You name it, and I’ve probably struggled with it. I’ve been ashamed of my body. I’ve been a people pleaser. I grew up thinking that food = love... and that got confusing. I've given up desserts and pasta in the name of "diet experts" only to feel like a failure when I couldn’t follow their rules. I've won egg roll eating competitions against boys at camp. I've been anxious about missing a day at the gym. I’ve scraped the bottom of countless pints of Chapman’s cappuccino frozen yogurt, desperately searching for more. I thought that fullness meant stopping when my belly ached. I’ve lived off tofu and power-bars with unpronounceable ingredients. I drank enough carrot juice to turn the palms of my hands orange.
My wake-up call came when my once-thick long curls turned into a halo of a fro, and I lost my period when I was 17. At first I thought my body was betraying me, (somehow I expected it to cooperate even after all the years I ruled over it like a tyrant.) but then I realized this health challenge was an opportunity. It was my body telling me that something had to change. I could no longer push myself from one extreme to the other and keep punishing myself. I couldn't keep taking care of everyone else's needs and neglect my own. I had to stop listening to everyone else's rules and find my own map and my own questions. I had to listen to my own body and most importantly learn how to trust it in brave new ways for the very first time in my life. A new relationship was born...Little did I know that in 2006, I would stumble upon a program that would become my calling. I decided to study Holistic Health Coaching at the Institute for Integrative Nutrition in New York City. With the help of my own coach, Debra, I discovered that I was in a relationship I didn’t even know about– with food and my body.
It was a long-term, serious relationship, but it had never been a peaceful or loving one (we clearly had communication issues). With Debra’s guidance, I began to let my body take the lead. I took note of when it was full, when it was hungry, when it felt like celebrating with ice cream, when it needed rest, when it wanted to play, and when it needed to say “no.” As I began nourishing my body with kindness and replaced judgment with curiosity, something interesting happened– I stopped being so mean to myself. I discovered a child-like self inside me that was more compassionate and forgiving when I “messed up.” |
If you don't go within you go without
I could no longer pretend that food and excess were the way out of the discomfort I felt in my own skin. The more I tried to numb and escape the "bad" feelings, I also numbed the joy, the creativity and the love. Because as my favourite teacher Brene Brown later taught me, you can’t selectively numb emotions – numb one, and you numb em’ all.
I knew I was looking for approval, permission and validation from the outside world. I just wanted other people to fill me up and re-assure me that I was enough, that I was worthy, that I was lovable. But what I realized was that if my worthiness was found outside myself, I would never feel full, I would always be wanting more and more to satisfy me. There would never be enough food, praise or love that could fill me up if I didn't already feel full within myself. I went on to pursue deeper coaching training with my mentors Stacey Morgenstern, Carey Peters and Liyana Silver and Christine Arylo. While I was learning how to help other women get out of their own way, I worked with my own coaches to get out of my own. Along the way, I had my very own "aha" moment- it was a very gentle voice that told me, "You are worthy and enough as you are love, you just forgot. But now you remember."
I’m Myrite, and as a Fullness Coach, I help women stop filling up with food, busyness and self-doubt and learn how to nurture themselves from the inside out.
You know the saying, “If you don’t go within, you go without?” My mission is to be your guide on your healing journey so you can discover how to live your life from an authentic space where there is nothing lacking – only wholeness.
How I became a Fullness Coach...
I immersed myself in the work of awesome women like Tara Brach, Jessica Ortner, Elizabeth Gilbert, Brene Brown, Julia Cameron, Danielle Laporte and Dr. Rachel Naomi Remen (to name a few). I started listening to Headspace and began a daily morning ritual of meditation, EFT tapping, writing and drawing in my journal. I gradually began to find my own unique voice, I reconnected to my creative inner child and I realized that everything I had discovered in my healing journey flowed from these three principles:
Mindfulness |
Kindfulness |
Playfulness |
Mind-full. Kind-full. Play-full.
That was when I had my “aha” moment: I am a Fullness Coach!
Not full because you’re so stuffed that the buttons pop off your pants or the, “I’m too busy, my schedule's too full” kind of full. My purpose is to cultivate genuine, authentic, inside-out fullness...
Not full because you’re so stuffed that the buttons pop off your pants or the, “I’m too busy, my schedule's too full” kind of full. My purpose is to cultivate genuine, authentic, inside-out fullness...
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I try to incorporate these three principles into everything I do, say, teach, and create because for me they are the core of living a healthy, happy and meaningful life.