Life is Not About How Beautiful I Am

I am old and learning a lot of things now that would have been nice to have known, before, but I'm glad they are happening at all!! LOL

There is nothing wrong with being beautiful, unless it is the only pair of glasses you use to see yourself or others. If your self worth is based on your degree of beauty, or lack of it, don't look now, but you are missing the boat. Degrees are comparisons. One is more, the other is less. You are always going to be more beautiful than some, and less beautiful, than others. So what? This narrow and distorted focus is not what life is about.

There have been times when I felt beautiful, and times when I was convinced that I was absolutely unattractive, for this, or that, reason -- one of them being "fat." Cultural beauty is based on swim suit models, magazines, fashion, and makeup. Advertising. Someone else's manufactured opinion, used to get you to feel an emotion that results in their selling you a product. Flimsy, but extremely effective manipulation based on both "envy" and "belief."

"Beauty is only skin deep, but ugly is to the bone."

So why am I thinking about this? A friend shared a blog post about a young mother who wants to set a good example for her little daughters so she has started saying, "I'm beautiful" in front of them in the hopes that they will say the same things about themselves. She does not believe what she is saying inside herself, but is grabbing at this straw in hopes that she can help her daughters to not go through what she went through.

She believes she is modeling the appropriate thing to them and is to be commended because she really wants to be a good Mom to her girls. I hope this works for her and her girls. I have a feeling it may backfire, though, because she is not telling them the truth about how she feels about herself. There was a clue in her writing that her little girls recognized her out-of-character behavior and falsehood. So rather than learning to say, "I'm beautiful", they are learning that "making stuff up" is appropriate behavior.

Children often see some things more clearly than adults think they do. They reacted by looking at her strangely... and that was the clue that something went through their heads. They had a thought or made a decision about what they saw in their mother. I remember doing the same thing when I was very very young.

I can only speak from my own experience of having the view of myself that I was ugly, having often been told so by my older brothers -- and others. I believed them. Believing them means that I took their words about me and internalized them as if they were the truth. They became my own words about me. Their, "Your're so ugly..." statements got transformed into very painful "I'm so ugly...." statements inside myself. I'm not blaming them. I truly believe that if they had really known how that affected me, they would not have done it. But children, and adults, can sometimes be very cruel. Those feelings still creep up from time to time, but, I'm no longer concerned about them, because I have learned something better. I have learned the truth.

When I look at young women, young mothers, and see that they are entangled in a negative self image and worried that they might pass that on to their daughters, I want to reach out and say, "Don't do that," as if I could stop their worrying, somehow, and also help them and their little girls.

Here's an idea that I think might work better and I noticed it in the movie called "The Help": "You is kind, you is smart, you is important" -- and the little girl repeated back, "You is kind, you is smart, you is important."

I loved it because I had had something similar taught to me, only, much later in life, by God, who said to me, "You are loved, and you are worthwhile."  I repeated the words back in personal form, "I am loved, and I am worthwhile" and my life changed.

We cannot make up a self image. We already have one. We also don't know who we are - until - we know who God is, and I very firmly believe that. Once I began to understand who God is, I began to have a more accurate understanding of who of I am. He changes me. We also cannot make up a self image for someone else, but we can certainly begin planting good things in the soil -- theirs and ours.

Even now, there is a man at church, who will sometimes shake my hand and say to me, "You're a blessing" -- and guess what? For a while, I feel like a blessing!! For a moment, I am a blessing. We are all like that. We women seem to unconsciously think about ourselves, the way that others speak to us, about us. That is also why emotional abuse is so effective. If we listen to repeated positive, or negative, statements about us, we begin to believe there must be some truth in them whether there really is or not. So we need to be sure we are getting and believing accurate information about us and giving the same to our girls. And who better to get accurate information about us, than from God, our Creator? The God who knows us better than we do ourselves, and loves us, anyway.

That may be why there is so much relationship teaching in the church that "Women need love," and "Men need respect."   Actually we all need both of these things, but a woman can go a long time on the knowledge that someone loves her. If I know that God loves me.... I don't actually crave to have someone else say that to me. I like it and enjoy it, but don't need it. I have God's love and that is enough -- that is my self image: I am loved. The more I know God, the more I know myself. Don't get me wrong, I often forget and have to be reminded -- but that is the human condition. We are forgetful and need to be reminded. So, I remind myself as often as I realize I need it.

