Sisters, Listen Up!

Dearest Lovely of Lovelies,

Would you like to know how I spend my first few minutes in bed almost each and every night? No, it’s not like that! Get your mind out of the gutter. I spend it fat shaming myself for eating too much or because I didn’t feel motivated to work out-again. I also do it throughout the day. Especially at work because I sit all day and I can feel my stomach rolling over itself or over the top of my pants or my boobs that sag like a basset hounds ears drop down & touch my belly.

Guess what? Even skinny, teeny tiny people have a roll when they fold their bodies in half to sit down. All women with natural boobs of any significance sag with age. Our upper arms get chickeny & flap in the wind like wings, our hips get wide, our butts sag, our face wrinkles, we get facial hair (ps, NOT fair. We have soooo much hair to deal with!!) and frankly, I could go on and on and on.

But this isn’t a lesson on aging.

This is a lesson on love.

I have a friend with an eating disorder. I have friends that get fat shamed. I have friends that get SKINNY shamed (Are you kidding me?? We all want to be skinny! Why are we being such jerks?!?)  I have friends that obsess with working out. I have friends that obsess over the foods they eat. I do not know of one woman on this planet that gets up and loves herself for the beauty that she is in that moment. Instead, we spend our mornings attempting to “perfect” the ugliness before we walk out the door and begin to judge one another on how she looks.

Yesterday I had a conversation with a coworker about her workout routine. She has a baby and a school age son, so rather than sacrifice her time with them, she gets up at 4am & then runs at lunch. She said she views it as something she needs to do for herself. She also told me about an overnight her son had. They had doughnuts for breakfast. Her son ate 3 in one sitting. The friend had one and made fun of her son. Then he came back for another. And another. And another. Totaling 4. She said to him “You made fun of Jason for eating 3 doughnuts. You made him feel bad about himself. But you just ate 4. So I want you to think about that before you say something to someone about what they eat or how much they weigh.” She said the boy’s mom is like that at home.

I have had more conversations about women’s self images lately than I can even begin to count.

See lovelies, our self bullying is not actually only hurting ourselves. Oh, it is. Definitely. But what it is doing is in-breeding a culture of hatred. We see better hair (oh, the dang hair again!) better clothes, better boobs, better butts, better jobs, better cars, better husbands, better kids, bigger houses…everyone is better than us.

We take that self hatred, refuse to see it for what it truly is, and begin to speak negatively about ourselves & others. Our kids see our obsessions, hear our words. ALL OF THEM!! And then we have passed along the curse. So when you comment on the neighbors new car, or her boob job, what are you telling your kids? When you say at the dinner table that you can’t eat dessert because you need to lose 3 pounds-every day, what have they heard?

The culture we have created of needing more stuff, needing to look a certain way, it being the norm that kids are having to be criminally prosecuted for bullying has gotten this way because of us. As much as men may rule the world, women steer it. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that being overweight is healthy and we shouldn’t exercise or eat right. What I’m saying is, eat the piece of cake. You will still be beautiful with chocolate in your teeth and icing on your face. I’m saying the zit on my chin, I’m going to own it. Proudly. Those saggy boobs (Do your boobs hang low, do they wobble to and fro? Can you tie ’em in a knot? Can you tie ’em in a bow?) are two squishy trophies I get to carry through life because dang it, I have made it this far. That roll hanging over my pants today? My potato chip dinner. Know why? Because I’m an adult and some nights that’s all the time I have. Some nights I just want them.

We need to work on loving ourselves where we are in this very instant. So put down the phone. Stop looking at Facebook for subliminal self “improvement” hints, or more appropriately-accusations. Once we are able to stop speaking hate over ourselves and begin to fill our hearts & minds with life & love, our entire outlook will change. We will feel beautiful-because WE ARE! Which will in turn change our household. Our families will be happier, healthier and more content. Bullying in the schools will decrease. Suicides will decline. And the world will become a less ugly world.

We need to be a source of strength and encouragement for one another. Tearing each other down & judging one another is destroying us. We are strong. We are fierce. We are mighty. And sometimes we are mean. No One wins when we throw our self hatred at another woman.

So lovelies, listen up closely.

LOVE THE UGLIES!! LOVE who you are. LOVE the woman next to you. You are BOTH absolutely positively BEAUTIFUL!!! Use your words to speak LOVE only.

And if you can’t-keep that beautiful mouth shut. It’s much prettier closed than it is spewing negativity.

I love you all! Have a LOVEly day!