Sofia Bothwell

The beginning of my 'weight loss' career was in Violet Hill Studios, North London, UK. I ran weekly self-help support groups for compulsive eating women. It was then that I started to writing about the holistic weight loss method that I was teaching. Our focus week in, week out, was looking at the emotional stuff that would drive them personally to eat when full. We talked about what it entailed to give up dieting. We discussed fears of weight gain and fears of being too skinny. I encouraged them to accept themselves as they were at the larger size and the emotional issues that surfaced to be healed were varied. This is still the way it works. If you want to lose weight for good you have got to listen to your hunger and fullness sensations and not just those emanating from your stomach. Your mind has hungers and your Spirit has hungers. What satisfies your mind? Intellectual pursuits? Reading? What satisfies your emotions? Fulfilling friendships, feeling appreciated, feeling ...

Editing has never been my favourite part of the writing, publishing game. When the creative flow strikes and downloads a block of writing, or a sentence, usually when I am walking or cycling or doing the dishes, that is the signal to put it down on paper or on the computer - and that is the part I love. In the early morning sat in front of my computer  re reading the download and then the inspiration flows as to how the story will flow. Words, sentences and pages spill through my fingertips on to the computer screen as I literally feel the flow of creativity flow through me and before I know it two hours have passed and it is dawn. That is how I got seven manuscripts and a lot of editing over the last ten years or so. Combined with traditional book publication eluding me and immersing myself in the world of single motherhood while home schooling. An adventure to be sure and one I wrote about in My Life My Way (getting its final edit now). I am compelled to blog about the Writer's j...

It is so beautiful when nature springs a surprise on you, like this delightful Magnolia Tree blooming in the dawn. Walking home from a ten hour night shift the last bit is uphill. I cycle on the flat and walk on the uphill stretch. 'Hard work never hurt anyone,' is what my Mother used to say. And as life has given me hard physical work as my means of financial income over the past few years I ponder the concept of this. So many are 'working hard for a living' and getting paid not a lot. I view it as my Zen training. Be conscious. Be present. Chop wood, carry water - it is what we got to do sometimes and I love it. I appreciate the good sleep I get, the regular income and the amount I can save to pursue more dreams. Someone once said that you feel like giving up shortly after you start a project and just before you finish it - that has been my experience too. And so, the grace I feel enjoying the hard graft of life and the knowing that 'I am not what I do' w...