Peach Friedman
author, educator & trainer
intuitive fitness for women

I dropped my daughter off at a friend’s house the other day so that I could jet over to teach my afternoon group at Summit, and another friend of ours was there too, chatting away about how she had bought a whole bunch of books to give to her friends (such a sweetie and what a good idea, by the way!). So she scampered out to her car to hand off a copy of Don Miguel Ruiz’s book The Voice of Knowledge.

I sat in the parking lot and read the inside flap. It goes like this:

Before we learn to speak, our true nature is to love and be happy, to explore and enjoy life. As little children, we are completely authentic. Our actions are guided by instinct and emotions, we listen to the silent voice of our integrity. Once we learn to speak, the people around us hook our attention and program us with knowledge. But that knowledge is contaminated with lies. With our attention focused on all the knowledge in our head, we no longer perceive the world through the eyes of love; we only perceive what we have learned to believe. The voice of knowledge comes alive inside our head, and what is that voice telling us? … That voice never stops talking, judging, gossiping and abusing us. It constantly sabotages our happiness and keeps us from enjoying a reality of truth and love … When the voice of knowledge no longer controls us, our life becomes an expression of our authentic self, just as it was before we learned to speak. Then we return to the truth, we return to love and we live in happiness again.

I’m a busy mom (which will be my eternal excuse from here on out but I swear it’s for real–I only have one baby and I only work part-time but I have never been so frazzled in all my life) and I haven’t gotten past the flap. I haven’t even read the first page. But that said, I did get something from the little message I transcribed above, and in fact I think it’s such a good recovery positive message that I read it aloud to all my groups and a couple of my yoga classes this week.

I don’t struggle specifically with anorexia or compulsive exercise anymore, but I am a human being and I do have crappy days. Lately the voice of knowledge has been telling me that I should be making more money, publishing a second book, doing more cool mommy things like taking my daughter on lots of play dates and making crafty mom type things, doing my hair & wearing makeup, and living in a much, much cuter house. With nice furniture. And things, like, art, hanging on the walls.

The thing is, I’m so programmed by what Ruiz calls the voice of knowledge that I don’t really think these are even lies–I think I really should be doing these things. Welcome guilt, failure, fatigue, etc.

So today I am thinking, hmm. If rather than trying to do all these things that I’m not doing now, I can instead put more passionate energy toward what I am doing, then maybe I’ll transform some of that negativity into creative juiciness. I’ll still have an un-cute home and messy hair, but maybe I won’t feel so crappy.

On that note, I just made my favorite fall chocolate-chip pumpkin muffins and that is certainly cheering me up. Whether it’s knowledge-based or not, my inner voice says YUM.

What do you think?