What does "support" actual mean?

Susan Peirce Thompson often tells people who relapse that they more "support." But ... what does that actually mean?

I was thinking about this listening to a recent coaching call. Susan usually uses "support" to mean other people: buddies. Mastermind groups. Making three phones a day. Finding someone who has really strong bright lines and asking them to be a buddy.

For an extrovert, I can see why these would be terrific.

As an introvert, they didn't work at all for me.

I had little success with buddies. One of my buddies dropped out because her family went through a terrible loss. Another was so condescending that I found myself feeling worse after talking with her. Another was wonderful but I found myself pretending to be doing better at BLE than I really was because I just wanted to get the daily check-in over. I dread phone calls, so a required three daily phone calls would push me right out of BLE.

I also never even found the FB BrightLifers group as helpful as I'd hoped:

-- People posting about their BLE victories just depressed me because I wasn't having any victories.
-- People posting about their BLE challenges just made me feel sad with them.
-- When I posted, I tended to get a lot of "rah rah" posts that felt good but didn't actually give me much help.

But I did eventually find the support I needed. It wasn't from contact with other people. Here's what support looks like for me:

-- Writing a regular blog post.
-- Listening to BLE and sober podcasts.
-- Reading sober blogs (god, I wish there were more BLE blogs).
-- Practicing extreme self-care (saying no, frequent baths, getting to sleep early, giving myself small non-food treats for staying sober)
-- Taking workshops and reading books all the time -- on meditation, yoga, self-care.

In other words, support can take a lot of different forms. That's why I made a list of my 40 favorite sober eating tools. You can find it HERE. In my view, any one of these tools is a powerful form of support.

The key to success is finding out what support means for you.

Try lots of things. If you've relapsed, try doing 5 things. If that doesn't work, try 10. Try different things. Find the support that works for YOU.

Disclaimer: This site is not officially affiliated with Bright Line Eating or Susan Peirce Thompson. The opinions expressed here are entirely my own.

Katharine Hepburn is my BLE role model

I love biographies, especially of people who knew how to be their person. Recently, while reading a biography of classic film actress Katharine Hepburn, it suddenly dawned on me. This woman is a BLE rock star.

No, she obviously didn’t know of BLE since, of course, it didn’t exist. But a surprising number of things about her life absolutely fit the BLE recommendations. Consider this:

—     She always incorporated a lot of vegetables into her meals. According to one of her staffers, she insisted that dinner include three different vegetables, in addition to whatever protein they were having. It would be easy to get up to 14 oz. of veggies when you prioritize them like that.

—     She valued sleep over almost anything else. She was known for getting to bed really early. She once said, “I think trying to be fascinating at 8 o'clock at night is my idea of something absolutely hellish.” A minimum of 7-8 hours sleep (9 or 10 if I can manage it) has been critical to my BLE success.

—     She minimized decision-making about clothes. Like Steve Jobs, in her later years she had a daily outfit and pretty much stuck to it — khaki pants, a white or black turtleneck, a red sweater and clogs or loafers. Not having to make a decision every day about what to wear meant she experienced less willpower depletion.

There are plenty of others, but I’m guessing that even someone who incorporated just those three habits would be well on their way to living happy, thin and free.

If you're struggling, it might help to think about your BLE role model. Find someone who inspires you and then, in tricky situations, ask yourself, "What would my role model do?"

Disclaimer: This blog and I are not officially affiliated with Bright Line Eating or Susan Peirce Thompson. The opinions expressed here are entirely my own.