Thais is a 20s something yoga dork (her word) with a passion for food and life. You can catch her taking naps in the park with her black lab Caviar or tweeting away about some quote or another. You can check out her corner of the blogging world at letitgo8. I do love me some Thais.
I’m a binge eater.
I’m the first to admit it.
When things are rough on the inside – I go to food for comfort. When I am not bingeing, I’m beating myself up about the last binge. I spend the whole day feeling guilty, ashamed, and pretty low. I look at my body with distaste and dwell on the binge like a big black fog that doesn’t lift.
It becomes a vicious circle and pretty soon I forget what started it. Did I binge because I beat myself over and over again or did I beat myself because of the binge?
Today, as I was getting ready for my work out, I was undressing in front of the mirror and I caught my own eye. So I gave myself a good look over.
And I stared. And kept staring, expecting my inner critic to have at it. But for some reason, the voice didn’t come. Instead, all those months of my own voice telling people to love more, to have more compassion, to keep an open heart, came back to me.
And that’s when it hit me like a ton of bricks, right there in the middle of the locker room.
I realized that I WILL NOT CHANGE BY HATING MYSELF.
I will not stop my bingeing by scaring myself to stop.
By blackmailing. By making myself cry with all the self-hate. By starving myself. By avoiding touching my skin because I do not want to feel my fat.
By not buying new clothes for years because I do not want to admit I went up two sizes. By not feeling like I deserve good people in my life.
I cannot hate myself into change. And neither can you!
When’s the last time ignoring, hitting and screaming hateful things at a child generate good response? I would never want to treat any poor child the way I treat myself.
So after that little moment, I decided it’s time to LOVE myself into change.
Because I really do want to change. I do not want to have binge attacks.
I want to lose weight and fit back into my jeans. I want to be able to show off what I have worked so hard to achieve. But my self-love shouldn’t come because I am a certain size.
My self-love should not be dependent on the percentage of body fat I have. My self-love should come because I am ME. I am dedicated, motivated, and I deserve the best.
I am a good person and I have a big heart. Which means I need to start loving myself NOW. No time but the present right? At the end of the day – we all make mistakes, we all slip up. You just gotta laugh, give yourself a big hug, and spend a little more time figuring out how to love yourself more.
And I have a pretty sure feeling that by self-lovin’ myself enough, good things will start to happen. I won’t binge as often because I won’t beat myself up all day about it.
I won’t feel scared to look at a mirror. I’ll stand up a bit taller and hold my head a little higher.
The weight will come off because I am no longer ashamed of it. It’s not going to be easy, but what do I have to lose?
Clearly hating myself hasn’t worked out too well for me so it’s about time I try something new.
What about you? Do you love or hate yourself to change?
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