I Thought Myself Fat

Wouldn’t it be nice if each of us _did_ think ourselves fat? That way, all you’d have to do is change your mind, think something else, and voila! We’d be all done with obesity.

That we thought ourselves fat is actually is true, but to get to the point of simplicity in changing your mind takes a substantial understanding. I do think it is possible for each and every one of us who suffers from an uncomfortable I’m-dissatisfied-with-my-body sense. That is an enormous problem in the United States.

I have always been a searcher for truth. I was raised a Catholic. As a little girl, it was easy for me to give up playing jacks or jump rope and dash into the coolness of St. John’s Church during lunch time for a visit with the Lord. I got a heady rush when I’d smell the incense; I loved wearing flowers in my hair and being in processions. I thought that the highest, good thing I could do was to love God and obey his commandments. I don’t want you to get some picture of a goody-two-shoes, because that is not who I was. I simply loved things religious.

When I was in the eighth grade, we had a visit from a Vocation Recruiter. She was a Sister of St. Joseph, the same order that taught at my school. I can’t remember all she said, but the part I remember the most is that at the Sister’s Motherhouse in Baden, PA, they waded in the creeks barefoot. Barefoot? Barefoot! I adored going barefoot. And if it was connected somehow to God and being good, I was there.

Being a Prep and subsequently becoming a nun were wonderful experiences for me. I took my search for the truth about life into Prep and the convent with me. I looked high and low. I asked questions by the dozens. I did not find answers that were ultimately satisfying for me. At the age of 26, I left the convent with unanswered questions.

I tried group therapy to discover why I was fat, since diets hadn’t worked. No satisfying answers there. I tried pills and wraps and spas and you name it. I can’t even count all the money I threw into this search for the truth and a solution.

And then I found the study of the mind. My former husband was studying such a course. I can picture him isolated in his office working through the courses with our baby pulling books off the bookshelves around him. My ex always wanted me to go to church with him. He also was a searcher and it’s no wonder we were attracted to one another. I hesitated, still full of the disappointment from my convent experience.

But one Father’s Day, he insisted what he wanted as a gift that year was for me to go to church with him. He attended the Church of Religious Science in Los Angeles and away we went. I was amazed! I was brought to tears! After all my holding back on him, I discovered a group of people who thought the same way I did. That was more of a gift for me that it was for him that Father’s Day.

I began to study the course materials they provided and I learned that I am a mental being, that my mind created and could change anything it created. Did they have all the answers to all my questions? No. They answered a lot of them and I continued to search until I found all the rest. I now know that life is a science and that there are laws in that science that can be used to resolve all of one’s problems. I know now that those laws, once learned, can be used to create any good thing desired. And I know this because I was taught how to use this information and have it actually work.

Was my main problem solved? Not yet, although a lot of layers have been peeled away and discarded as I unfolded more understanding.

Pat Matson loves life and its lessons. She’s made learning those lessons her edge. Pat has crafted an understanding about life through using the obesity she bore as a catalyst to search for meaning. Her generosity compels sharing this understanding. Her insights, humor, warmth and honesty will both entertain you and aggrandize your life. Pat invites you to embrace your own World of Within. She can help you do that at www.theworldofwithin.com.