Those Pesky Compulsions
During this holiday time have you noticed that your compulsions are more present? Maybe it’s the compulsion to stay busy, or eat a lot of Christmas cookies, or go to Starbucks numerous times for an eggnog latte or buy extra bottles of alcohol. From one view, it can be very scary to see how compulsive we have all become. Over 70,000 people died last year from opioid overdoses in the US and even though for decades we have tried endless diets, we are heavier than we ever have been.
It isn’t only food, alcohol and drugs where compulsions are evident. You can be compulsive about most anything, all the way from busyness, to biting your fingernails, to OCD, to screen time, to keeping messy, to shopping.
From another view compulsions, rather than problems to be solved, can become teachers to be listened to, for they are one of the most powerful places where you can learn about and discover how to unhook from struggling with life. Why is that? Compulsions will not be healed through struggling with them. In fact, when you try to control them, they end up controlling you! But shift your perception just a bit and you begin to see that they are an invitation to move beyond struggling with life so that you can engage with it, rediscovering the joy of being present for life!
Many of you know that early in my life I was extremely compulsive around alcohol, drugs, food and self-hate. And yet all of them have been healed. My food compulsion does still come in tiny waves, but it is my teacher, my ally on this journey back to an abiding and trust-filled connection with myself and with my life.
What does that look like? I keep a bittersweet chocolate bar in my house at all times. Most the time I’m either not interested or I enjoy a piece or two. If you would’ve told me years ago that chocolate would sometimes stay in my house for weeks, I would’ve laughed hysterically. Now, this chocolate bar is my alert system. When I’m interested in more than a little bit, usually when I am stretched by life, it signals me that something inside of me needs my attention.
What a different way to be with our compulsions! Imagine for a moment what your life would be like if you saw that your compulsions are not here because you are doing something wrong or life is punishing you or you are just a weak willed ninny. They are here to heal you to your core. As I share this with you, I am feeling such joy. It is truly possible to heal and be healed by your compulsions.
For the past six months, I’ve had an exhilarating time putting together this new way to be with compulsions into an online course, Being Healed by Our Compulsions, which will be offered for the first time in January. If what I’m sharing with you intrigues you, I invite you to CLICK HERE and listen to this short Masterclass video. It will give you a sense of what we will be exploring as we gather together to shift our relationship with our compulsions.
If it isn’t time for you to do the course, CLICK HERE for the introduction and the first chapter from my book The Gift of Our Compulsions. May it help you to see that you are not bad or wrong for being compulsive. Instead, your compulsions are here to guide you out of the world of struggle and back into the joy of being fully alive.