But, for this young mother to simply and suddenly start staying out loud, "I'm beautiful," when she does not really believe it is true, will ring false inside herself, and also inside her children. If that young mother began to know, understand, and accept God's love for her, her own self image would truly begin to change. Then she would no longer have to worry that she is passing on something bad to her daughters. Then, if she felt the need to say, "I am beautiful," because God loves her, which makes her beautiful, her words would ring true inside herself, and her children. I doubt she would need to say that, though, because the words, "I am loved" said inside herself, are so much more powerful -- because they are the truth.

I suggest that she needs to start planting the seeds of God's love in her girls. I think she should be saying things like, "Jesus loves you, and you are beautiful, and intelligent," to her daughters at the appropriate times. (Not as a sort of mindless "mantra" but when the situation calls for it.) She should be saying, "You are loved, and you are worthwhile" to her girls when they need encouragement. I saw the young author say things about her daughters in her post that she needs to be telling them out loud.

If she models sincere honesty and kindness to them, and teaches them what God is like, they will admire her and want to copy her. If she tells them that they are beautiful and responsible, they will believe her and say they are beautiful and responsible to themselves. The best window of time for this is when they are very young -- but it will work at any age, really. If done when young, they won't have to grow through so much pain. They will have other pains, but not that one, which can be so debilitating.

Help them to be strong in Christ. Tell them, "Jesus loves you." Tell them, "I love you." Tell them "You are loved" and they will know they are beautiful, just as they are -- to the bone. Being beautiful means being loved by God. Nothing can replace that particular glow!!

Jesus loves you.
You are loved.
You are worthwhile.
You are beautiful and responsible.
You are kind.
You are smart.
You are important.
You are a good girl (or boy.)
You are a blessing!!

Praise the Lord!! God is good! God is holy! God is love! God is infinite!

If you really want to begin to know God better, ask Him to show you what you need to know about Him. He knows what you need and will show you.

For those who need some intellectual type spiritual inspiration I also recommend studying Volumes one and two of A.W. Tozer's books: "The Attributes of God." You can find both of these titles at Amazon.com, and other places where Christian literature is sold.

Be back soon,

Marcia


Here is the blog post, in case you would like to read it for yourself, http://offbeatfamilies.com/2012/11/telling-daughters-im-beautiful

OK. That Didn't Work -- But God Did! Amen

What didn't work? The idea to substitute fruit for binge ingredients. It really just kind of made things worse. The thing about carbs and craving and binging is that, what you ate a little while ago, or the previous meal, will have an effect on your next meal, or hunger episode. Hello!! That's why they call it a "binge." Trying to substitute fruit was the same idea as doing medical meth for other drugs. You are still hooked on drugs. I was still hooked on sweets.

I was still out of control, but, oddly enough, my A1C turned out to be 5.5 which is pretty good and below the pre-diabetes level. I was really surprised to see that. That proves to me that I don't need to worry about cooked vegetables as much as I had been lead to believe. Live and learn.

That did not help the weight gain, though, which is the thing that is still haunting me. I have now put back on twenty pounds and am really flabbergasted by that. It happened in one month's time and feels like a train wreck to me.

I finally heard the message at church that I needed to turn THIS over to the Lord and ask Him to do for me what I could not do for myself. God is so amazing. I also asked him to point out to me the effects of the binging so I would not forget and begin to think it was OK again.

The first thing I noticed was during a binge on bridge mix and spice drops that I could feel my heart beating in my whole body. My body felt like it was throbbing to the beat of my heart. I purposefully began taking deep relaxing breathes which helped things to calm down. That was the reminder of the "pressure" that is associated with craving and binging. The whole concept of craving is the idea of being forced to go get the item that is being pictured in the head. The pressure is real. The pushing, craving, gnawing is real. Taking deep relaxing breathes helped to reduce the felt pressure.

