This time of year I find that people are especially hypercritical of their shape. As I walk on the beach, or relax in a pool - I see so many afraid to join the fun and actually Live. They’d rather stay wrapped in their safety cocoon & hide ‘their body.’
As a former anorexic - I remember how that feels. How I’d let life pass me by. Trying so hard to have the proportions of the woman I’d admired from the magazines. I’d starve myself to fit in the clothes I’d be wearing for a weekly modeling shoot. Horrified at the prospect of not being able to zip a dress because I’d gained a pound.
I was Always tired
Always hungry
Always sad
I wasn’t Living
Truthfully I was barely even surviving
And even at my Lowest point - when I was hospitalized for my illness and warned I was on the verge of organ failure - I Still felt that it wasn’t enough. That I wasn’t enough.
Eventually I got the help I needed. Left my captor behind, took back control of my life and started the arduous journey of Learning how to Love myself.
I mean REALLY Love myself
Not tolerate
Not accept
But actually Love, Appreciate and Celebrate who I was. And that I was so much more than a body.
The reason I’m sharing this is because I had a conversation with a client the other day and his words keep surfacing in my mind.
He had recently left an unhappy marriage. His self esteem had suffered tremendously over the course of the last decade & he was so broken and wounded I could Feel his pain. It hurt my heart.
I wrapped my arms around him so tightly he shuttered a bit, before beginning to release all the hurt he’d been bound by and melting into the moment. Tears began falling on my shoulder and he started apologizing. I told him to let go. Let it all go. Allow himself the grace to be open to receiving Love.
He sobbed harder - spilling out the pain, insecurities over his body and the rest of why he felt unworthy. Explaining that once he hit the gym and had a ‘better body’ maybe life would turn a corner and he’d be ‘deserving’ of happiness.
He’d been hinging his Entire hope of fulfillment on this delusion that ‘his body’ ruined everything and fixing his body would ‘fix’ his life.
It was cathartic
Honest
Sad
But So pure
It was the first step in His journey of discovering self love. And that he was More than worthy More than deserving & More than allowed - to Love and appreciate himself for being here. Purging the preconceived notions that were holding him back from Living. And taking a step towards recovering from the trauma he’d been subjected to.
His existence is not an accident
He has a purpose
He is Special
And in order to fulfill that purpose and be everything he is Here to be - He needed to Value Himself.
Now please don’t skew my words or take what I’m saying out of context. I am Not opposed to self improvement, weight loss or working out. There are Plenty of benefits from these things. What my point is - is that it may be important, but if you’re insides are broken it really doesn’t matter how pretty the packaging is. So we shouldn’t disregard the importance of accepting ourselves as Whole & Complete Beings.
We are so much more than bodies!
We are Spirit
Pure Energy
And Love Embodied
We are Creators ❤️❤️❤️
….. I was lucky
I found my Tribe and Purpose. I no longer worry about my form and let it rule me - because I Know now that I am so much More than that. But when I ran across this poem today - I found myself circling back to the conversation I’d just had with my client and I Knew that it presented itself to me for a reason - I was meant to share it.
Your Body is Not Your Masterpiece
Your Life is
It is suggested to us a million times a day that our BODIES are PROJECTS. They aren’t.
Our Lives are
Our Spirituality is
Our Relationships are
Our Work is
Stop spending all day obsessing, cursing, perfecting your body like it’s all you’ve got to offer the world. Your body is Not your art, it’s your paintbrush.
Whether your paintbrush is a tall paintbrush, or a thin paintbrush, or a stocky paintbrush, or a scratched up paintbrush …. It is Completely Irrelevant!
What is relevant is that YOU HAVE A PAINTBRUSH which can be used to transfer your insides onto the canvas of your life — where others can see it and be inspired and comforted by it.
Your body is Not your offering
It’s just a Really Amazing Instrument which you can use to create your offering each day.
Don’t curse your paintbrush
Don’t sit in a corner wishing you had a different paintbrush.
You’re wasting time
You’ve got the one you got
Be Grateful, because without it you’d have nothing with which to paint your life’s work. Your life’s work is the Love you Give and Receive — and your body is the Instrument you use to accept and offer Love on your soul’s behalf. It’s a system.
We are encouraged to obsess over our instrument’s SHAPE — but our body’s shape has no effect on it’s ability to accept and offer love for us.
Just none
Maybe we continue to obsess, because as long we keep wringing our hands about our paintbrush shape, we don’t have to get to work painting our lives.
Stop fretting
The truth is that all paintbrush shapes work just fine — and anybody who tells you different is trying to sell you something.
Don’t buy
Just paint
No wait — first, stop what you are doing and say THANK YOU to your body — right now.
Say THANK YOU to your eyes for taking in the beauty of sunsets.
THANK storms, and children blowing out birthday candles.
Say THANK YOU to your hands for writing love letters and opening doors and stirring soup and waving to strangers.
Say THANK YOU to your legs for walking you from danger to safety and climbing so many mountains for you.
Then pick up your instrument and start painting this day Beautiful and Bold and Wild and Free and YOU.
- Glenan Doyle
Self Love Tribe ❤️
You are Special
You are Enough
You are Loved
Nameste
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