Loving yourself to change.

by

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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Comments

  1. This is really great and really hit a personal nerve. This was as if I wrote this myself ~ going through the same thing and learning to Love myself!

    Thank you so much for sharing and being so real and open.

  2. I want to. I realized on someone’s blog the other day that I don’t feel guilty when I binge though. Maybe I’ve grown numb to that feeling after practicing for so long? It’s true I hate the effects of fatness on my body, but I don’t have regrets after indulging. It’s a weird realization, because what do you do with that?

  3. I love this post. I firmly and completely and totally and completely believe that the only way I can make permanent change is by believing that I deserve it.

    If self-loathing worked, I would have been a “Pixie Stick” long before now. Just as I am right now is good enough.

  4. I think that self love is fabulous, and bigger than weight. I’m finally respecting myself, but I need to respect my emotions and my needs. That will alleviate a LOT of my frustration, sadness, and guilt.

    Great post!

  5. You KNOW how *I* feel 🙂

    There is no greater power than love…loving yourself means loving others means loving yourself means loving others….to infinity. In my world, where I mostly where rose-colored glasses, the self-love movement will lead to world peace.

  6. I find comfort in binge eating as well. It’s not often…only when things get REALLY bad. I’m trying to learn to love myself always, but that’s a rough battle to take on. When you feel like hardly anyone in the world loves you, you start to wonder if you’re even worthy of love.

  7. The emphasis on treating ourselves more humanly is great. We are amazing people and should be our biggest fans. I truly hope this post helps others understand the power of positive self speak.

  8. Such a wonderful entry, I can honestly say that this was me and still is to a much lesser extent, it has taken a lot for me to love the man in the mirror and recognise me for my inner beauty as I tried to put down in my Retrospect blog entry.
    Love the person you are.

  9. This post really hits home. I know from recent experiences that my life changed ever so little when I replaced “My God you’re a fat f**k” to “You have kind eyes. You have a nice smile” whenever I looked in the mirror. I had to will myself to do it, but by the end of the week I noticed a measure of peace within that hasn’t been there in a long time.

    Thank you for sharing.

  10. “I realized that I WILL NOT CHANGE BY HATING MYSELF.” This is so true! Being super-critical or super-criticized only makes us feel hopeless – why try if I’m just going to mess up again? When we accept and love ourselves, we know we’re worth the effort. We don’t have to be perfect, we get credit for the effort. So we try. We’ll probably fail a ton (Edison failed 10,000 before he made the lightbulb), but eventually we’ll do it!

  12. Thanks for sharing this with us. I have certainly had my share of binges too. Although I think mine come from a different place.

  13. Excellent post. 🙂

    I had a similar experience with looking in the mirror and expecting the negative voices to start up and it not happening. Mind blowing. There is so much more opportunity when you approach with love rather than hate.

  14. This is so true. Loving oneself brings better rewards in both self-image and confidence. I have noticed this a lot recently, my confidence in social situations is markedly better despite having gained heavily in the last year.

    What I like to do now when I see my reflection is to see myself as an interesting combination of curves and shapes, like some kind of beautiful abstract art. That way I by-pass the demeaning thoughts and just concentrate on the uplifting ones. I find I feel so much better, and am much more inclined to live a healthier life.

    Happiness is all about perception.

  15. YES.
    The turning point for me was when I started encouraging myself instead of insulting myself. I’d tell myself I could do it istead of berating myself as I tried to eat better or exercise and not dwell on past failures. And the more i did it…the better I felt about myself. I felt like I deserved to succeed. That every day was a new one to start over…And I changed.
    I still catch myself sometimes doing it when I’m tired or angry, and it’s amazing how sometimes I still feel like I’m not good enough even after having come so far, but loving myself as I was gave me the strength to chenge for *me*. Most days I can’t believe I’m me 🙂

  16. This is EXACTLY what I needed to see today. I had a rough day yesterday and have been beating myself up over it. Hating myself isn’t going to help.

  17. This post really had a message for us all that look in that mirror & always find the faults vs. the good. It really does make a difference how we talk to ourselves. For me, it is always a work in progress but I try….

    THX! And so glad you are loving yourself!

  18. This post really hit home. I resolved a few years ago that if I don’t truly love myself, I will never truly be able to love others. I began acknowledging little things I did that were positive for others…letting people out in traffic, praying for others, holding a door, etc. The more I acknowledged that I treat others well, the more I realized I treated myself terribly so I started treating myself how I treat others. The self-love I feel now is being challenged as I lose weight, i.e. the saggy, flabby skin. It’s very hard for me to look at myself without a nasty thought or comment creeping into my head and sometimes out my mouth. When it does happen, I remind myself that I am healthier now losing 85 lbs and once I put clothes back on, not many people but me realize what’s underneath.

    Binge eating is something that will probably always be part of my life, but learning why I do it and understanding that sometimes I can’t figure out the reason why I did it is okay. It’s okay to let go. It’s okay to slip once in a while. This is a life-long journey and none of us is perfect.

  19. Did you write this for me? Thanks for being brave and posting this. Last week I decided to accept me and love me- the next day my friend commented how thin I looked…huh, I guess it does work.

  20. I think you hit it on the head when you said “all those things you’ve been telling other people”. Loving others will hopefully lead to loving oneself. And that in itself is the change. Then, we lose weight, get fit and do it forever and for the right reasons. Here’s to all of us getting there!

  21. My bingeing doesn’t have anything to do with food but is still bad for me – my self image and could be very hurtful in soooo many ways that I am working hard to stop. I’m using the great strides I’ve made so far as “see, you can do it” statements. Don’t dwell on one day. Instead see all the great things you’ve done up to now. Like I always tell my son, who is a goalie – it’s not the goals they score, but the hundreds you do stop. One brownie that you gave into is no match for the hundreds of walks you’ve taken. And get right back to the walks and forget the brownie.

  23. Teeg you ARE beautiful, and strong, and amazing, and do you want me to keep going, cause I will!!! It will not happen overnight, but just make baby steps for each change. I love going to you for support, so know I am always here for you:-) I am dealing with it all first hand too, but remember some of the words shared by Geneen Roth…we are all beautiful, the outside is just a shell…
    Sending lots of love and hugs,
    Terra

  24. Very powerful post:) I’m slowly learning this same lesson – for years I hated myself thin and while it worked on some level (I was skinny, I guess) I HATED myself. Absolutely loathed myself. Lasting change only comes from love, both from ourselves and others. Thank you for the beautiful reminder!

  25. LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE this post? Think I love it? I know exactly what you are feeling. I’ve been there, and I am working hard on changing it too, it’s hard fricking work, but I believe it’s worth it, I believe I will change that tape in my head, and I believe you will too!

  26. Great post! I too struggle with binge eating and would try to use self hatred to motivate myself to stop the binging. But it would only make it worse because I’d make myself feel so crappy that I’d binge to feel better. I’ve realized that by caring for myself and not starving my body, I’m more able to handle my emotions without food.

    Good luck 🙂 And your weight does not define who you are!

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