How to Set Hope-Filled Goals in 2026 Without Obsessing Over Weight Loss: Feat. Amy Carlson

00:00:02
Speaker 1: Life Audio. Hey friend, Happy New Year. Heather Creekmoar here. I'm glad you're listening to the Compared to You podcast today. Today I have one of my absolute favorite guests joining me to talk about the new year thoughts and resolutions you may have about getting healthier this year, and why so many of those thoughts are probably good and rooted in a good place. But how we can make sure as Christian women that we're truly pursuing what it is we're called to pursue. And Amy is an eating disorder expert. She's a dietitian, she got a master's degree and this stuff. She's licensed dietitian. She's been working with women for decades around food and body issues. And she's so insightful, and she's so kind, and she's so gentle, and you're just going to love what she has to say today. This is new staff, friend, We're in a new era. We are, well, it's not new. It's kind of like the nineteen nineties have come back and everyone's shrinking around us. So what do we do? How can we think about this rightly? How can we pursue our health goals without being so distracted by those around us who simply aren't eating. Old friend, You're gonna love what's ahead. I'm glad you're here for it. Here forty Day Journey starts January twentieth. There are still spots available, but it's filling quickly, so go to improvebody image dot Com look for the forty Day Journey tab and you can join us on our next forty day journey. Also, I have a free gift for you this year. It's a late Christmas present of sorts, but it's a mini course called Obsessed Too Blessed. If you're tired of being obsessed over body image stuff, go to improvebody image dot com backslash Obsessed hyphen Too hyphen Blessed and you can find that mini course, sign up, download it for free, and get started on your journey to body image freedom. Now let's get to today's episode. Amy Carlson, Welcome to the Compared To podcast again again.

00:02:28
Speaker 2: Oh Heather, I'm so happy to be here as always.

00:02:31
Speaker 1: Okay, what I just realized, though, is you were only on the show one time last year, and that is just inexcusable. So apologies for that, and I know the audience is like, yes, yes, hello, that was wrong. You needed to have Amy on more last year, so sorry that that was a fail in my part.

00:02:49
Speaker 2: So I'm so excited to be back. I'm so excited back. Actually, it's such a pleasure when I get to come on here. So actually, thank you for inviting me.

00:02:57
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, I am just excited is January, and I'm excited that maybe we can have a hope filled conversation. I like that for the woman who's like, Okay, well there's actually I don't want to just limit it to one woman, because there's you know, we've got lots of different listeners, right, but I know that there's probably some women out there like me who always every year took this opportunity to jot down some goals. Right, here's what I want from twenty twenty six and for me every year. Yeah, and I would I would love to say that my first goal was like spiritual growth, and number two was like loving people better, and then number seven was lose weight. But that's not actually the way the goal list read. It was number one was lose in certain number of pounds here, and it became my purpose for the year. And I I've grown in my journey where I don't do that anymore, right, But I have a feeling, so back to these categories of women, right, the feeling there's women listening who still did that, who did that a couple of weeks ago, and are like, yep, got it. Check, And then there might be other women who are like I stopped doing that, right, Like I've I've kind of grown, I've developed more freedom. But now I spend five minutes on social media and everyone I know is taking the shots, they're own gelopi ones, They're shrinking, And now I'm feeling like, I don't know, maybe maybe that should be my goal for the year. Otherwise I'm gonna be the one who's bigger than everyone else. I don't want to do that. Amy, give us, give us some hope, give us some perspective, like ground us, ground us where we need to be grounded as we start off this year.

