Be Your Own Beautiful

I've been thinking a lot this week about intuition and clarity. We, as women have all heard about "women's intution." I have really been focused on fine tuning my own intuition and fighting for clarity and understanding. Why are we so damn hard on ourselves? We have all heard that we are own worst critic, right? If you're female, and you're reading this, you agree with me. You're feeling guilty sitting down, enjoying the guilty pleasure of a little humor. Guilty for not unloading, or even starting that last load of laundry, guilty because you have work to do, a phone call to return, an e mail to write, a child who needs a snack...and the list goes on. What is with all this guilt anyway? Where does it come from? Who gave us all of this? Well sorry chica, this might sting a little but guess what? We do it to ourselves!! We allow others to set our own emotional boundaries and we start to believe the negative scripts in our own head. We start to feel like this is all there is, this is all we are. There are plenty of times in my life when I have thought, well, I'm a single full-figured mom who has some emotional baggage to deal with and a child. e Who the hell would want to be with me. Well guess what? Until I belived I deserved better I wasn't going to find better. As it turns out, a lot of people thought I was amazing too. As much as I believed that I wasn't pretty, smart, or perfect eneough to be worthy of a compatible mate, I was. That has now turned into I AM!!!! You are too. It's true too! You just might not know it yet. Whatever lies you're telling yourself you need to acknowledge---and pronto. So do me a favor will you? One day this week (or the next if you're into procrastination) get up, put on your favorite CD, a pot of coffee and take a long hot shower. Go to your closet and pull out your best outfit, your abosolutely favorite knock-em-dead outfit. If you don't have one it's time to get one. Look to your left, look to your right, scroll through your facebook friends list and find one of those women who you admire and who has great style. Call her up, text her, whatever, and tell her you want to learn to like the person who you see in the mirror. I know sometimes it hurts to be that blatantly honest with yourself and admit that you hate your hair, the bags under your eyes or your body type. Guess what? If she's any kind of a decent friend, she'll be honest with you and admit that she's had those days too. Hey, we are women, and society is fucked up cause we all don't look like we fell out of a Victoria's Secret (or in my case) Layne Bryant catalog. SO WHAT?! Just because you're not Elle Mcpherson on the cover of Sports illustrated does not mean you aren't worthy of a decent, healthy, emotionally available, faithful, attractive mate. * * * * So, there you are in your leopard print dress and a strappy pair of new sandles,red lipstick, hair jacked to Jesus, and flawless smooth skin. Now what? You just have errands to run? The oil needs changed in your car, you have to get some groceries and you have to take all 4 children to the store with you...ya I know what you mean. So much on your plate and not eneough people to delegate too. That's not my point. My point is get your sexy, strong ass out there and hold your head high! That's not all though...I want you to acknowledge people's reactions and how they treat you when you value yourself. You'd be amazed how many men stop and hold the door for you, how many clerks smile or go the extra mile. 'Oh really? That item is no longer on sale?' 'Wait, let me check with the manager, Yes! We will honor that price this week!' Someone who you'd might never expect will stop you, someone who you don't even know, and tell you how nice you look today. It happened to me just today on the way to my counseling appointment. Yeah, I'm in counseling so what? You should get some too. I could spend another post on the benefits of a third party perspective, and I will in the near future. So there I am in a knee length brown skirt, lacy top and leopard print peep toe platforms. A very attractive black man told me: "You look really nice today." What do I say? The hardest thing in the english language for us to say, besides no, I said: "Thank you," and I smiled my winningest smile. Because I have great legs and naturally white teeth that are strait. Those are the things I have learned to love about myself. Yet what do we do as women? We back peddle all the time: Oh well thanks but I haven't showered, I just had a baby and need to lose 400 pounds, I didn't have time to apply my makeup properly, I really need a haircut, I broke 7 nails, and my roots are 6 inches long. STOP!!!! STOP IT RIGHT NOW!!! Or I will come bitch slap you into conciousness and a higher state of self awareness. Just kidding, kind of, but not really. Have you heard the term 'fake it til you make it?' Well you know how I just went off about the lies we tell ourselves and the voices we all have in our heads? I call those voices negative Nancy's. Maybe it's the voice of your mother or your father, the voice of all the ex-bofriends you've had, an ex-husband, a former boss. Whosever voice it is you're used to listening to that's been telling you you're not good eneough, you need to TUNE IT OUT!!!! And start to say "thank you," when people take the time to pay you a compliment. I used to think those people were just being nice or possibly felt bad for me, until I went on a recent shopping trip with my friend. My friend, who shall be called Susan (for all intents and purposes) is blonde-haired, with turquoise blue eyes and lips that even Angelina would kill for. She has flawless skin and a winning personality. Susan is smart. So smart in fact that she recently graduated with her masters in Speech Pathology! A master's degree in and of itself is awesome and worthy of praise. Yet she is a kick ass rock star hero of mine becase she raised 4 children under the age of 12 while she's done the bulk of her schooling. She has maintained a household, ran herself ragged, survived on very little sleep and cried, a lot. Hell no, it hasn't been easy. What it has been, is WORTH IT!!!!! After being divorced for several years she met and married another man with 5 kids and now they have 9!!! So when I start to think my life is bad and that I can't accomplish anything I think of Susan. Balls to the wall-studying her brains out-tryiong to be the best mommy-than wife again-possible. So while I see all these good and wonderful amazing things about Susan, and so does her husband, and children and step children and professors and on and on, she doens't see the same thing. I went with her to help her pick out an outfit for graduation and a few special occasions she has coming up. What does Susan see in the mirror when she tries on dresses? She sees back fat and a tummy roll from carrying 4 children, two of them in fact at once! Ya, did I mention she has twins? Well here I am in the dressing room doing the regular routine of trying to be a good friend and tell her how beautiful she is. But you know what? It's meaningless until she believes it herself. Some psychologists would say that until you love yourself you can't love anyone else. I beg to differ. We are women. We are the first to wake, the last to sleep and we put our kids first. We run ourselves ragged. We overwhelm ourselves because we have to get it all done. And I'm sorry but if you're a single parent working on your Master's degree with 4 small children you're goinna end up eating a lot of take out, and pizza. So WHO CARE'S???? I will tell all of you, and myself, just as I told her, You are NOT ugly just because you don't have a bikini body. Neither did Marilyn Monroe, and men still lust after her. So I am asking you to fake it, just this once, for the greater good. Look in the mirror each morning and start to love yourself. Start to respond positively instead of negatively when people compliment you. I have often said to friends when I pay them a sincere compliment and they start to defame it for whatever reason--"Shut up, you're line is: THANK YOU!" So start each day knowing that you are worth something, because you are worth something better than you think you deserve. Not because you are so many things to so many people but because YOU ARE SOMEONE and YOU ARE BEAUTIFUL, and just a little at a time, I hope you start to believe it.