Self

TODAY'S MOTIVATION

I'm a hypocrite. To some degree we all are. Let me explain.

I have these beliefs about life, about how things should be, about how we should behave and how we should live. I usually feel pretty strongly in what I believe, especially when I just know that it's the right thing, but I just can't seem to live by some of these beliefs.

You see, I believe that people should love themselves for who they are. I believe that most people are harder on themselves than they should be and if they only saw themselves as other see them, they wouldn't be so quick to criticize themselves. I often say to  people, "If that was your best friend saying that about themselves, what would you say?".  The thing is, I don't practice what I preach, because I am critical of myself all the time. Where do I get this from? Well I think society is a pretty good influence, but I also think it is just a habit that I have picked up that I need to be more aware of. I also think that I have let others be critical of me and in turn by allowing this I have disrespected myself.

I also believe that if people want to be truly happy with themselves and how they look (and feel better), they need to quit obsessing over the latest diet and just start getting healthy. Avoid process foods, stay active, indulge once in a while, eat in moderation, take time to make wholesome meals, plan ahead, grocery shop frequently. The thing is, this sounds good in theory, but it seems that everywhere around us there are messages to the contrary - and I am influenced by this just as much as everyone else. I say I want to feel better, be healthy, live a long happy life, be there for my daughter (and I do!), but I also want to look skinny, wear nice clothes, look attractive for my husband, etc. As much as it's not about the number on the scale, I still have an number in my head and if I don't reach it I will likely feel like a failure. Why do I do this? I dunno. Our society constantly focuses on how women look, and we all want to meet that standard, and I'm not sure that will ever change. I don't know one woman who doesn't wish that she looked different in some way.

I am following a lot of healthy "rules" when it comes to eating, exercising, etc. But when it really comes down to it, I am still on a diet. I say that because I am still writing down everything I eat, I am restricting certain things that I cannot eat, I measure some of my food, I am eating less calories than if I were not trying to lose weight, and I am feeling like a failure if I don't follow it religiously.  I feel like I am in a conundrum because I am overweight and therefore feel I need to diet first, then work on just eating healthy. One day I convince myself that if I just toughen up and restrict more of my eating, I will see results faster. Another day I tell myself that this is a lifestyle change and therefore I need to not restrict myself so much. And in the end the scale usually wins and this is what ultimately dictates my behaviour and my opinion of myself.

I'm not sure how to change that, or if I ever will.

I also worry about how my thoughts may affect Maya, because I am constantly saying that I want her to grow up with a positive sense of self, yet I still struggle with this at my age. Sure, I am a lot wiser than I once was (getting older does that to you) - I know that I need to appreciate who I am and what I have now - but I am not completely a hundred percent happy with who I am.

That is why I do things such as place post-it notes all over telling people they are beautiful because even though I cannot always follow my own advice, I would like to still encourage these beliefs and maybe in turn I will slowly change myself. I will always have some extrinsic and shallow reasons for losing weight, but maybe just for today, I will let myself off the hook and just be happy with who I am.

Speaking of operation beautiful, Maya and I did some errands yesterday and took our post-it notes with us.

Here is a picture of us getting ready to leave. I tried to take a picture in the mirror to go with the sticky-note-mirror theme, but didn't realize my mirror has hand prints all over it:

And Maya double checking the sticky notes.

We had to run some errands at the mall and so we stuck some notes in various places including some change rooms at women's clothing stores, the public bathroom, a coffee shop bathroom, and the book store. We took a few pictures with my camera phone but some didn't turn out very well.

Maya was at her limit and all "shopped out" so we went home with some notes still in my purse.

I put a few in the bathroom at kickboxing this morning:

RANT OR RAVE

While we are on the subject of beliefs, my brother-in-law explained this book a few years back and even though I haven't read it, the premise changed my way of thinking about food. I picked it up from the book store yesterday. I'll give a review when I'm done reading. 

RANDOMS

When I was a kid, I remember watching this one scene on sesame street where the puppet pulls a "Weird Al" and sings about cereal to Madonna's song, "Material Girl". 

For some reason I remembered this when I was feeding Maya cereal one day and started singing my own version of it. Now every time I feed her breakfast I sing it and it always makes her have huge smiles. It's hilarious. 

Maya is going to have so much evidence of why I am an embarrassing mother when she gets older.