Today I received an email from my friend Yvonne and it really touched a sensitive spot. The photo that I have posted on my blog is as I was in my early to mid-twenties. Is it vanity that made me publish that photo? Perhaps… but I’m not so sure. A lifetime of feeling less for being more is hard to let go of. This photo was taken for my passport when I was going to France to join my fiancé in Marseille. I also had a visa for the Congo to go visit my sister. I did go to Marseille for a few months. Never made it to Brazzaville.
To make a long story a bit shorter, after a few years of living together, I realized that my fiancé was never going to get married, at least to me. He kept saying how beautiful the girls on the Riviera were with their incredible bodies being flaunted on the beach in Nice and Cannes. How did it make me feel? Ugly, unworthy, and unlovable. I wasn’t slim enough. . . even though I had starved myself for weeks living on grapefruit and boiled eggs. I got slim ok… but still, it wasn’t enough. Finally I got sick to my soul of feeling rejected for who I was. So after 5 years, I left him despite his assurance of his deep love for me.
On the rebound, with my family condemning me for my leaving him, I met with a man who wanted me as I was. . . or so I thought. By then, my health was not at a peak… but I was slim! After four painful miscarriages, I was able to conceive and gave him a daughter and a son. My body felt these assaults and, as if in an attempt to cushion me from pain, I got f a t. Oh the F.. word, it isn’t the four letter word that is an insult to our spirit. It is a much shorter one but how much deeper it goes, slicing through your heart and your essential being and the last vestiges of any measure of self-worth.
Are we children of God? I think so. I do believe in a Supreme Creator who must love all of us in our imperfections, for why would he/she/it keep on making that many of us falling any distance from perfection? Far too many beautiful young girls go through anorexia, bulimia, self-flagellation in this search for a goal that may never be achieved. Why are we so engaged in a short body life when eternity will eventually greet us as beautiful, powerful, incredibly loved spiritual beings, a reflection of our Creator? And here, I DO mean a genderless parent, all loving, all accepting. When we make these harsh judgements on ourselves, we are doing violence to our essential spirit. I did.
I can’t speak for men. But at some level, I think that, if they fall under the supreme judgement of the media, they must feel of lesser worth for having a slight paunch, for hair missing above their forehead, yet having so much more unwanted coming out of their ears and nostrils. Does it affect their sense of self-worth? I can’t say. We are ALL so judgemental. And judging is so far away from loving genuinely, isn’t it?
When Yvonne sent me this quote from Einstein, it plunged me in old unresolved pain and deep hurts. If we are NOT the body, how did we get so far away from acknowledging our true essence, which is spirit?
Anyway, here it is:
There are many models of us, two-legged creatures. When we limit our vision to that of a perfect body, an engaging smile, or clear blue eyes, we are SHORT-CHANGING who we really are. If an acknowledged genius says this, perhaps we can take note.
1 comment:
Stargazer:
I'm beginning to think you have some sort of telepathic connection to my thoughts. I was wrestling with this same issue yesterday (as I have off and on for most of my life). Oddly enough, there is a Sawyer Brown song that, when I remind myself of it, helps me the most. It is called "Some Girls Do" and says that some girls don't like boys like me...but some girls do. But once you are in a relationship, it seems to get a little more complicated than that doesn't it?
Virago
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