00:04:52
Speaker 2: I love that sentence that you started with that we would have a hope filled conversation, and that actually is exactly what we intend to do, is for people to feel hopeful and just in that what you just those few sentences, you just like we could unpack fifty two things because a few things one I think it's really natural at the beginning of a new year. It often happens for women at the beginning of the school year as well. We just sort of have that natural sort of Okay, it's the beginning of something, So beginning of the school year or beginning of the calendar year. I think it's really natural to reevaluate, and I think it's really exciting. As believers, we would maybe even use that language of examine where we would just let the Lord search our hearts and know us and really reflect on twenty twenty five and say, God, what are areas of growth and what are areas that I had anticipate I hated growing in or really really thought last January that I was going to really dive into and wow, didn't even touch them, you know, didn't even go there. And I think about that verse, you know, without vision, that people perish, and so I think what is exciting is I think this is a really natural, beautiful thing, and especially for women who can be very project and organized and right, and it can be very helpful in community when you think about a small group or friendships that are just spiritual friendships, and I think the risk what I hear you saying and what I for sure am seeing in my office and it was certainly. I mean if you looked back at calendars. I know we've giggled about this before, but my calendars would have this like I would have a big circle, you know, eight weeks from now and then you know, be exing it off every day, the old like Hallmark calendars that once again maybe without kittens up and you're just like, wow, I didn't know I liked kittens and until they came on my calendar. So I think I think the risk is even for women who are walking in ever increasing freedom that right now you said it, and just a couple of seconds ago, was am I getting left behind? I thought we were. I thought we were all in this together. I thought we had decided collectively as women that we were gonna walk in freedom and we were going to choose this thing. And then all of a sudden you're like, oh, oh, oh, I think I'm getting left behind. This is this is a lot of anxiety. I'm getting left behind in my weight? Am I Am I doing something wrong? I get that language a lot in my office. Am I doing something wrong? I must be doing something wrong? And so what a great conversation for you and I have, and I I have this story that I you know, I always come with my stories to your your podcast. But I was in a public restroom not so long ago, and I was washing my hands and these two women ran into each other in the bathroom. I didn't know them, and the younger woman said, oh, my word, you look so good. And the other woman opened her mouth and she I could tell she was older, and she said, oh, thanks, honey. Thinks she said, I'm just three pounds from my high school weight of one hundred and eighteen pounds, and so I have three pounds to go. And I, I mean, you could imagine what I wanted to do. I wanted to have an intervention, but instead I just briefly turned around and I could see she was maybe in her seventies. She was maybe in her seventies, and my heart was broken. I walked away. I actually got teary eyed because I thought, oh Lord Jesus, please let me not be in my seventies, right, and let the women that you and I get to talk to not be in our seventies and managing, micromanaging three months. And first of all, she's held on to a weight from high school. How many years ago was that. So all I could see was this video montage of all the experiences of her life that she had missed. And so part of this hopeful conversation is not what am I going to do to get this thing? It's what am I going to miss if I choose that?

00:09:22
Speaker 3: Right?

00:09:22
Speaker 2: So even if if we if you just sat right now with your journal and you thought, Okay, I'm super tempted to create a whole project out of my weight in twenty twenty six, or I'm going to start this thing, and you know, oh it's so tempting. I'm not going to tell anybody because everyone knows I'm trying to use this differently, right, But what if you just sat in journal and just ask the question, what am I going to miss if I invest my time in that? What parts of my life will suffer if this becomes the priority, and just sit with that for a second. Let's linger and ask those questions and even do it in collaboration. I'm there's no question you have these amazing podcast listeners that come back time and time again, and many of them probably have certain maybe even know each other, and they could ask those questions together, you know, yeah.

00:10:16
Speaker 1: Yeah, sorry, you got me thinking, and now you're waiting for another question, like, I don't know, I'm still chewing on that. We're lingering.

00:10:25
Speaker 2: We're lingering, I mean, and the reality is, I mean, you know, I get I get a little bit in my in my spirit, I get a little right, I get a little in my spirit. And I was in session this week. I asked a client if I had permission to share this. I said, mmm, i'llmost share that this week, I said.

00:10:46
Speaker 1: She said, oh, please, jare it for sure?

00:10:49
Speaker 2: But we've been working together for a couple of years, and again, coming out of the die culture, probably twenty years, I think, was really really deeply embedded in the diet culture, and just she's coming on this calendar year of just unbelievable letting go and sanctification and letting go of all these things and being so deliberate about this I'm going to call it recovery process of letting go of any social media, letting go of even some relationships that were solely built around dieting and those right, and being so intentional on letting the Lord do that work in her life. So we were actually talking about this new position she had taken at her church, which she never in a million years would have thought she would have been worked at a church, and all these different things. And I just stopped and I looked at it. I said, can you imagine this basketful of fruit that would not be here if your time had been solely invested in what it had been invested for the last twenty years, which was perfect eating the next diet. And by the way, in those twenty years, she never reached that whatever that magic goal it was in twenty years, She's never even she never reached it. It was always this you know, looney tune cartoon mirage and the desert that she was chasing. And she and I both got teary eyed, and she just said, oh my word. And so I said, I just see this tree with all of this fruit, and I said, and I have this visual of you pouring into this one tiny section of your garden for twenty years, and it just it just never grew. It just never grew. And when you when you said okay, I'm done, I'm done, and you let the Lord do all this other stuff, I said, it's all growing. You have this flourishing, beautiful garden that's bearing fruit. And she and I just looked at each other. She goes, I just she said, I can see it. This this fruit was just stunted. There was no like, there was no effort, no prayer, no time and attention to these other things. I mean, her life is so full, the marriage, her relationship with her children. Again, this thing's giving some things that had happened to both of her children pull her aside and said, Mom, we want to affirm the work that you've done. You're not the same person as you were when you're growing up. And she just was teary eyed, and they just said we see it. We see and we want it and we write and it's like, why would we sacrifice that right? Why would we? And we do right? We over year after year year away.

