I had the pleasure of visiting with a dear patient of mine yesterday. It was hard to believe that this was the same women who had walked in my door six years ago. She looked so comfortable. Finally at ease she has found peace in her life. When I asked her about the dramatic changes, she told me a story.
Seven years ago she wrote a poem. It was a list of what traits her perfect man would possess. She then rolled it up, put it in a bottle and sent it down the river. Guess what happened? Two years ago, he appeared. She didn’t recognize it at first because she had forgotten about the poem until only a few months ago.
The story got me thinking of this whole concept of ‘putting it out there’. I hear it all the time and often wonder why it works for some and not for others. This patient’s story gave me some insight. When she dropped the bottle into the river, she let it go. Not just physically either. She forgot all about it. She didn’t put a timeline on her perfect man list, just what she wanted.
This is where I think many of us falter in this ‘putting it out there’ concept. Take weight loss for example. Most of us can say, I want to weigh X lbs or be a size Y. Many of us add a qualifier though and say that we want it by Z date. So we ‘put it out there’, with strings attached. In fact, we never put it out there because we never really give it up.
Another area where I see this (and personally experienced this) is with fertility. We say, I want a baby and we decide when it should happen. Instead of trusting that it will happen in its own time, we try to manipulate and control it. This often only feeds the problem. And we hear the stories all the time about the ones who finally ‘gave up’ and then ended up pregnant.
Please don’t misunderstand me, I am not suggesting that we say what we want and then sit idly by. No, if I want to lose weight, then I need to be willing to change things. I need to be willing to feed my body healthy food, I need to be willing to move my body, and I need to be willing to give my body the rest that it needs. What I need to let go of, is the timeline. I need to be willing to follow the proven path until I get the results, no matter how long it takes.
So here are my final thoughts. Have a clear picture in your mind of what you want. Write it down. Envision it. Believe it. Then act in today. Do today whatever you can to take you closer to your goal. But leave the timeline up to ‘out there’. Because really, it’s not up to you anyway 😉
Yours in health,
Kerri Fullerton ND