Hello there, my name is Patricia Black and this is the very first post in my new blog, my baby–Food, Sex, and God.

I chose some biggies in terms of topics, I know! So much of what I’ve spent my life delving into connects to these big three, and they are inter-related. We all have hungers. We crave, we are moved by desire and we negotiate with our desire or run from it and sometimes even manage to forget about it to the point that we don’t even feel it. Me, hungry? No, I’m too busy running on this treadmill of work, success, whatever. But, at the end of the day we can’t really run from our obsessions. What if we were to actually dive in and trust our desire, trust that it will not lead us to chaos and destruction but to some truths with heart. Well, I know how scary that can be. And there’s no guarantee that there won’t be chaos. But this is life, it’s an amazing ride when you can open yourself up to all of it.

I could’ve thrown money in there too, but I’ll admit that I don’t have too much that’s useful to say on that topic. And I like threes.

But on Food, well, I have the qualifications of having had an eating disorder as a teenager and into my college days, and of continuing to struggle in my relationship with food for many years–just like most women in America. But that was the thing that led me to learn about nutrition and yoga and the whole world of holistic health. It opened me up to seeing myself and the world through new eyes. So, the suffering and the obsession were the seed that grew me. I worked as a holistic health coach and natural nutrition counselor for many years, helping women make peace with food and shift to friendlier relationships with their bodies. They often came because they wanted to lose weight, but there were always many other desires beneath that one.

Sex, where to begin? When I worked as a holistic coach I heard from so many women about the shame they felt around their bodies and the constant trying to control what and how they ate. And I started to see that there was a connection to how they felt as sexual beings. The body image stuff, the sense of self-worth being tied to feeling desirable, and again the question of hunger and desire and just how to “deal with” them. Being something of a personal development junkie, I managed to find a life coaching program centered around a practice called Orgasmic Meditation. The practice blew open the doors to exploring my sexuality and everything I knew about relationships. Thing is, I’m still shy about writing on this topic it but I guess it’s just like being in bed with a lover and feeling shy–the desire pulls you through. And I do have lots to share with you about my explorations, and insights, and my own on-going questions.

And lastly, God! Did I really decide I’d write about God right next to food and sex? Well, yes, if not next to these very earthly domains then where else? My relationship to God and even to the word “god” was for many years fraught with anger, confusion, resentment. You see, I’m what they call a PK, a preacher’s kid, and thus the complicated relationship. When I was much younger I thought I wanted no part of God, but that wasn’t true at all; I just didn’t want spirituality in the way that my father’s church and religion prescribed. And all that teenage angst and rebellion was wrapped up in how much I resented God for taking my dad away from me and from our family. But underneath all that there was so much yearning and so much love waiting to find a place to pour itself into.

And so, the common theme in all of these is desire. Yes, yearning, longing, hunger. And women have I complicated relationship to desire. I know I do. And I find it worth going deeper to discover what it’s all about because it does carry so much power, regardless of how we choose to relate to it.

Why am I doing this, anyway? Being this rather private introvert and choosing to write about these very personal topics. I write for myself because through writing I discover what I really feel and what I know. But I also write for others because I hope that in writing honestly and being willing to expose my metaphorical belly, that I will be permission for others as they grapple with their own questions and embark on their journeys. I hope this blog will be read by women who are tired of holding it all inside and holding it all together. Women who are tired of swinging between self-deprivation and mindlessly acting out. Maybe I’m writing for the addict in all of us. And for the recovering perfectionist too. I am one for sure. Oh, and if some men find their way here, I hope they will get a view into the inner lives of women and learn something about what makes us tick.

My hope is that this will be a place for connection and conversation. I welcome your comments and your musings on these topics.

As you can see, it’s a newbie blog. There’s a lot to do to make it more pretty and fancy, which is not really my skill set. But, I wanted to get started and to connect with some readers and begin the ride already!

Here is a quote from Mary Oliver. A short and sweet mission statement:

Instructions for living a life.

Pay attention

Be astonished

Tell about it.