00:13:40
Speaker 1: Well, because the liar is very good at telling us that it's not. Your life is not going to become more small if you try to chase being small, which is exactly what it will do. But I think his narrative is your life is going to start tours or to fly open. Amazing wonderful things are going to happen if you could just spend just a little bit of time, you know, a couple of weeks a couple of months working on getting to be small, then whoa, the floodgates of blessings are going to come pouring over you. And we believe it, right, or or we believe it for like eight weeks and they were like, oh, it's not working. And instead of thinking it's not working because this isn't actually the path I's supposed to be on, it's not working because I'm doing something wrong or I'm just not good at this, or like it becomes a self defeating mentality. Yes, right, but I think, like you know, to your client story, it's like, whoa, it's so true. We we have to see that a life lived for weighing my high school weight, right, a.

00:14:53
Speaker 2: Very small life IV that language life, right, I like that language. Actually, I think that actually it's really important language. What you just used, this idea that the enemy is always the enemy, right, and he was good, it's actually really good at when. Yes, and that mirage and the lie that my life will begin when in fact, I would again journal prompt. Hello, just writing your journal, ladies, women, men, if you're listening, writing your journal, My life will begin when because that I just told you, she never reached that weight, right, like never, never, not the one that she really was. She kept losing weight and all those things, but my life and by the way, she's incredible. She's just incredible. And and to see when she comes on, we are virtual and when she comes on, I'm like, you're radiant. You're just absolutely radiant. She is. She's just absolutely radiant. And I like that language of the mirage or the lie. The expectation is my life will begin or open up. And again I'm going to clarify, which I always do. This isn't to say that people can't want to lose weight. There's nothing in anything that I am ever saying that. If you're like, you know what my body feels, you know whatever, And again that can be a whole nother podcast that we talk about. So it isn't that I'm bad for wanting to lose weight or I'm less spiritual because I want to lose weight. No, absolutely not one of the things. Though, that is happening, and I just these conversations are in my office again this week. Is that that is the primary conversation that's happening in church around tables. Right, What am I restricting? They wouldn't use that language, right, but what diet am I falling? But what am I restricting? And also what am I eating? I had a client command and she goes so sick of people talking about what they're eating, or so sick of them saying, Oh, I just need to lose a few more bounds, you know. Oh I'm so frustrated I And she said, why is that the most important thing that is true about us? And so having goals around our health just in general or wanting to you know, oh I haven't. I had a label tear this year and also had a meniscus here, so just thumbs up for all that. Right, So this last year and a half, I, you know, went in the MRIs on both things separately. Exciting and right. I go to the krupt the double doc who's got the whatever, and he's like, okay, we can send you here and you can potentially get surgery for both of these. These are separate, separate conversations, but neither one is a must for surgery. So but you can do that if you want. And this is how that looks, and this is how it looks if we do pretty aggressive PT. Well, my goal was to repair and to recover from a label tear and a tormentous because I'm not ignoring that health goal. That's not I'm not vain because I would like to use my shoulder and guess what I can't. Actually, I could not let this. I couldn't get my arm back this way, and now I can and I could even put it behind. Yay, you're very excited. Goal accomplished. Goal accomplished. And so it is not weird that we have goals or expectations around our body or even around our eating. You know, right now, fibers coming into the spotlight, which my husband is so sweet. He's he said, I'm sure you know this already, but I read anol so sweet. He said that more than protein, they're saying.

00:18:44
Speaker 1: Fiber fibers back.

