….I’d be happy.
What if you could be happy the way you are right now? What if you could look in the mirror and accept all parts of yourself rather than define yourself based on others perception of what is “beautiful” or “accepted”?
Once upon a time I was in this very same space. I had just finished my first year of college when the additional pounds crept on. I never worried much about my weight but always had low self-esteem and would therefore compensate by making sure I looked “perfect”. I thought if I looked “perfect” than I would be accepted by everyone no matter who I was on the inside. What I now recognize is that I didn’t like myself enough to know I was good just as I was without all the superficiality.
I remember however at a ripe young age thinking differently. I knew I was likeable, fun and charismatic but then with the exposure of society and listening to voices that told me otherwise, the lack of self-esteem piled on like thick film upon my soul. It caused me to be more reserved and fearful with the world around me for the fear of judgment, rejection and abandonment. In turn subjecting myself the need to look “perfect”. Isn’t that what we are taught? If we are “skinny and pretty”, we are safe in the world and if we’re “ugly and fat” we’re not?
I remember as the scale arose, I was in denial. It wasn’t until a (male) friend pinched my waist side and told me I better start getting in shape because I was losing my “hotness”. I looked at him, laughed a fake laugh and slapped him for being so cruel. Yet that moment never left me. To think that one action from another could catapult someone into such a tailspin of self-destruction.
Disappointed, I was no longer going to be accepted, I took the bull by the horns and tried “everything” from dieting to exercising and nothing worked. After that summer I transferred to another college away from home and found myself comparing my body and face to every girl I encountered thinking things like, “I wish I had her body, why can’t I be lucky like her, no guy is ever going to like me, I hate myself, I hate my body, if only I looked like that”… and that’s just a sample of what went through my mind.
I won’t go into my full story but what happened from here was my return home after graduation followed by 5 more years of excessive exercise, under eating and overindulging in other unhealthy areas until I wound up in the hospital and diagnosed with anorexia.
I was malnourished in every sense of the word and not just physically but mentally, emotionally and spiritually.
I was so imprisoned by my body, I didn’t even know who I was. I had defined myself by what my body looked like and thought she was far from perfect … fat or skinny!
This was the start of my spiritual journey towards radical self-love. It took time to heal but I now see the gift in it all in being able to empower women to love themselves and in turn fill their sacred vessels with divine love and nourishment.
So, why do we waste so much of our precious energy on defining who we are based on our looks?
It’s simple and you’re not to blame!! WE don’t know any better!!
We unfortunately live in a society that teaches otherwise but I am inviting you to join me in paving a new path for generations to come. The maniacal pressure around body image needs to stop!
So I am here to tell you that we don’t have to live in shame around what we look like or fear that we won’t be accepted in the world. We just need to be ourselves and love ourselves the same. If we can just recognize that we are “beautiful”, whole and complete just as we are then our bodies will not become the victims of an otherwise deprived soul.
We chose to come into this world to experience life on earth, which is to be joyful and happy. Yet we are so bogged down by misery, sadness and lackluster in our lives because we are not living our “truth”. We simply don’t even know how to “be” ourselves because we are always trying to please others by the way we act and the way we look.
I would love to share with you a few ways you can get started in healing your relationship with your body. Be sure to download the Issue 5 of The Forever Young Magazine from 2015 where I share with you some of my most sacred body rituals.
- If Only I Could Change My Body! - July 29, 2016