Freedom to be Me
I didn't grow up as an athletic person. Running, jumping, or participating in sports were not strong suits of mine. In fact quite the opposite. Reading, writing, painting, drawing, singing, and other fine art activities were where my strengths were expressed.
Needless to say, the lack of athletic involvement did not result in an "athletic" physique. Perusing through photos of me during my preteen years and onto adulthood has shown that my size and weight has varied considerably through the years. Especially after the birth of my two children.
My way of coping with my self esteem issues related to my weight and size was to emotionally eat. Chocolate, cookies, pies, cakes, soft drinks, etc seemed to provide a temporary fix that made me feel better for about 5 minutes. But this process left me with the regret of knowing that I was inadvertently sabotaging any progress towards feeling better about myself and my body. In fact, I remember a series of weeks when I chose to believe that calories and weight weren't actually related. "Forget what the experts said," I thought "there is no way those four or five cookies before bed are going to make a big difference."
Yet the more I played the comparison game with other women and fashion magazine photos, the worse I felt about myself.
Some months ago I struggled with postpartum depression. Tired of being on medication and knowing that I wasn't getting much better, I decided to take up running. The decision to run had nothing to do with changing my weight and size. I was just tired of sitting around feeling blue and trying to escape my feelings with food. The cycle of feeling bad, eating, feeling bad some more wasn't conducive to feeling better or getting out of depression.
Around the same time, I felt God begin to challenge me about my coping strategies. I would say with my lips in prayer and through songs of praise and worship, that He was all I needed in life. That He was enough to meet all my needs and handle all my burdens. Yet I was not living that reality when I escaped my feelings with food, instead of surrendering my burdens to Him. I chose to respond to God's challenge to stop escaping with food and started engaging with my feelings. I decided to work through the hardships instead of running from them.
In the following weeks these changes continued. I stopped escaping my sad or negative feelings with food. I signed up for a 5k race to give me a goal to work towards in my running. I started eating cleaner so that I felt physically better running, instead of feeling bogged down by toxins. I listened to an audio book, Made to Crave, by Lysa Terkeurst to get encouragement and advice on my new journey.
Ultimately, while I felt like a ship that was dry docked and undergoing repairs, changes began happening below the surface. Somewhere along the way, I stopped tying my self worth to the size of my jeans or waistline. I stopped comparing myself to others I thought looked or were "better than" me ... or feeling better because I saw someone who "didn't look better than" me via the same comparison games.
I hadn't actually noticed the results of these changes until recently. I was walking in a shopping center. I looked in the store window to check out my reflection. I grimaced a bit because I felt my reflection didn't do me justice, but then I moved on and let it go. I didn't feel bad about myself. I didn't feel like a failure. I didn't feel "prettier" or "uglier" by what I saw. My reflection was just that. A reflection, and not my true self. For the first time in years, I passed by women who were pretty, fashionable, and had make up on and I didn't compare myself. I didn't measure myself against them. I just acknowledged they were pretty, and moved on to more pressing matters in my world. And I found freedom there. Freedom to be myself. Freedom to disregard my perceived shortcomings, at least in the area of my physical image. Freedom to enjoy walking around without being self conscious. Freedom to just be me, and enjoy who I was.
It's taken some time and some work. But I have finally begun to let go of the comparison games to find my worth. I'm not looking in the mirror to measure up who I am or what I think about myself. I am walking in the realization that my worth exists because God created me to be wonderful, just how I am. Not because of what size I wear.
Needless to say, the lack of athletic involvement did not result in an "athletic" physique. Perusing through photos of me during my preteen years and onto adulthood has shown that my size and weight has varied considerably through the years. Especially after the birth of my two children.
My way of coping with my self esteem issues related to my weight and size was to emotionally eat. Chocolate, cookies, pies, cakes, soft drinks, etc seemed to provide a temporary fix that made me feel better for about 5 minutes. But this process left me with the regret of knowing that I was inadvertently sabotaging any progress towards feeling better about myself and my body. In fact, I remember a series of weeks when I chose to believe that calories and weight weren't actually related. "Forget what the experts said," I thought "there is no way those four or five cookies before bed are going to make a big difference."Yet the more I played the comparison game with other women and fashion magazine photos, the worse I felt about myself.
Some months ago I struggled with postpartum depression. Tired of being on medication and knowing that I wasn't getting much better, I decided to take up running. The decision to run had nothing to do with changing my weight and size. I was just tired of sitting around feeling blue and trying to escape my feelings with food. The cycle of feeling bad, eating, feeling bad some more wasn't conducive to feeling better or getting out of depression.
Around the same time, I felt God begin to challenge me about my coping strategies. I would say with my lips in prayer and through songs of praise and worship, that He was all I needed in life. That He was enough to meet all my needs and handle all my burdens. Yet I was not living that reality when I escaped my feelings with food, instead of surrendering my burdens to Him. I chose to respond to God's challenge to stop escaping with food and started engaging with my feelings. I decided to work through the hardships instead of running from them.In the following weeks these changes continued. I stopped escaping my sad or negative feelings with food. I signed up for a 5k race to give me a goal to work towards in my running. I started eating cleaner so that I felt physically better running, instead of feeling bogged down by toxins. I listened to an audio book, Made to Crave, by Lysa Terkeurst to get encouragement and advice on my new journey.
Ultimately, while I felt like a ship that was dry docked and undergoing repairs, changes began happening below the surface. Somewhere along the way, I stopped tying my self worth to the size of my jeans or waistline. I stopped comparing myself to others I thought looked or were "better than" me ... or feeling better because I saw someone who "didn't look better than" me via the same comparison games.
I hadn't actually noticed the results of these changes until recently. I was walking in a shopping center. I looked in the store window to check out my reflection. I grimaced a bit because I felt my reflection didn't do me justice, but then I moved on and let it go. I didn't feel bad about myself. I didn't feel like a failure. I didn't feel "prettier" or "uglier" by what I saw. My reflection was just that. A reflection, and not my true self. For the first time in years, I passed by women who were pretty, fashionable, and had make up on and I didn't compare myself. I didn't measure myself against them. I just acknowledged they were pretty, and moved on to more pressing matters in my world. And I found freedom there. Freedom to be myself. Freedom to disregard my perceived shortcomings, at least in the area of my physical image. Freedom to enjoy walking around without being self conscious. Freedom to just be me, and enjoy who I was. It's taken some time and some work. But I have finally begun to let go of the comparison games to find my worth. I'm not looking in the mirror to measure up who I am or what I think about myself. I am walking in the realization that my worth exists because God created me to be wonderful, just how I am. Not because of what size I wear.
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