00:18:46
Speaker 2: I think it's so sweet when he when he gives me nutrition information, I said, you know what, honey, it's true. And I said, and I said, one of the things that happens is the poor carb manufacturers. They can't get they can't get carbs to come back. But I said, but fiber is a different word, right, and that's gonna sell, right, it's gonna sell. So I said so, and he goes, oh, really, I said, yeah, those poor you know, people who manufacture carbs are like, for the love we get, can the grains come back? And I said, so fiber is another way to say, and he goes, oh interesting, I said, not that we don't need fiber. I said, but now the fiber is going to take this glorified rule, you know, And we can have that goal. We can say, you know what, I don't need a darn piece of fruit. I'd love to do that. I'd love to or I'd like to eat more seasonally, you know, I'd love to maybe reduce the amount of travel time my food has to take. Great, let's eat seasonally. I'd like to make new recipes. I'm always in sessions we talk about meal planning because it's so helpful for our mind space when we have an idea what we're going to cook in the evening. That's not disorder, that's not weird.

00:19:56
Speaker 1: Mate.

00:19:57
Speaker 2: So these are all lovely things. They don't I have to be the number one thing that we're talking about in every circle hoops. And then they also don't have to be right the most important thing I'm doing. I don't have to be the most important thing I'm doing. But it doesn't make us less spiritual because we want to.

00:20:14
Speaker 1: Be healthy, right right. I love that. And I'm actually I was laughing at myself a little bit because I vividly remember sitting in It's just like a turning point in my life because I was a I don't know if there needs to be a term for a food sharer or a food diary sharer or somebody like I was the person who would just casually in conversation with my husband or when he was my fiance boyfriend, you know, so he would understand that it was okay for me to eat whatever I had ordered. You know. I was the one who would be like, well, you know, I didn't eat anything until noon, and then I just you know, had a small salad and said, that's why I had to order this, you know, steak and potato and all the things. Like I was that person. And I was at we were at a hotel and it was the hotel breakfast, and I was sitting like they were like cocktail like high tables, and I was sitting kind of pretty close to the person beside me, and I heard her rattle off to her boyfriend husband everything she'd eat me yesterday. Wow, And it just it it really got me. I was like, that is the craziest conference over ear Like he looked like he couldn't have been more bored, He could have cared less what she had to eat.

00:21:31
Speaker 2: All they like, I don't even know what you're saying, girl, And so.

00:21:35
Speaker 1: That was a turning point for me. I was like, wow, I need to stop doing that. That's kind of ridiculous. And of course, like I was doing it to make sure that he knew it was okay for me to eat because I hadn't eaten too much or all those things. In anyway, I'm kind of taking us off on a tangent.

00:21:51
Speaker 3: Here from where we're going, but it kind of makes me want to go back and hug that, because honestly, right, of course worse I mean again, if you and I could go back and dig up those old right food journals and food over and over and over and.

00:22:08
Speaker 2: The evaluation, the over evaluation, right, I mean, the over evaluation of of of whatever, and again these I know we've got this conversation on here before. I just think it's funny because I'm a little older than you. But when we were in that era, right, fat was the demon, right, I mean, when you think about potato chips that had lestra alestra made you a diarrhea?

00:22:33
Speaker 1: Right, oh wow?

00:22:35
Speaker 2: Right, and you think that sounds insane. I mean it sounds now sounds And of course my young sweet clients, they're like, what are you talking about? You know, give me an avocado, give me some nuts. You know, they're they're they're over, They're just like, what is that even? But I use it so often to go if that sounds insane today. And that was research quote unquote right, the topic, preology, just science, everything. Okay, so let's I'm like, let's think about it. Let's think about it. It's always comes back to moderation. In fact, I said this to somebody this week. I said maybe it was my husband, and my husband right that it actually nutrition actually doesn't change. The cultural rules change. So how it's been for fifty years, how it's been for one hundred years, how it's been for great whole food variety? Right, just a lot of different I mean, and again that's not we're not talking about perfect eating. But the overall kind of science crux is the same. It's the same. And so but the food rules change, and the cultural biases change, and food industry and what it's pushing and what it's what's what's being magnified right changes, And so it's like, wait, if I can recognize it's not like, I mean that was all food industry driven, the fat, the no fat, I mean that was all So it's.

00:23:58
Speaker 1: Like even the low carb I did an episode. I might have even been last year on. There's a book called low Carb Fraud, but it exposes how it wasn't a doctor or a scientist that actually perpetuated the low crop. It was a guy who wrote a book. He was a journalist, and he took a study that no one else interpreted the same way. He interpreted the study in a particular way to make his point in a book. And now your doctor will prescribe that you be low carb based on the work of a journalist.

