Sometimes I just ache for people. As a wellness coach who interacts with a multitude of folks who are in coaching with “to lose weight” as their reason, I hear myriad versions of “I hate how I look” and “I feel really bad about myself all the time” over and over again. I’ve seen those exact words come across my desk at least three times today. I also interact with a great many folks who are very very stressed out, overwhelmed and anxious as a result of the pace they’re trying to maintain. “I just need to do more, and then things will be better” is a common refrain.
I even started a chapter in Collisions of Earth and Sky explaining this very phenomenon:
Sometimes when I’m working with people, I’ll ask them to call out the qualities they like about themselves, and it’s almost always hard for them to do that. Has your body (whether the physical one that tends to come to mind first or bodies such as the mental, emotional, or spiritual) ever felt like the enemy? I’m guessing that you, at some point in life, have felt some animosity toward some aspect of your being. Most people do. I certainly have. People seem to default toward sharing what’s not working, what they are trying to change, what’s got to go.
Many of the folks I coach are working through body hatred and a general sense of dissatisfaction. Most folks don’t go around proclaiming self-love.
Unprompted, the qualities people like about themselves remain largely unsaid (if they can think of anything at all). From not liking physical appearance to not feeling smart enough to feeling like there’s not enough money or prestige or friends, human beings—you, me, and most people—are fantastic at calling out the negative. There is, of course, plenty of negative stuff going on in the world. Feeling bad about yourself, or what’s happening in the world that you can’t control, can feel like the end of the world.
It is just plain hard for so many of us to see our worth, to feel deeply how much we matter, and to allow enough space to process all the emotions that move through our bodies week after week. Truth be told, there’s a lot to do. Being alive is hard work, and we’re not all born into the life situations that offer the support and safety necessary to thrive.
So it's often easier in the moment to numb out (via food, drink, scrolling, or watching…) or get busy (Schedule more things! Pick up that extra shift every week. Say yes to filling the calendar to the brim!) than to sit with what’s going on or dig into what needs to happen to make the change or the mental shift that’s going to have true impact. Sometimes it’s hard to know what needs to happen, what does actually need to change to help move the dial in the direction of abundance (of life-giving stuff) and away from lack (otherwise known as fear of want).
Lindy West wrote, “What if you could decide you were valuable and it would be true?”
What if, indeed. Some might call that another one of those radical ideas.
But you can, and it is.
Sit with that question for a moment. How does your body react when you pose that question to yourself? “What if I decided I was valuable and it was true?” Maybe you tense up in resistance, like a wall wants to go up around you, a wall that you don’t really like but a wall that you know, so it feels safe even though it’s not serving you well. Maybe your heart rate picks up and you aren’t sure what to do next now that this other possibility exists–the unknown is scary, even when it leads toward the good. Maybe you feel a sense of relief as you let out a breath you didn’t realize you’ve been holding, and suddenly your shoulders sit lower and you have more room to look up. However your body responds, just notice it. Let it be there.
I ache for people because it’s so hard to see beneath the surface stories–the stories we’ve all been fed since we were little kids, some of which are nourishing and full of love, sure, but some of which are toxic and encourage loathing and shame. The key is to allow yourself to believe that the only true stories are the ones that include acceptance, love, and respect. Those are the stories that deserve your attention. The ones that encourage loathing, hate, and shame? Those are lies.
Listen to the stories that lift you up, not the ones that tear you down.
In a culture that holds very specific and often unattainable ways of being as ideal – especially when it comes to beauty (this includes age), body, or busyness – it can be easy to slip into the “I’m not enough’s” or the “I’ll be better when’s” or the "It was better then's". It’s tough to value yourself as you are right now in today's media influenced environment, or to interject an alternative storyline into the one you’ve been listening to until now. But it can be done.1
Your invitation today: Acknowledge your value. This doesn’t mean you have to suddenly love your body or clear the calendar or appreciate your age, but it IS an invitation to see your worth. You are a valuable, complete, imperfect human (as we all are) - no matter what the scale says, no matter what the size of your clothing, no matter how many responsibilities you take on, no matter how many decades you've been alive. You are enough. Period.
Cheryl Strayed wrote that "acceptance is a small, quiet room" and it sure can be. It's also a room worth spending enough time in to hear what's under the silence and in the space that's yours.
Belonging
If you can only
be sure of one thing,
be sure of how your presence
here on earth is essential.
Nothing would be the same
if your thread wasn’t woven
deep into this great tapestry,
woven over millennia
by the synergies that make life possible
on this fair planet—
Earth, fire, water, air
meet in space and across time
to tell the story
of your worth—
that you matter, and that’s the part
of the story to focus on.
Hard days will still be hard:
but you are woven deep
into something bigger
than yourself,
something that wouldn’t exist
if your thread wasn’t here,
something that always remains
true even if those hard days stack up.
The world may be
an uncertain place
but your place
in it isn’t.
You matter.
Your place is here.
Take care of your enoughness, folks — the world needs you in all of your imperfect beauty.
Recruiting the help of a qualified mental health professional can help with this. Visit https://www.nami.org/help for support locating a mental health professional in your area.
I have lot’s of empathy for the “feel good” mindset and I often do things to avoid falling deeply into the whirlpool leading to doom and gloom. But it can be taken too far. If I’m sailing between the Scylla and Charybdis of my daily existence, I must not just focus and the blue skies and halcyon sea of the moment but be aware of all the pitfalls along my route. I must not listen to the feel good sirens that want to lure me into becoming part of a porcine herd.