the song, the more disturbed I was by the lyrics.  The best way I could come up with to articulate this blog post is in the form of a letter.

Dear Ms. Trainor,

I regret to inform you that your mama has lied to you.  She's right that most men do prefer more curves than an anorexic skin-and-bones supermodel can offer.  However, very few of them are Sir Mix-A-Lot.  They’re just not into the bass.  Unfortunately, the days of Rubens are long gone.

On one popular dating site, 90+% of men want a skinny woman.  By their own admission, the vast majority of those men won’t date an obese woman; a large percentage won't consider dating a slightly overweight woman even if she were their perfect woman in every other way.  It doesn’t matter if she is smart or funny or compassionate.  She’s got to be a treble.

Many people say that this is just a “preference” for slim partners that they can’t help.  It’s wasn’t so long ago that many people “preferred” not to associate with those in a minority group, and our society thought that was ok.  Let’s just call a spade a spade, shall we?  This "preference" is actually prejudice in most cases.  Yes, many of us find ourselves drawn to people who have certain characteristics, but to refuse to look outside of that type is no more than narrow-minded bigotry against those who are obese.

You may not be a size 2, but you are certainly not much more than a size 12.  As a matter of the fact, there are no truly plus-sized women in your video.  There is one obese male dancer wearing an ill-fitting shirt whose purpose is mystifying and objectifying, but then again, given how illogical most music videos are, I shouldn’t overanalyze these issues. 

I appreciate that you are spreading the message that “every inch of you is perfect from the bottom to the top.”  It’s definitely true that many women recognize “the magazine workin' that Photoshop/ We know that sh*t ain't real,” but other young and impressionable minds don’t yet know that those images of false perfection that they are confronted with all day, every day are fiction.

Perhaps instead of consoling women and telling them that their bass is ok you could focus on educating both men and women that all humans are far more than their physical appearance.  Their bodies aren’t what will hold a relationship together.  Instead, a person’s spirit, intellect, and personality are far more important.  I’d recommend you stop looking for a man who is concerned with your derrière and instead start looking for a man who respects your entire being.  You’re young, beautiful, and healthy.  If a man can’t look past a few pounds, he’s not worth your time and effort.

Sincerely,
Been There, Done That (and got the double bass t-shirt to prove it)

© 2014 Green Heart Guidance