"Ask Christa" #3

“Ask Christa” #3

Laura Barnett from England writes:

I was going to ask you a deep though provoking question, but I can’t think of one. Sooo, I’m going to ask you, What your favourite thing about Christmas and this time of year?

Most definitely….CHRISTMAS MUSIC! Harry Connick Jr, Amy Grant, Michael W. Smith, Bing Crosby, the classics. I literally can’t get enough. Studhubs said the other day, “Any time we’re ever in a bad mood, let’s just put on Christmas music and it’ll go away.”

I have to agree with him on that one!!!

Roberta Prevedello from Rio de Janeiro asked me:

Why don’t we find videoclips with your songs in the Internet?

I haven’t toured that much doing my own stuff, but come January, that’s about to change. I have a few videos on my youtube page, www.youtube.com/christablacktv, but really do need to get a few more up there. Just wrote a new song, and will post that in the next couple of days!

Megan Turner from Middlesbrough, England wanted to know:

Do you have any tips on weight loss because i’m really unhappy with the way I look but everyone else thinks its fine, but making other people happy isn’t making yourself happy so do your own thing right?

Things like; what to eat. what not to eat. how long to exercise. and so on.

This is such a good question—and a loaded question, for sure.

First of all, you’re right. Making other people happy isn’t making yourself happy—but sometimes, other people actually have a better perspective than you might have and one that is a bit more realistic. (Not across the board…but this is sometimes the case.) The people closest to us are able to see EVERYTHING about us—even things we probably don’t realize!

So when I first got married, I absolutely hated my butt. Not sometimes hated—ALL the time hated. I write about it in the second chapter of my book…how this guy in high school told me I had a big butt one day while walking out to the parking lot (trying to give me a compliment), but at 125 pounds and a size 2-4…I had anything but a big backside. The truth didn’t really matter. It didn’t matter that I was actually thin. I chose to take his words and adopt them as truth…and because of that, every mirror I looked at, my butt was the first thing I turned around to fret over, bite my fingernails, and lose sleep because of.

No matter how many people told me that my butt looked good, I didn’t hear ANY of their words. I couldn’t. For every 20 people who told me I looked great, it was that one negative voice that stood out clearer than all the rest. Did I have a big butt? Actually…I was pretty much skin and bones. But because I chose to focus on the negative—negative was pretty much all I ever saw.

See, I could tell you all kinds of work-out regiments, eating plans, and ways to help diet to change your body. I could teach you all my secrets on how to count calories, eat right for your blood type, and how to burn fat faster. But these things won’t ever permanently change you. In fact, at the height of my anorexia with bones bulging out through my skin…I STILL would swear up and down that I was fat and needed to lose weight. Why? Because my MIND needed to change.

And believe me—once my MIND changed and my HEART began to heal….my body followed what I believed about myself.

Your body might slim and tone in slavery to diet and exercise, but without your mind and heart changing, you’ll never be free. (Believe me, I live in LA and know heaps of perfectly chiseled goddesses who are completely unhappy with their ridiculously perfect bodies). When we’re unhappy with parts of our bodies and channel frustration, self-hatred, anger, and insecurity at ourselves, nothing ever permanently POSITIVELY changes.

Let me tell you how (after gaining 50 pounds during my bulimia days), I was able to drop the weight. I started looking in the mirror—and loving where I was right at that very moment. Yes, I saw things I wanted to change (I wanted to go try on jeans without having a nervous breakdown!), but I began receiving and accepting myself just as I was—and championing myself to change! When you chose to start moving towards change from a place of LOVE….your body listens.

Here’s an example.

For most of my life, i was OBSESSED with food. I thought about what I was going to eat for lunch, what was in the buffet at school, what was in the vending machine down the hall, and what was on the table across the room at the Christmas party. I counted calories, worked out for hours at a time to fix the ‘messes’ I’d made, had strict rules & restrictions. Some times I would lose the weight, but it never permanently stayed off, and no matter how small I got—it was never good enough. If I had been successful at dropping a dress size…I was unhappy with my hair color. Once I’d changed my hair color, I was angry at my skin. The more I focused on my skin, the more depressed I would get…binging out of frustration, and gaining all the weight back.

Self-hatred never permanently changes anything. If you hate yourself for being overweight, you’re going to hate yourself for something else once you lose the weight.

If you want to change your body, your appearance, or your weight, you HAVE to look in the mirror right now—as you are—and start loving yourself. Love that you want to finally get healthy. Love that you want to feel beautiful. Love that you’re proud of yourself for wanting to get in shape. Congratulate yourself if you actually move closer to your goal…and shrug your shoulders and laugh if you accidentally mess up. Condemnation, shame, hate, and frustration are the enemies of your mind, soul, and body.

You will never fully change—unless you’re being loved into change.

I’ll definitely get more into diet and exercise at some point, because I do believe it’s important to be healthy—but i know, with all my heart, that if you don’t change your thoughts, beliefs, heart, and emotions…it won’t matter how thin you become. You will never, ever, ever be happy—regardless of how many pounds you drop.

Alright friends, find SOMETHING to be grateful for today, and just thank God for it. Thank Him that you have internet. Thank Him that you have hands. Thank Him for something today—anything.

Love you guys. Stay tuned today for a way to get a free chapter of my book. (Yep, that’s right—a free chapter of my book!)

xoxo, Sista Christa