Swallowing the Truth on Body Image

Over the years I’ve heard a lot of women talk about how they don’t like their bodies and how it has affected them in so many ways. Invitations to social events become a closet room torture session, sexual intimacy or nudity is revealed under a cloak of darkness and self worth a daily source of frustration and sadness.

I have struggled my whole life with having a low self love regarding my body. I tried hiding my (at times) disgust from my two daughters with the aim of instilling a sense of  respect and love of all peoples natural forms. To some degree I am sure I have succeeded but as they grow older my acting skills don’t match their wisdom.

I am out of time and you know what……I am just sick to death of giving myself a hard time. So much wasted energy, worry, anxiety, missed activities and loving embraces.

You cant make someone eat peas when their taste buds repel the texture and flavor so how can I make myself love something I don’t…….I cant and wont pretend any more.

I thought I had to live the rest of life just trying to accept who I was or what I believed myself to be. I only saw with eyes, not with heart.

Then just last week I had a massage from a beautiful soul sister. It was dark, no lights except a soft fire, due the kids being asleep not far from the massage mat. As the energy moved my tears flowed. Without any mental attempt I became aware of a knowing deep within…….I love my body for what is has given me, what it has done for me, the places it has taken me and the adventures it has taken me on. I’ve been lost and it walked me out, loved for days and risen to love more. My bodies been hit and hurt, raped and teased, nurtured life and cycled over many years. Its has worked hard, real hard and yet still feels soft to touch. My body keeps me afloat and harbors a soul yearning to do more for the world yet. Its incredible.

So like the peas I had watched my brother try to swallow as a child and into his teenage years, my body shape is something I may never like but I can appreciate and choose to like all the other qualities that makes a pea a pea other than its flavor.

All my life I have been looking at my body from the outside in with its dimples and blemishes, scars and increasing silhouette size.  How could I ever get to the good bits on the inside when I stopped my journey towards self love at the very first step, at the very first layer? My quest to value and love what I had been given, a remarkable assemblage of loving vibrational cells that could grow life itself was self sabotaged from the very beginning. Without insight, without the ability to become aware of our many layers, we build up a wall of resistance and self loathing. I now choose to begin my meditations from the inside out.

Now, here in the dark, in the safety of a true friend I met my inner self. I saw past the first layer and found so much more. Like focusing on the positive or choosing to see the brighter side of things I saw into all the crevices, between the folds and even through blood and air. I became aware of how my body has supported me when I believed it was the other way round (me supporting others). I became aware of a flowing energy surging through the gaps of my cells that is connected to all things and how insignificant our body size is too this universal source of truth and its movements and natural place in our physical world………so eat the peas and know their truth, know their true uniqueness and value.

It might take a while longer to get to know myself but from now on I can teach my girls how to really see themselves. I can show them how to value their existence from a place of truth and love…..how to love themselves.

May all beings see themselves for who they really are.

Much metta and much gratitude for my massage in the dark.