00:24:32
Speaker 2: On a journalist. Right, That's that's exactly right. And honestly, what's interesting too is there's so much siloed research that people are filling their mind with. Oh and again there's no judgment here. I can understand people who who are having write their symptoms and different things and they're trying to figure stuff out. But there is so much I'm going to call it pseudo research with experts that are and there are a lot of them kind of saying the same thing, so that you start to go, well, this must be accurate, this must be true, and it's unsustainable actually, so that so many clients come in so burnt out, so exhausted, and so defeated because they feel like, if I cared about my health, I should be able to do this thing, if I really cared about my health, But I can't, and I don't know why. I'm such a you know, and it's like, well, first of all, it's unsustainable. It's it's and it's unrealistic, and it's unhelpful. And what looks more moderate and more just like yeah, this is this is totally living. And again going back to the woman that was three pounds away from high school weight, which actually just makes me just want to cry. It's like how much life did she miss? And and is she more healthy? By golly, she's in her seventies. Well done, great, well done, you're there, you're there.

00:25:57
Speaker 1: Yeah, Yeah, Well what did it cost?

00:26:00
Speaker 2: What did it cost? Yeah?

00:26:02
Speaker 1: And is food supposed to be this hard? Yeah? I mean I think that's that's you know, that's really a question that you have to wrestle with because it does feel like growing up in this culture, it feels like food is supposed to be hard, and food is supposed to be something that, especially if you're a woman, you spend a lot of time trying to figure out and optimizing and you know, optimizing, and so it's like, whoa was it supposed to be this hard? Like is this like? Yes, it's actually supposed to be. It's big a part of my life. Yes, I've made it.

00:26:38
Speaker 2: And it's really really driven by consumerism. You know, back in our day. Excuse on our day, you know, you would buy a book and you'd read the book and then maybe there might even be a book club about it, right, and maybe there were some products, but it was. But now you're inundated twenty five seven and you and I've had this conversation again. It's probably a different podcast, but a different episode, I should say on here. But you know, a couple of years ago, there was a culture a little bit more of I'm going to say, maybe the health of every size, and just a lot more body acceptance and body neutrality. Well, with the rise of right chats, there is now a culture of emaciation and it starts in Hollywood. It's there, it's it's it's you know, influencers and and and so. What was once this kind of joyful acceptance that was like, oh, I'm so glad we're head of this direction. All of a sudden it was like quick left, We're taking a quick left. I didn't know this was possible. I was fine going down this road until I knew this was possible. Right, Wow, I don't have to be okay with this body. I'm going to take a quick left. And again, the the there's no accusation for I mean, they can be very helpful, very useful. And again that's could be another episode. But I'm talking about cultural shift of where there is a very very thin ideal and it's who's questioning it. We've kind of asked that question. I have another precious client. Again, all of these I've gotten permission to share. But she again, different client, come out of many many many years of eating disorder, severe anorexia, diet culture, all the things. She's very involved with, their church and homeschool co op. And she said, Amy, I I have about one mom friend that eats. She's like, I'm there packing when I pack my kids a lunch. You know, I pack my lunch. And she said, but these moms aren't eating. And this one mom in particular, that's a pastor's wife, and she said, I've never seen her eating at one time. And when I say, oh, did you not bring your lunch?

00:29:02
Speaker 1: Oh?

00:29:02
Speaker 2: No, you know, and she said, I'm so embarrassed because I'm the am I is there something wrong with me that I'm eating. That's the culture that we're in that I feel weird that I'm eating lunch as an adult.

00:29:19
Speaker 1: Right, So yeah, because it's back to the high school mean girls, like if you're not just drinking a die coke right right, right, right, eating food.

