Sometimes the voice in my head sounds like Jedi master Yoda. A few months ago while trying to figure out the root cause of that wicked insomnia spell I had, this is what the wise one echoed,
“Focus on your body
not. Evolve is the time.”
“What the eff Yoda?”...my lower self balked. My higher self knew exactly what he was talking about and it has lifted a burden that has been weighing heavy on my heart for quite some time. I have lots of work to do, but now I can sleep. In fact, my sleep is almost back to normal.
After much deliberation about this, and trust me it’s been very hard, I have decided to change the focus of Back in Skinny Jeans and lessen my time here, and focus more time growing and expanding Noshtopia. Yes, it’s kind of a biggie announcement today, and also poignant as I am this close to 2,000 BISJ posts.
“What!!!”
At the core, it’s very simple. At some point, we as women have to evolve beyond making our body & our looks the priority in our lives. At some point, we have to let go of obsessing and focusing on what we weigh, our dress size, and what other women look like compared to us. We have to let go of the constant fat and body talk, and just love our body. At some point, it becomes time to let go of an old life where we defined our life by our physical body, and move onto a bigger life filled with depth, interestingness, and progress. At some point, we have to stop trying to be an image, and start being who we really are which has absolutely nothing to do with the way we look.
Why can’t you blog
and evolve at the same time?
I am ready to move forward in my life and evolve, and because of that it became clear, crystal clear in fact, that I cannot do that and blog all day long about the very thing that I need to let go of. Don’t get me wrong, I still have interest in the topic. I just don’t want it to be the focal point of my life anymore because after 2 years and 7 months, it has become too much, and more importantly, the honest gut truth, it is not who I want to be anymore.
In order for BISJ to move to the next level and become big like a Diet Blog or FitSugar, I would need to either sell it to someone who can and wants to take it to the next level or grow it myself which means hiring other contributors, adding more content on fitness, health, trends, and tips, and spending more time promoting and marketing the blog.
...I’m ready to cut the anchor, but not sell the ship. ...
Beyond fundamental business growth stuff, when I started to seriously ask myself, “What do you want to be?” The most important thing that came up was that I don’t want to be a body image/fitness/weight loss expert. The desire to grow BISJ would all be different if I did indeed want to become like a Kathy Smith, a Richard Simmons, or even a Skinny Biatch. On selling the business, I’m ready to cut the anchor, but not sell the ship.
What we focus on is
what we prioritize.
When I asked myself, “What do you love doing and talking about?” what came up was food & cooking along with photography & being creative and using all of that to somehow help others. I spend so much time at Whole Foods because it is seriously like Disneyland for me. And stores like Sur La Table, Williams-Sonoma, and Crate & Barrel are to me like what Best Buy and Fry’s are to geeks. And have you seen Tastespotting? The best internet food cornocopia out there.
I never mentioned this widely before, but 6 years ago, I almost became a Holistic Chef focused on food as healing. Ironically, this chef desire came about after a knee injury from marathon training where the doc told me no running for 8 weeks. I used that time to learn how to clean up my eating and nutrition. This is where the idea of Noshtopia was born.
How our insecurities
can keep us in smaller lives
I used to have these dinners and nosh parties during my injury recovery, so others could share in my eats. I was complimented most on my ability to fuse unrelated tastes together in a way that was uniquely delicious. I’m big on fusion. It’s like puzzle solving to me. Because of that encouragement and because I love how cooking allows me to be highly creative, I looked at schools, jobs, and mentor programs, but ultimately dropped the chef idea because of unworthiness issues.
It’s not that I didn’t think I was good enough to do that actual work. My Inner Resistance Monster convinced me, “Who’s going to take someone who’s suffered with the ED bulimia seriously as a chef specializing in foods for healing. You have a distorted relationship with food, and binge and throw up food for goodness sake. What example is that?” See, how our insecurities can limit us especially when we believe them.
Turning a liability
into an asset
Noshtopia started at the same time as BISJ, but has gone on and off mainly because of those same unworthiness issues. Today, I realize that because of my past with the ED, food allergies, and weight problems, it actually helps make me be a better food person because I have a deeper understanding of what people go through and how they can suffer because of food in their daily lives. Something I once viewed as a liability, I now view as an asset.
Noshtopia will allow
me access to more learning and a wider audience
As a quick FYI, since I re-launched Noshtopia back in March as an eating wellness blog, the traffic is already nearly 20% that of BISJ in only 9 weeks. Granted a big chunk of that traffic comes from BISJ when I do the Nosh Bites, but that is a load of interest, and that is me only spending 20% effort on Nosh at the moment.
What I love about the Nosh audience is that I can have greater access to a wider group of people and appeal not only to the weight conscious folks, but the folks with food allergies, the vegans, vegetarians, and raw, as well as your general omnivore who just wants to clean up their eating and general food lover. A topic that I see becoming more prevalent is designing dishes to cater to mixed eating households (one person is veg, one is gluten free, one loves meat & potatoes.) Is there a way to cook one base dish yet make it edible for everyone by making some simple additions or subtractions? Absolutely!
Besides, letting loose on my creativity with food, I get to showcase my photography, and have access to learning about so many other things that light my fire. There are endless creative possibilities with Noshtopia, and I can’t tell you how excited I am about it!
Tomorrow, I’ll go into more detail on what Back in Skinny Jeans is going to evolve into. On one hand, there will be a death, but on the other hand there will be a birth, and I believe the changes will be good for me and you my fantastic audience. Trust me in that I thought very long and hard about you my loyal and avid readers. I’ve worked very hard to get BISJ to where it’s at today and me evolving means that hopefully you all get to evolve as well ;-) More mañana.
