“I want to eat!”

That’s what suddenly comes into your head.  If it’s not happened before in this abstinence, remember that acceptance of the disease involves realizing these thoughts do come.  The “muscle” we need to develop is the one that pushes this program in between the first urge and the action it wants us to take.  In the beginning, it might not come naturally, and possibly not happen at all when you first start.  Some of what will be proposed in future chapters, in the beginning, might be done after eating.  That’s okay.

Firstly, can you identify the thread or threads that are trying to elbow by you to get to the head of the parade?  Hopefully, you have taken some time to interview (or at least consider) your threads previously and developed some kind of an understanding of them.  Why do they want you to go eat?  What happened?  Why do they want to help you feel better?

One of the important ways it might work is by assuring whichever constituent part of your disease has arisen that you’re not telling it that it can’t continue on to the food when done.  The idea is just to delay it for a few moments so that you, the higher self, can have a dialogue with it.

This is where the concept of “the observing self” comes in.  The main shift in thinking involves looking at our thoughts, rather than from our thoughts.  Our thoughts might evaluate a situation perfectly, if they are not touching on anything that might skew our perceptions.

But… we have a disease that prevents normal perception in this one area.  This is where we need to learn to question our thoughts, which may be coming from our genuine selves, but which might also be coming from one of the tendrils of our disease.  This is where we need to utilize “the observing self.”

I will often ask clients “What are your thoughts telling you?” instead of “What are you thinking?”  That’s a subtle difference, but an important one.  It’s changing the viewing point from which these thoughts are seen.  “The observing self” involves the ability to ask yourself the same question – or more accurately asking the thread about its motivation.