00:29:28
Speaker 2: You're eating food right, it's and she just I love her little imagery of her taking her you know, sandwich old and she's just like, I'm sorry, somebody else eating and I it just makes me want to I want to erupt because I'm like, guys, this is this is not okay. And by the way, again, anonymous anywhere in the country could be this. This Mama's kiddos when they're when they go to birthday parties, they're just they're eating and eating because they're not used to right having right I'm around food, so there's some evidence that that's actually having an impact on children, and so I think that's the other thing. Is this whole very very then focus but also over over, I like you the word optimization that you use because that's really kind of a buzzword, right, and optimize my nutrition. I'm going to optimize my health. Is a very very siloed individualistic and as believers, I'm crucified with chrisis and like a who lose chrisis to me the life I live in this body and now live by faith like it is a community effort. And if my eating whatever this is impacting my children or spouse or right, this is something I have to valuate if I'm it's like, if I'm causing it is actually it is it is actually worth evaluating as a believer to go this is not just impacting me? Who else is this impacting? Right? How do the women feel around me? And I'm not talking about just eating, because you know, I don't want to make them feel good, But I'm saying this is, this is us as women giving each other permission to be human. Oh what a wonderful opportunity.

00:31:18
Speaker 1: To make a basic human need and meat It's.

00:31:21
Speaker 2: Like, it's like, I wouldn't expect you to be, you know, in Minnesota. Right now it's freezing where I'm from. I'm living Houston originally, I'm from Minnesota. I wouldn't. I wouldn't. I would be strange to me if you weren't wearing a coat. But you're like, I don't need a coat. I don't. I don't basic human need to be warm, right, No, I'm I'm, I'm I can overcome it. I don't have to wear a coat and thirty below. It's like, well, that's weird. It's equally as weird that you don't need to eat, I think, right right, you know, yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:31:52
Speaker 1: I'm remembering a homeschool class I are taught, and one of the kids was giving a presentation on their delicious Thanksgiving dinner and we took questions at the end of every presentation, and a boy raised his hand and said, that sounds really good. Did your mom meet it with you or was she on a diet? No? And the little girl giving the presentation was like, yeah, she ate with us. And I was like, oh, wow, like and I mean I think kids were little. This was years and years ago. Wow, little but he knew moms don't eat with families sometimes.

00:32:33
Speaker 2: No for sure, no for sure no, right, wow, that makes me think. I just did an elementary school presentation, which I probably won't do again, by the way, not my target audience, but I got asked to do it. And I had done a presentation for pe coaches and health coaches and it was awesome at the beginning of the year in August. Well, then this one coach is so lovely. She just said, will you come do something for a third, fourth, and fifth? Then I said yes, in a moment of weakness, I did. So. I had to do presentation to third graders, then fourth graders, and fifth graders, so one hundred and fifty kids at a time in the gym, and I'm like, wow, and this is the PE coach right before she said third grade is grade, fourth grade and fifth grade's terrible. You know, I thought, oh, okay, thanks for letting me know that right before. So the fifth graders actually were terrible and loved. I was praying on my way there and I was cyc, lord, I have we're doing this, and I just was like, you know what my goal is that these kids feel seen. So I before I started, and when people were filing in, I made sure I went up and down and made eye contact with every kid and said, so glad you're here. I'm so glad you're here. Thank you for coming. Well, we were doing a hunger scale and doing it with fun, you know, balls and these big nets and teaching you know, hunger and fullness and and this is something you're you're born with and naturally good at and what does this feel like? And so you know, what does it feel like? How do you know when you're hot? Like? Oh? And then all they're all telling about it when they're hot, and how do you know when you're cold? And I said, you know, how do you know when you're hungry? Actually, the dieticians, sweet sweet McKenzie young, she was helping me do it, and she said, how do you guys know when you're hungry? And this little girl raised her hand just and she said, I don't need to eat when I'm hungry. And she said, oh, I actually, maybe you mean when you're full? Is that what you're feeling? You mean when you're full? And she goes, but how do you feel when you're hungry? And she goes, I just ignore it I've learned how to ignore it, and it's me post it note right, like make sure I circle back with that. But here the difference between third grade, who had all these fun idea you know, they were just shouting things out about how do you know you're hungry? And oh like tummy and all these things. Fifth grade she's like, m I don't, I can, I don't. I don't have to eat? And I thought, wow, fifth grade, right, and she raised her hand confidently like she's proud of that, proud of it. This is just absolutely not like I'm going to keep this a secret, but I don't. I don't need to eat. That's a really superpower that I don't need to eat in food. Yeah.

00:35:11
Speaker 1: Great, which then we carry through, right, and then the woman who doesn't eat at the birthday party? Yes, wow, how can we be like you?

00:35:18
Speaker 2: Yeah?

00:35:19
Speaker 1: Yeah, teach us your ways Jedi master? Yes, I mean that's really what we do.