That night when I tucked into bed, I suddenly noticed my heart felt like it was fluttering very quickly and when I checked my pulse I could not find one. It lasted only a few short seconds, and I have not had one since, but it really shocked me. God was showing me what binging does to my body. That is what I had asked for: knowledge and experience that would not allow me to continue down the wrong path.

The next morning He inspired me with a new concept -- at least it is new for me. I looked and noticed that there is a difference between the lusting pressure for food, (picture the open mouths of little birds clamoring to be fed) and how a mother feeds her family (mother bird feeds properly). The operative word being "feed." I know that if I had had children I would have insisted on feeding them to the highest degree of healthy eating knowledge that I had attained -- just as my own mother did. It involves a responsibility to the ones you are feeding. I believe I would use the guidelines that I know and I would orchestrate the feeding of my family according to it. I realized that that is what I want to do for myself. Instead of "eating", I would be "feeding" me. Feeding also implies healthy and well managed with purpose.

I'm not sure I can explain the difference so that someone else will understand what that means to me, but I shall attempt it. This is certainly my own subjective experience but I shall try to shine a light on it, in case it helps some one else, and also so I can remember it myself. So what I need to keep a tight reign on is the difference between the experience of eating which involves, consuming, smelling, tasting, chewing, swallowing, and repeating for the unbridled pleasure of it -- and the idea of feeding myself properly. This is completely subjective. It also involves other feelings in my body that I associate with eating and craving and enjoying food.

So I'm choosing to use the terms "consuming", and "feeding." Feeding being a well managed plan, executed in a balanced and healthy manner. Consuming being the act of eating which may include craving and/or binging. Consuming is taking in -- Feeding is watching over and giving.

I've unconsciously thought of "feeding" as something you do for someone else. You feed your kids. You feed your family. You feed your friends. I, for some odd reason, had never though of "feeding" in a relationship between me and myself. Feeding involves a plan and a purpose. Consuming is about pleasure.

So why could I not get pleasure from a plan and a purpose for feeding me, in the same way I would do for feeding others?

The first time I put the plan into operation was when I went to a buffet with a friend. We both had talked about out of control eating at a buffet which, for me, is the experience of knowing I can choose as much as I want of anything I want, and then being lead only by my eyes -- or the appeal of the presentation. If I saw it and liked it, it would go on my plate (even though I usually still avoid starchy carbs). I did have a sense that I needed salad but the fact that I like it, helped to get it onto my plate. There is also pressure to think that you want to "get your money's worth."

So we both decided to do it another way. On the outside it probably appeared to be the same, but it was really different inside. We made a point to talk about what each one of us was planning to do, after we paid to get in, but before we began choosing food. In fact we actually made the plan in the car on the way over. My plan was simply to eat only vegetables and meat. His plan was to eat more vegetables and smaller portions.

Then God inspired us to pray for His help to make the right choices and stick to our individual plan. So we were not doing the blessing on the food (yet) we asked God to be in charge of us and our plates before anything was placed on them.

Then we went our separate ways and filled our plates and met back at the table. I did my usual heaped up salad  and realized that I did usually follow the plan up to this point. For me the point of departure in the past was always afterwards and involved more portions and desserts. But I had a new plan this time, with the help of God.

When we met at the table we examined each others plates and talked about it a little. He had more vegetables and color on his plate than I had ever seen before. He said he had gone for more vegetables and less meat. Mine looked like it always did, except that I had included some blue cheese dressing mixed with Ranch. I was happy to be on track, and so was he.

Then when the salad plate was done, I decided, before I left the table, that I was going to get some steamed broccoli and meat loaf. I came back with the broccoli and also some brussels sprouts and the aforementioned meat loaf with spaghetti sauce on it for flavor. (I forget what he did.) When I was done eating, leaving a small amount of leftovers (very unusual), my stomach signaled that it was full, and I heard and obeyed. I had no reason to go get any dessert, and actually, it did not seem appealing. I was glad. Thank you Lord.

So the key is the prayer and trusting God -- and the plan and the decision to feed me properly and not eat indiscriminately is what He gave me. Thank you Lord! He never leaves us! Praise God!

Be back soon,

Marcia