I have finally created a list of things that I learned from my rice-diet. It was a difficult list to create because I learned an incredible amount about myself during that week. I definitely learned much more than I assumed I would before the completion of the challenge. I have separated my thoughts by numbers. There are seven lessons in total, one for every day of the challenge. Here it goes (I hope you can relate to a few of them)…
1. I use a significant amount of time in my day-to-day life rummaging through my cupboards and fridge, trying to come up with something to eat; even though, many times, I am not hungry.
2. Eating is a social action. There were many times throughout last week where I could not attend events because it was focused around "eating". Has food really become the only thing that people can do together?
3. I EAT ALL THE TIME! I have conditioned my body to eat...and eat...and eat. When I am bored...I eat. When I don't know what else to do...I eat. When I go out with friends...I eat. When I come home from school...I eat.
4. Peaches look the same after you have thrown them up as they did before you threw them up.(Brief Explanation: One evening last week when I just had no energy left because I had been throwing up everything I had in me, I decided that peaches might make me feel a bit better...turns out, they didn't).
5. I find great joy in food. Throughout my week last week, I would fantasize about the food that I could be eating if I was not on the rice-diet. Then, as the week progressed, I found that I even began to dream about the food that I ate before that week. When I would awake from those dreams, I would find that the salivation from my mouth had drenched half of my pillow.
6. Food has become something of a comfort for my mind and body. On Friday of last week, I was faced with this truth like a slap in the face. To explain, Wednesday/Thursday/and Friday of last week were quite difficult. I was unable to eat anything and my body constantly vomited anything it had left inside. I was unable to walk for long distances and I fell in and out of sleep throughout the day and night. The colour was drained from my face and I was very irritable.
Now that you understand the place that my body was in, you will hopefully better understand my reaction to the e-mail I received at 1:23pm on Friday, January 21st. It was just before I had training for my new job, I was checking my Facebook to kill some time and saw a fellow Beyond Borders student's status which read that he would be heading to Kenya in the spring. When I saw those words, I nearly fainted (mainly due to excitement but I am sure my lack of nutrition was also part of it). I quickly opened my Hotmail account, clicked on the email sent from my professor and completely disregarded the statement in the subject line of the email that stated "Please read the ENTIRE email!". I skimmed through and finally stumbled upon the word "India". My heart dropped. This couldn't be right, I thought. "She made a mistake, I am supposed to be going to Africa", were thoughts that immediately crossed my mind. However, just as these thoughts began to fill every part of my brain and body, Emma (a fellow Beyond Borders student and work-mate) arrived. The next few actions I took, honestly, felt like an out of body experience. I handed Emma my laptop and waited with anticipation for her reaction. She emphatically stated "I'm going to Kenya". Once again, my heart dropped...not because I was envious, not because I was jealous but because her statement reminded me that I was not going to Kenya...I was going to India.
Now I would like to pause here to explain a bit further about my initial feelings towards India. I believe that India is amazing. Its vibrant colours, its friendly people, its culture, its incredible smells and sounds...there is only one thing that India is not; it is not what I wanted. I wanted Uganda. For some crazy, irrational reason, I wanted to spend my placement in Uganda and I had felt that that was what I had been working towards.
Back to Friday, when I finally got through the 3.5 hours of training and began to walk to my car, reality finally set in. I started to walk faster, and faster, and soon I found myself running to the parking lot where the safety of my car was parked. I rummaged through my backpack, found my keys and spent much longer than usual opening my car door as my eyes began spilling tears. I turned my car on, and sat. I sat alone, crying for quite a while before an elderly man I had met in the library last semester, knocked on my window. He asked me if I was "okay", to which I responded "I'm fine" (a typical "I'm upset but I do NOT want to talk about it" response). However, this man would not take that statement as a sign for him to leave me alone. He asked if I was upset about school, my family, a significant other? Finally, I could not hold it in any longer...I blurted everything I had been feeling and my utter disdain for the placement I had been given. My less-than-eloquent speech would have driven many away, but this man just stood and listened. Without saying anything, he opened my car door, helped my lifeless bones stand up and wrapped his arms around me. I buried my face in his down-jacket and cried for what felt like hours. After a bashful apology and goodbye, I once again, sat in my car, but this time I did not feel alone.
You may look at my initial reaction as selfish, some might even call it ridiculous and I would agree. However, I ask you to understand that I truly do feel incredibly blessed to be in this program; however, I have continuously felt that this program, as well as other recent happenings in my life, have pushed me beyond the point of comfort. I am constantly being challenged in ways that I never thought would be challenging to me. It is as if the comforts that I find identity within are being stolen from me, and I truly don't know what will be left.
Back to the lesson that I learned last week. I learned that food is one of those comforts that make me feel good, they make me feel like “me”. After my training last week, I had an immense desire to eat. I wanted to eat hotdogs, Swedish fish, pizza, and of course...strawberry-kiwi juice (all my favourite foods). I wanted to feel the comfort that sugar and unhealthy foods provide me with; however, I couldn't. I was faced with the ultimate challenge of stepping outside my comforts, and finding solace elsewhere. If I had not been fasting last week. I would never have met the old man that gave me such comfort and joy. Last week, I learned that when the comforts that I hide beneath are removed, the "me" that I am so afraid of showing the world, is exposed...and maybe that’s not a bad thing after all.
7. I have been incredibly blessed with an abundance of food. The night that I finished my rice-diet, I looked inside the fridge and truly was overwhelmed by the massive amount of food that before I would have looked past in search of something different. It is incredible to me that people continue to go out to the grocery stores to pick up more food when they have more than enough already waiting to be consumed in their own homes. Even now, almost a week later, I still find it hard to choose from the options that I have in my kitchen. So, the question that continues to haunt me is what is the benefit of this much choice? Doesn't it merely just cloud our minds, distracting us from making space to meet with people?
I hope that everyone that reads this post will find some relation to the lessons that I learned during my week of fasting. I truly hope that you look at the comforts that surround you and remember that those things are fleeting, what would happen if they were taken away? I challenge you to fill your lives with people, with community…because when all the comforts that we find identity within are removed, those people are what will be left.