00:35:26
Speaker 2: They're like the Ninja of hunger, like how did you juke your hunger? Rather than the joy. My brother is flying in as we're recording this, and my sister in law, who I adore, and I'm prepping cranberry pur pie, which I love to make and the tradition of having that when guests come and just a fresh, big pie coming out of the oven with of course you have to have vanilla ice cream with that, right, and the joy of that and what's missed over and over and over because we would say I can't have that, I'm not allowed to have that. And so going back to our original right question, if I if I make that my mission for the year, what am I going to miss out on? What things am I going to have to sacrifice in order to make that my mission? What fruit am I not going to attend to in my garden because this is the only thing I'm pouring into. Right. I was in church a couple Sundays ago and we're doing Kingdom Living and Sermon on the Mountain. It was out of Matthew seven, and it was not crux of his his sermon. But of course, you know how the Lord does. He does like a little neon sign. It's like, well, whatever, I'm just going to read it out of Matthew seven. Starting verse seven, it says, asking, it will be given to you, seeking, you will find knocking the door will be open to you. For everyone who asks receives the one who seeks fines, and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened. Who among you, if his son ask him for bread, will give him a stone, Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake. If you, then, who are evil? So I think it's kind of funny know how to give good gifts to your children? How much more will your father in heaven give good things to those who ask him? Therefore, whatever you want others to do for you, you also do the same for them. For this is the law and the prophets. So I'm listening, I'm reading in the and how much more just comes out like a neon sign for me. So I'm it's in my church notes, you know, just highlighted big, and I'm writing it all week. How much more? How much more? And I'm asking God, what do you want me to know about this? So the end of the week, I think, but the Lord, go go go read, go read it again, like, don't miss out the second.

00:37:45
Speaker 1: Half of that.

00:37:47
Speaker 2: How much more? That's where I got stuck. How much more will your father and heaven give good things to those who ask him? And so I thought, what are we not asking him for? Right? And in this context, most of us are asking for weight lovelace or right, these these certain things, and he's saying, how much more like don't the C. S. Lewis quote right of being satisfied with me? You know mud past the holiday of the sea? Right, it's like, right, oh much more right?

00:38:17
Speaker 1: Well, because what I really long for, like I mean just even thinking about weight loss, you know, my my body has changed significantly in perimenopause and probably recovery from eating disorder too, but yeah, you know, my real desire is to be loved, yeah, right, right, to feel accepted, like I love how you went through the class the third fourth fifth graders, to see them like I want to be seen, not like seen and like I look at me, but like I don't want to be overlooked, right, yeah, And that is the more yeah that I think we're taught comes from weight loss. Yes, if I could just be thin, then people are gonna look, they're gonna see me. But I'm afraid what actually then happens? Says I'm I get objectiveized more right, they're still not seeing us, right and the like then they're just seeing my body perhaps then, but but that how much more like we have we have these these desires, these deep desires to feel loved and known and seen. Yes, and it's just a trick that weight loss is gonna make that more happen.

00:39:37
Speaker 2: Yes, I love that you. I love that you just said that. It is it, It is it if I if I'm going to teach hunger to end fullness to to third, fourth and fifth grader is the Lord says, all I'm asking is my eye. That's all. That's all I'm asking to do. I don't care if they hear anything else. So one hundred and fifty times three kids? Right, did I get to look in their eyes? And you just said the more? That the mirage is that the weight loss will give us the more. And the truth is that God is saying it's for you're trying to control what's uncontrollable. God is already pouring it out into we just who will ask. That's what he says, how much more to those who ask? And so God, I would say, if you want a twenty twenty six goal, let it be to ask. Let it be to ask God, what are the things in my life that have felt stunted? What are the things in my life that I have overlooked? Because I've been so preoccupied with my life will start when that's the other journal prompt, right, So what in my life, God are you inviting me into? What do you have?

00:40:45
Speaker 1: Lord?

