28/02/2023
There are certain things in life that you just have to acceptโyour height, for
instance, or the family youโre born into. And, yes, the length of your legs or the
width of your hips.
But the thing is, as women, we are constantly taught the
opposite. Weโre given this message that we can alter every single aspect of our
faces and bodies, and weโre encouraged to do so to try to achieve this ideal of
what a woman is โsupposedโ to look like. Youโre expected to fix yourself. To dye
your hair, or get eyelash extensions, or change the tone of your skin, or the shape
of your nose, or the size of your breasts. There is so much fixing.
So, as women, weโve got to be pretty damn amazing to realize early on that
physical perfection is neither achievable nor useful, and that all that fixing can
be toxic.
I learned that lesson the hard way myself. From a very early age, I was told
that my body was not perfect.. But no matter what I did or how much I starved myself, my proportions
were the same. My hips were always going to be wider than my shoulders. My
legs were always going to be the shape I was born with. If only I had made peace
with that by twenty-five, my energy would have been put into much more
worthwhile things.
I was thirty when I decided I needed to recover from my eating disorder. I
think by the time youโre thirty, youโve started to get this awarenessโat least I
hadโthat you may have been taught the wrong things.
I was looking back at
how I had lived my twenties, and I realized that what I was doing wasnโt
working, that I didnโt want to live like that for the rest of my life. I knew that
there was a better way of living, because I looked at people who werenโt
obsessed with their bodies like I was, and they seemed a lot happier, calmer,
more peaceful.
They didnโt spend every waking minute thinking of ways to work
off every single calorie they ate. They had lives. It was a turning point for me. I
had to surrender to the fact that I really wasnโt as in control as Iโd thought I was.
That Iโd hit a dead end. I remember thinking, God, I donโt want to be this
miserable anymore.
Iโm grateful for the lessons Iโve learned, but I know Iโll never get that decade
backโall the time spent weighing myself and not being able to hang out with
my friends because I was fixated on changing myself.
Weโre all made differently: our families, our frames, our personalities and talents.
Appreciate how you were made, and stay on your mat. Thatโs where happiness
lies.