What Would It Be Like?

Much of the work I do with my clients is about food, but also not about food. 

Because eating disorders involve food, there is much exploration about what this food means to me; your body, your story, your experiences and values around food. 

But there is also much to explore about what is going on in our lives and our nervous systems when we turn towards food, exercise, or other behaviors such as shopping or scrolling. Or what happens when we avoid food or movement. 

Often this work involves being exposed to the uncomfortable thing that we are turning away from– the loneliness, rejection, boredom, anxiety. Sometimes this involves actually doing “the thing” but at the early stages, these exposures look like imagining what it would be like.

This helps our nervous systems to experience the thing first, before we do it to help build tolerance to the very things we are avoiding. 

Imaginal exposures can also help open the world of possibilities to what is out there, beyond the stuckness. 

What would it be like if there wasn’t a perfect way to eat?

What would it be like to move your body without a calorie burn goal?

What would it be like for movement to be joyful?

It’s also a low-stakes way to practice curiosity in our everyday lives, which is key to transformation and the antidote to shame.

In what ways has shame or fear limited you?

What would it be like to “do the thing” in spite of (or with a softening) of that shame?