00:40:46
Speaker 2: So this sweet client, the one that the fruit is blooming and off the tree, and these beautiful fruit, she said, so much changed for me the first time you prayed what do you have? Lord? And she said it just I'd never prayed that way, she said, I had never, And so she said, I began praying that and she said it opened up a conversation, not a one way, right, And so I just I love this idea of just bringing before the Lord, what are your goals for me? And if we as believers, if Heather and Amy are sitting together, and we've got our journals in it, we're like, as believing women, we would go love the Lord, our God with all our hearts, soul, mind and strength, and love our neighbors ourselves. Let us spend ten minutes and evaluate my life according to just Lord, examine me and see what needs to shift in twenty twenty six that that would begin to explode in me. And then I would ask God, God teach me how to do that. I don't I'm stumped. You know, for most of us, it's like I can know these goals, these seem like really great goals, and then the Lord's like, oh, I have so much more. I have so much more.

00:41:51
Speaker 1: Right, right, because those goals are just for that little to go back to your other analogy, those goals are only for that little teeny tiny part of your garden that you've been overwatering killing what overwatering? Like I am not a gardener, but but that you know, the little section that you've beat to death.

00:42:14
Speaker 2: Beat to death, beat to death.

00:42:15
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, and there's this whole big field.

00:42:21
Speaker 2: But you know what, wouldn't it be fun if your listeners just started like commenting back after this and just said, I spent time with the Lord and this is my goal. This is my goal, this is something God gave me, this is my invitation. Wouldn't that be encouraging for them to hear what others are hearing from the Lord? What a cool thing that we would We're not getting left behind, guys. We're recipients of God's goodness. He literally I could sit here and do nothing and just soaken God's love and his care and his acceptance and his absolutely mind boggling love that transforms us from who we are to who we're becoming. And it isn't because I'm following a plan. It's because I'm basking in God's love for me.

00:43:09
Speaker 1: Well, even that left behind language, right, like we all like I know what that means, I know how that feels. But it's the wrong race. Yeah yeah, everyone's beating me in that race. I'm in the wrong race.

00:43:22
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, step aside, guys.

00:43:24
Speaker 1: Right, it's yeah, like that's not that's not what it means to run the race with insurance, right, although I have I have had someone argue that, okay, yeah, but yeah that you know, God's kingdom is upside down. Yeah, his ways are not our race. His thoughts are not our thoughts.

00:43:48
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah that's right.

00:43:51
Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely, Well, Amy, You've got company Covin. Well, any final thoughts as we close up today's episode.

00:44:00
Speaker 2: Well, I think my invitation to all of us, me included, will be to just sit before the Lord and ask that question, God, what do you have for twenty twenty six? And that I would yield my own agenda, that I would be excited for the how much more? And that we would begin to ask and even share some of those things with friends or spouse or what is God inviting me to ask him for? Because wouldn't be wonderful if we again we started sharing those things and our testimonies began this precious woman with the fruit. It's like what if our baskets were so full?

00:44:43
Speaker 1: Right?

00:44:44
Speaker 2: And so that's my encouragement, my exhortation, not only for people listening, but for you and me too.

00:44:49
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, I love that. I mean it is it's the opposite of control, right, It's I'm going to just do an illustration for the YouTube audience, right, but it's like clinging tightly control it to like turning and letting my fingers fall open and having a loose grip. And in that it's a symbol of trust, like, Okay, I actually need you to show up and show me like what you have for me, you know, Yeah, give this to me, provide this for me if this is what I need, right versus I'm going to control it. I'm going to make it happen. And doing it that way grows our faith, right, the open handed way. Then we grow in faith as we do that, versus we stay sunted. Yeah, our grip is tight, Amy thank you so much for being on the show today.

00:45:49
Speaker 2: You're so welcome. This was so much fun.

00:45:51
Speaker 1: So it was, and we're not going to make this the only Amy Carlton episode of twenty twenty six that is on my goals list. Get online too, Let me get online too, and thank you for watching or listening today. I hope something today has helped you stop comparing and start closing you Bye bye. But compared to you podcast is Pradley Body Life Audio Podcast Network.

00:46:13
Speaker 4: For more great Christian podcasts, go to Life audio dot com.

00:46:25
Speaker 1: Hey friend, would you check out the date on that episode you just listened to? Yeah, it's been a minute. Listening to old podcast is almost like reading my diary from several years ago. In some cases, it's even a little embarrassing. So instead of listening straight through season by season, can I encourage you to skip ahead? I released brand new episodes every Tuesday and Friday, and if you're not sure where to start, you can go to improvebody image dot com find the start here button and I've got several episodes listed and categorized so you can find the topics that are of most interest to you. Your time is valuable, so skip straight to the good stuff. I'm glad you're here. Thanks for letting me be a part of your body image and food freedom journey.